"Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass. It's about dancing in the rain."

[dorian-excolo.livejournal.com]

[Saturday, June 19th (Day 384)]
[Early Evening, The Dormouse]

And the day started so well.  

We'd been busy enough to keep the boredom at bay, so that when I took my break for lunch it felt like a proper break, which is always fun.  I made a sandwich, smoked a bit, put aside a few books for Jane to borrow, and things were looking up.  

But then it rained not long after - I moved to the front porch, still just high enough to want to appreciate the cool breeze finally coming through - and things took a turn towards melancholy.

It seems like no time at all, doesn't it?

I manage to occupy myself the rest of the afternoon, nitpicking little things that just make matters worse, before I finally just close the shop and take a shower.  I wash my hair, I dab on a bit of cologne, I take care in choosing my clothes; still, it's not until I'm actually out the door that I let myself realize where I'm going.  And what I'm after.

A man can only put up with this sort of thing for so long.  

I knock on her door.

[Open to Wanda]

"Life is not about waiting for the storm to pass. It's about dancing in the rain."

[dorian-excolo.livejournal.com]

[Saturday, June 19th (Day 384)]
[Early Evening, The Dormouse]

And the day started so well.  

We'd been busy enough to keep the boredom at bay, so that when I took my break for lunch it felt like a proper break, which is always fun.  I made a sandwich, smoked a bit, put aside a few books for Jane to borrow, and things were looking up.  

But then it rained not long after - I moved to the front porch, still just high enough to want to appreciate the cool breeze finally coming through - and things took a turn towards melancholy.

It seems like no time at all, doesn't it?

I manage to occupy myself the rest of the afternoon, nitpicking little things that just make matters worse, before I finally just close the shop and take a shower.  I wash my hair, I dab on a bit of cologne, I take care in choosing my clothes; still, it's not until I'm actually out the door that I let myself realize where I'm going.  And what I'm after.

A man can only put up with this sort of thing for so long.  

I knock on her door.

[Open to Wanda]

Now we are thirty-three

[valmont-vicomte.livejournal.com]

Saturday, June 19th

Today dawns as bright as one could hope for one's birthday, though the air is heavy, but by the afternoon it is raining, sun prisming through water.

It is the first birthday Marie has missed, and the sixteenth. Today I seem to be seeing double, memories of the past splintering as brightly as sunlight gleaming through raindrops. The real past, and the one that never was, both of them pregnant with meaning.

I am thirty-three years old, and last year I drank with my friends and took Kaeli to bed, all laughter and kisses and then lovemaking of surprising intensity, and across the town Kora lay bleeding to death on the floor of the sheriff's office while Hermia held Maryk together. And in another world I celebrated my twenty-first birthday so hard that I vomited in Kaeli's bedroom after she took me home, and fell asleep on her bed fully dressed. In this world, a year ago tomorrow I ran to the sheriff's office to find out what had happened to Kora, and Hermia met my questions with a gentle strength I had not expected, and I think even then I started to fall in love with her, over hot coffee, watching her hands flutter as she grew passionate over philosophy and feeling. And in a world that never was Marie brought me coffee for my hangover, and told me about Kora, who I'd never known, and I cradled the cup in my hands as I sat on the sofa and thought dimly about how fragile bodies seemed, before curling up under a blanket and sleeping the afternoon away.

I am not so very sad; only thoughtful, and not disposed as I was last year to throw a party. Tonight I want my family around me, and that is enough. The man I was a year ago would have been shocked; but the man I was then was on the very cusp of change, and he did not know it. And all things measured, I am, for the most part, glad.

[closed]

Now we are thirty-three

[valmont-vicomte.livejournal.com]

Saturday, June 19th

Today dawns as bright as one could hope for one's birthday, though the air is heavy, but by the afternoon it is raining, sun prisming through water.

It is the first birthday Marie has missed, and the sixteenth. Today I seem to be seeing double, memories of the past splintering as brightly as sunlight gleaming through raindrops. The real past, and the one that never was, both of them pregnant with meaning.

I am thirty-three years old, and last year I drank with my friends and took Kaeli to bed, all laughter and kisses and then lovemaking of surprising intensity, and across the town Kora lay bleeding to death on the floor of the sheriff's office while Hermia held Maryk together. And in another world I celebrated my twenty-first birthday so hard that I vomited in Kaeli's bedroom after she took me home, and fell asleep on her bed fully dressed. In this world, a year ago tomorrow I ran to the sheriff's office to find out what had happened to Kora, and Hermia met my questions with a gentle strength I had not expected, and I think even then I started to fall in love with her, over hot coffee, watching her hands flutter as she grew passionate over philosophy and feeling. And in a world that never was Marie brought me coffee for my hangover, and told me about Kora, who I'd never known, and I cradled the cup in my hands as I sat on the sofa and thought dimly about how fragile bodies seemed, before curling up under a blanket and sleeping the afternoon away.

I am not so very sad; only thoughtful, and not disposed as I was last year to throw a party. Tonight I want my family around me, and that is enough. The man I was a year ago would have been shocked; but the man I was then was on the very cusp of change, and he did not know it. And all things measured, I am, for the most part, glad.

[closed]