Holiday

"Blanche Dubois always depeneded on the kindness of strangers. Well I guess I have always depended on the kindness of friends", she said, laughing.

Her laughter scared him, in a way that the scars on her thigh did not. "Papa always said I laughed like the devil", she had told him on the first date, but he had found her charming then, the diamonds had glistened against her wrists that fit into the palms of his hands, and then she quoted Shakespeare when he touched her thighs, and he thought, "This is it" in that moment, but time has a habit of shattering like glass, and we are left with the dregs of memories, the sour taste of slightly stale wine slipping down our tongues, the tightening of the larynx as the alcohol sears through our throats - I could never drink wine. I told you that on the first day, but you did not beleive me, until I was curled up on your bathroom floor, and somehow we were both in your bathtub, and I was naked. My head was in your lap, and your hands were combing my hair.

''You always had gentle fingers", she said, "They almost reminded me of a violin, and when you played my back, I felt that we were making music."

He laughed. "God, that might be the corniest thing you have ever said to me."

She laughed to, but now it was different in tone - nervous.

Laughter turns grapes into wine, and wine into vinegar.

They were drunk on the dissapointment that comes with broken love; its shards are so enticing, its scent so pure. You breathe it in like incense, and worship at the Temple of Loneliness, where Preists of Anger burn flowers long into the night, and thighs forget the feel of lover's breaths.

Breathe my child, for when the morning touches her lips to night's chest, there will be no sigh.