Status: Developing. There may be more shorts, there may not.

Love

To shreds, you say?

A spiral of disarray and self-loathing as the steam hits his face, he turns to look at her and realizes slowly there is nothing to be done.

He is in a place so far from her mind, an echo of something that was once a blooming forest of beautiful colourful gemstone flowers they danced in. There was beauty all around, and a full celebration of life was bestowed upon the happy two.

He is looking to solve the problem, while she sits and is stewing in the problem, knowing it is there, looming like an axe murderer. The cocoa is warm still, the mug hot to the touch. The drizzle adds to the gloom, but keeps her mood in check, for she likes the rain. It's little melody, drumming on the glass, whispering a song of other days when happiness engulfed the two and love poured out of their souls and into the air, infecting everything with happiness only love can bring about.

And now the shreds of a priceless mind fluttered down to the dusty floor. Scraps of poetry, a note to tell him how much she loved him, the images of the beautiful forest, the moment their minds caressed each other for the first time in the sand, oh the lovely sand! How it shined and glittered with the love of a million people and a million animals. The joy it brought to all.

He looked at the time and realized the last hour hadn't passed for him. He looked at the steam, and it appeared a ghostly statue. And he looked at her, at her face, frozen with the tears and the lips locked on his name. He knew as much as her still face did. He smiled, tears distorting his vision. He kissed her forehead, and wished her the life she needed with her crushed dreams and dead soul, knowing she wouldn't be far behind.

The memory of the unspoken care, the wish and need to protect, help, and guide the souls they shared, cradled in each other's arms, kissing and loving and crying for the joy of knowing one another - this was his thought as a blood vessel in his brain enjoyed its own obstruction by a clot.

He stood there and bathed in his love for her, no time passing for him as he died.