It was incredible; Like the world was brighter, eyes saw with greater clarity, everything more colourful and vibrant. He remembered the moment it happened, could never forget it so etched into his being it was; Carved like two names in a tree surrounded by a heart. It was in that moment he had felt complete, that the pieces of him made sense, or didn't have to; They were the same pieces just in place...They had found their opposite, landed perfectly despite their jagged and frayed edges, and he felt whole, connected...A puzzle solved. im src
He couldn't remember himself without her so inexorably entwined they'd become; It was curious, inexplicable really, but he didn't mind. They had just fallen into each other and ceased to be individuals; The jumble of irregular shapes that were him didn't mean much without her, made no sense. They just were and so making sense of them held no importance. They'd found each other and that's what mattered. In a moment his life had changed and the thought of it brought a smile to his face, even now, when in this moment a smile seemed out of place.
The darkness pressed in on him though...A familiar feeling felt many times before her.
Shades of grey drained the colour, vibrancy stolen as his chest constricted, an invisible weight crushing the air from his lungs and the life from his heart. There was just enough of him left to wonder if he would ever take a full breath again, or just shallow gasps that barely sustained him and, not for the first time in life, he wanted to be gone.
Hair blew across her face caressed by the light breeze. It carried the scent of spring flowers, grass and petrichor left by the early morning shower. Puffy white clouds scudded across an azure sky, birds sang and the creek babbled it's way over and around the rocks in counterpoint...But his eyes were downcast everything else all but forgotten.
He sat, back to a tree on the bank. Two sets of boots sat discarded nearby and the remnants of a picnic lay scattered and forgotten. She lay, head in his lap, body curled up as she slept. She said she just wanted to lay there for a while with him but had soon fallen asleep and he was content to cradle her, feel her closeness and watch her sleep.
He'd told her he was in love with her that day and the remembered thought made him smile. He thought of the words he'd said; We're like two separate jigsaw puzzles, all the pieces there but incomplete. I feel like the pieces of us have been thrown together and when we landed they all fell perfectly into place - Two now one.
She smiled and they'd kissed...As always it felt like the first time, and it lingered.
Someone touched his arm and the vision faded despite his efforts to hold it; As he came back to the room the smile at the memory of that moment departed...All those years ago, almost too many to count, and that kiss still touched him deeply, that moment by the creek they had reenacted so many times.
It's time, a soft and respectful voice reached him.
He looked up, eyes glazed, thoughts still under that tree next to that creek, and nodded once. He stood, straightened his tie then buttoned his jacket but his legs didn't seem to work anymore and he sat again, almost slumping. He couldn't...He didn't know how. There was something wrong with him. All strength, all reason was gone. He felt different, not completely himself, not anything, as he sat trying to breathe.
That day at the creek returned, the memory...Every memory he had had since the moment he'd met her seemed to come to him at once; A jumble of moments, a kaleidoscope of colour, the pieces of their lives rushed and whirled around him and she was there...
It was then he knew he would never be complete again. He knew a piece of his jigsaw was missing and he'd never be in place again and that his pieces no longer had meaning.
He sat surrounded by the memories of a lifetime spent with his beloved knowing that it was impossible to determine where he ended and she began; It was impossible to piece himself together - That together would never happen again.
It was then he remembered something she always said; I love you today, tomorrow and always, until the end of time. It had always made him smile, made him fall in love all over.
Until the end of time.
He liked that part and he smiled at the thought of her saying it; How her eyes seemed to light up, look through him and see so clearly.
He looked up, a room full of people watching him patient and respectful, and with the vision of her eyes upon him in his mind he nodded once again - Time to move he thought.
As he made his way forward he felt the pieces of himself breaking away, coming apart; Tattered, frayed parts of him fell away until he was just a jumble of broken pieces. An old man, alone and wanting, needing, nothing more than to be wherever she was; To be whole.
[End]
Today's track: Jigsaw heart
Design and create your ideal life, don't live it by default - Tomorrow isn't promised so be humble and kind
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