For Emma, Forever Ago

Night had closed around the small house completely, folding its black velvet wings around the glass windows and sitting heavily on the flickering lights. It was dim, but still bright enough for them to make out every shape in the room; to study each others faces with restless hands and still eyes. The young woman sat with her legs curled up below her, resting back against the cushions of the couch. Her large, coffee-colored eyes blinked once, slowly, in the dimness. The man sat on the other end of the couch, close enough that their knees almost touched, with his legs kicked out in front of him and resting on the wooden floor. He had lain his jacket by the door, and she could now study him more closely.

When he had disappeared, he had been a boy of eighteen. All rangy limbs and soft-hewed features. He had been beautiful, then. Youthful and full of innocence, with a smile as wide as his face and eyes that could put the clearest day the sea has seen to shame. Boyish, with long arms and legs, but a way of moving that promised strength as he aged. Now, that aging had come to pass. At twenty-two, he shouldn't have looked so old - but he did. He was still the boy she knew in many ways, but in others he had changed. Those ocean-blue eyes were now the color of sapphire; a blue so deep they occasionally flashed grey-streaked black when the light left them. His face was harsher, made older by the scruffy beard and tiny scars. One of them laced the left side of his nose, just beside the corner of his eye. Another cut across the right side of his jaw, almost invisible through the brown-blonde hair. They seemed inconsequential, now, but the young woman still flinched slightly as she drew her eyes across them. His body, however, had done everything which had been promised and more. Those long arms had filled with thick muscle, sinewy and visible even through the fabric of his shirt. His long legs were powerful, as though made for travelling. He had a sturdy chest, tapering slightly toward the hips, thick through the waist. He looked like pictures she had seen of Greek warriors.

He looks like a soldier. She didn't know why that thought hurt her chest so much, but it did.

Raising one hand, the man raked his long fingers through his tangle of blonde hair and pushed it back over his forehead. He looked ... tired, she thought. Bone weary in a way that only suffering can make you. But when his eyes met hers, that tiny spark of blue electricity jumped through their surface, they seemed to come to life. That gave her hope. When the man smiled, she didn't even realize she was smiling back. Deep creases appeared at the corners of his blue eyes, and his lips curved upward in that familiar smile. It rang through-and-through of childhood.

They both held a cup of tea in their hands, the steamy mist curling from the surface of the green liquid and evaporating into the air. She ran her thumb up and down the curved handle of the porcelain cup, mindlessly. His own hands were still against the cup.

"So," she whispered, for no reason other than to break the silence. It was a comfortable noiselessness, but she wished to speak to this man. This man who she had thought of as a corpse for the last three years. This man who had been her three seconds from sundown. "What was the war like?"

He chuckled. His broad shoulders shook slightly, and then rolled backward in relaxation as he settled more deeply into the couch cushions. Those midnight eyes blinked once, and his smile wavered slightly.

"Well..." he began, and then raised a hand off of his teacup to cover a yawn. "Excuse me. Well, the war was hell."

"Tell me about it." the words came out as more of a request - a childish plea - than a statement.

His smile disappeared, and he ran one large hand across his jawline. His thumb paused at the scar, sitting on it for that brief second of hesitation she had come to know so well, and then continued to his chin. His words, when they came, were hesitant and thoughtful. But as he spoke, his voice grew stronger.

"I'm ... not sure that I can." he admitted. His eyes found hers in the half-light. "It was like ... a violation of everything you've ever been taught. Every principle ... science .... humanity ... sanity ... intelligence ... decency. They were just, gone. I saw men die, M. I saw men go to worse places, too. I saw men run into gunfire for the most petty things ... bracelets ... a picture. I saw men give into their most selfish and wretched desires. It was like ... the world was still there, but I couldn't see it quite right. Like I was looking at it through this broken mirror. It just became this ... kaleidoscope of mud and bullets and blood. It was ... well, it was like hell."

They sat and stared at one another for a long time, after that. In the other room the clock ticked mournfully. The silence stretched on.

"I'm so sorry." she said sudden, her voice a whisper. "I shouldn't have asked."

Instead of replying, he reached out and lay his hand across the top of hers, giving it a small squeeze. When he spoke, it was a complete change of direction.

"So, what have you been doing since I've ... been gone?"

She hesitated, and then smiled. It was a soft smile, a feather curve of her pink lips. "I've been reading, I suppose. I work during the week. In town, at the school." she said the final word slightly sheepishly. "I teach English."

"You became a teacher?" the man's voice came out as a throaty laugh, happy and incredulous. "You were the terror of that school!"

She nodded, her own smile widening slightly. "Yeah. Go figure, right. I read a lot. I drink a lot of tea. Still have the old cow pasture, but the grape vineyard has rather fallen apart."

"All you need is a couple of cats, and you can die happy." he winked, grinning in the echo of his laughter. "Still watching the sun rise?"

Her smile faded slightly, and she shook her head.

"Not since you left."

His own smile disappeared, and something appeared in his eyes. It was a strange glitter; not menacing, but deep. It was resolute and forceful. "Tomorrow morning." he whispered the words like a question.

She nodded. The movement was barely a turn of her chin toward her chest, but it brought the smile leaping back to the man's lips.

"Now," he yawned again, too slow to stifle it this time with his hand, "if you don't mind, may I ..."

"Of course!" she exclaimed, leaning down to put her tea on the ground and climbing to her feet, "Come on, I'll show you to your room."

"Emma," his deep whisper was stained in amusement, "it's me. Even after three years, I know where my room is."

"Oh." she murmured, her voice small. But when her eyes met his, there was a light in them that could almost match his own; sweeter, though. More meaningful. "Iver, it's me. I wasn't taking you to your room."

"Oh." he returned, and then smiled subtly. "Lead on."