Walking Home

"Oh night of unending snow, please don't let me fall!" she thought as she made the familiarly long trek from her car parked way down the block to the warm assurance of her Cobalt Blue apartment door.

The magical slowness of crystal falling all about her, prismatically catching the street lamps, made her feel dreamy and restless at the same time. Her mind, the hare, raced over the evening's events- the wine, the opening, the library office, the letter she accidentally saw- all of it. Her body, the tortoise, slowly made deliberate and measured lace of the shimmer below.

This was a feeling she was very used to, having lived here all of her life, but for some reason it always felt unprepared; almost crazy. How can the body, so flexible and supple become a stiff stick figure; toes clenching invisible ground through shoes and eyes divining through the amassed white glitter a methodical path devoid of dreaded black ice? Couldn't she have stored up some of the humid heat from summer? Some of the steadiness of running spring mornings? How could this body with its heavy thoughts feel like it was learning to walk again?

Although...everything in her body did feel light and transcendent for the first time in a long time. Melted almost. His last touch still searing through her yellow sweater; surely her skin was singed beneath its fibers. She would have to check later.

What he said that night would stick with her for years. It would haunt her thoughts and push her onward.

One word...only one word. The simplest answer to her complex question.

"Yes"