7A/N: This is a bit of an artsy, poetic piece. Not very much like normal prose, really. If you're majorly confused, say so in a review, and I'll attempt to clear things up. And as a head's up, I use the ( ) to identify more direct communication (so, like the narrator is "talking", so to speak, but not out loud). And if you're still confused, again, I'll explain in a review reply if need be. Otherwise, appreciate the poetry of it! Ha ha. Read, enjoy, and review!
Too Cold for March
Time is passing.
Sliding away.
It's cold here, on the bench. The sky is gray again, almost as gray as yesterday but there's a touch more of white in it, a streak here and there.
(But of course you already knew that. You've been out here all day. I wonder how many birds have flown overhead since I've been here last. I suppose you would know that, too.)
Waiting.
The grass seems freshly mowed. I don't think it's grown much since yesterday, but then again, I don't think it was very high yesterday, either. It's too early in spring to be mowing already. The trees are still bare. And it's too cold for March. It's just too cold.
(Aren't you cold? Out here all the time with no coat. Honestly.)
I glance down at my watch. Sometimes I wish it weren't digital. It seems so harsh that way, so bleak. A nice analog one with a round face and smooth, sweeping motions is much more poetic. The little hands moving round and round. Never stopping until they do.
(Sometimes I believe that if I ripped them off, time would stop and I could freeze in this moment forever. And sometimes I believe that if I spun them backwards, time would reverse and all that has passed would not pass and I would not be here and neither would you.)
But there are just numerals, the seconds flashing steadily as they melt away into the past. It's not so different from the present, except that it's gone and I can't get it back.
12:47 p.m. Twelve hours and forty-seven minutes post-meridian.
I don't think I understand yet. Otherwise I wouldn't be sitting here, waiting for you to return. I know you won't, yet I sit and wait and expect. But I suppose you aren't that far away. Quite near, compared to other people.
(We're the only ones here, after all. Alone and together.)
I like the trees here. They're big and quiet and I bet they cast marvelous shadows in the sun. It hasn't been sunny yet. The sky's always gray, it seems. Perhaps out of reverence. Perhaps not. Then again, I don't think the reason why really matters. It just is.
(And you just are.)
I shiver in my coat, hands deep in the pockets. The breeze is toying with my hair again. The grass beneath my feet is cropped short and rather stiff, the edges curling over your stone, claiming you as theirs. I guess that's right.
(You never were mine. I wish you could have been, even now, for the briefest of moments when I can hear your laugh ringing out and see your smile so clearly. But then it fades again as it always does, and I merely sit here and try not to think too much.)
"It's too cold for March," I whisper to the empty air.
You don't question. You understand. It is far too cold.
Time is a hollow word. It deserted us long before it deserted you. The minute has faded into the past and now I can't sit here any longer.
(I want to rip them free, but I let them be. It was yours, anyway. Not mine to keep, even though you can't want it back.)
I stand up from the bench and walk away, the grass crumpling beneath my feet. I left your watch on the stone, beside the engraving of your name. The battery is dead: the hour hand close to the one, minute hand between the nine and the ten. It stopped that day. It knew there was no point in continuing.
"I'll be back again, same time tomorrow."
(Now you'll be able to tell. Hope I won't be late, except I'm always here. At twelve forty-seven.)
And it's just too cold for March.