Snow Field

Walking through the park in the brisk afternoon, the woman turned to her friend and posed a question.

"When we're dead, will you still be with me? Still at my side?"

The man stiffened out of cold and surprise, checking to see that his overcoat was tightly buttoned. He drew a breath and continued walking, ignoring the stare she had fixed upon him.

"In what way?" He replied, hoping she would solve the riddle on her own, despite knowing the exact answer.

"In the way that, lasts forever and is encompassed by all that poetic bullshit Dickens and Latin writers have gone on about forever. The way that we are, not as living people but as two connecting beings, recognizing the preexisting traits and qualities in the other that we knew to have in ourselves all along; bringing them out. Sharpening them, honing them. Puzzle pieces fitting together. That sort of thing. Not depending on the exterior world as it changes and evolves to a new level of perversion or when my face sags so much that you cannot tell whether I am smiling or otherwise. Poverty or war, oppression, death or global obliteration. Beyond the pretty red heads with nicer ass' that will come out of nowhere and catch your eye. When the last bucket of dirt is poured on either your grave or mine. Will you still be there?"

He stopped and looked at her seriously as she spoke. Her blonde eyebrows jerked around excitedly as they often did from beneath a wool cap. She had clearly thought about this for some time.

Silence enveloped the two as they stood looking at each other, she searched his eyes for the answer and he stood with a dazed unfocused sort of look.

For such a cunning linguist, the words failed to solidify.

He continued walking and she shuffled along next to him, glancing over at him every so often quizzically as a light snow began to tumble silently to earth around them, making the scene all that more serene.

A lone bench sat next to a tired looking old street light.

A ragged old looking wreath hung from it's lamp, moved slightly in the breeze.

They seated themselves on it closely together to stay warm.

She was watching a pigeon shake off the snow nearby when he spoke and she jolted.

"Absolutely. You answered yourself, at least, in part."

He paused and lit a cigar, inhaling deeply; wrapping an arm around her.

"It's like I've always wanted to be right there next to you, I just couldn't get close enough and I didn't want to part; ever. I felt like the only way to do that was to somehow graft myself on like a third hand or voodoo myself in as a conscience, so I could see you come up with these amazing thoughts that you have, these mind blowing ideas. To actually see you paint them as elegantly as you do on the canvas."

He coughed.

"Then I realized......that I am already there, right there. And so are you.

You are a piece of me and I of you. A major part of the machine, whether we like it or not. I didn't come this far just to give up. Ever. I couldn't anyway. You're too important; even in the beginning."

He brushed the snow off her hat before ashing the cigar.

"And wherever we go in life, however far or however much things change, you'll always be in the back of my mind.

We are but a handful of dust, each grain a year of our lives.

No, not of our lives, but of our youth.

To which we forget. And yet, only remember as the best.

To the very contradictory paradox of death.

And when we forget ourselves, and meld to another.

The precise moment of contact and bond, to where we realize the other is there.

Not because we have to be, but by the very essence of free will.

Such a thing that can only flow and survive in such an environment.

Like the energy in every corner of the universe.

Neither created nor destroyed.

Things will sag and stop working, the world will change but we will always still be who we are."

He paused to take another draw and she stared, mouth slightly open. He loved her perfect teeth.

"I'd take a breath now, if I were you." He smiled.

She gasped and grinned back.

"You've been thinking about this."

He laughed.

"I'd say you have been too. Did I answer it?"

She smiled.

"Better than anyone else could sir."

They sat in silence for a moment. The snow continued to fall at a steady pace and he routinely brushed off a layer of snow from the both of them.

No sounds were heard, no people passed.

"So where do you want to go from here?" She asked, checking her blackberry.

He considered it.

"Nowhere. I've got all I need, right here." He said, leaning in for a kiss. She smiled as his lips enveloped hers and shuddered slightly. She felt his love.

"Merry christmas." She said breathlessly, staring into his steel gray eyes.

"Merry christmas." He replied, looking into her deep blue ones.

And there they remained, watching the snow fall.