5In My Arms Tonight
The sadness in your eyes nearly killed me. There was a pit where your soul should have been, a yawning chasm where bright flames once lit smoky blue. The emptiness in your face, your voice, stung me more than any rebuke ever could.
You'd given me everything you had. Passed the torch, and I'd let it go out years before, strangled by the bitter solitude of my life. But cold embers could still stir, and stir they did as I watched your every movement.
The lines etched along your face remind me of a world weary traveler, your drooping eyelids of a broken spirit. There's a shake in your hands, and I grab one with my own. Its cold in my grasp. As I raise it to my lips, the calloused skin of your fingers brings a tingle to my spine, same as it did years before.
I see the question in your eyes and answer before you can ask. "Returning the favor."
I'm afraid to squeeze your hand, afraid it will break. It's so thin. Thin and pale, like the rest of you. Hands, skin, hair… all carved from icicles. If I melt them, will anything be left to hold?
Our lips meet, yours dry and cool. Our kiss begins awkwardly, but you fit well in my embrace, like a traveler finally returning from some long journey. If our minds have warred against this, at least our bodies remember, fitting together as they always have.
I don't want this to end. I never have. But wishing alone can't keep you here forever. But as you look at me, eyes flaring to life, I silently pray that this time we'll get the happy ending we deserve, that you deserve.
If this only lasts another night, at least I'll know I've given you something. A place to rest from the cold, somewhere to forget everything that brought you to me in the first place. I've given you hope.