Valentine's Eve.

They met in the airport, 14.40. at a door with two different meanings. 

 

For her it was opening as she was exiting, for him it was forbidden entering and she wasn’t leaving but arriving. 

 

A bunch of roses he was carrying matched the colour of the top she was wearing, they waved and then held each other. 

 

Hugging. 

 

It had been too long, almost four days. Maybe five. 

 

For him it had seemed like five lifetimes or at least an endless age that had now suddenly ended.

 

And living could once again start.

 

For her it was maybe a continuum of something different, but she said; “I missed you.”

 

So it felt safe, his having missed her too.

 

The house had been a black hole that had sucked him in and spat him out lifeless.

 

Not now.

 

They drove through the coming autumn, under blue skies and then deep into the forest.

 

They ate cake.

 

She sat on the sofa unpicking stitching, he lay on the floor unpicking the tension in his back.

 

They listened to the radio, old school.

 

It brought tears to their eyes.

 

Sadness and happiness.

 

Life.

 

They watched the last episode of a series that had been shelved from before she had left.

 

A circle whole again, they went to bed and slept together.

 

Dreamt together.

 

They woke to the morning, a warm wind from the south.

 

Maybe a desert wind.

 

He went for a walk through the forest.

 

She stretched and exercised.

 

He returned and wrote.

 

Then stretched.

 

Then they walked together over the hill.

 

Gathered fallen apples.

 

Walnuts.

 

Watched a praying mantis moving carefully around their steps.

 

And butterflies that followed them home.

 

One white.

One red.

One yellow.