Bones

Once upon a time, there was none, for to bones time is only a memory. Bones notice neither hours nor days, sun nor rain. They exist in tribute to what was. With enough time, even memory fades, and bones become dust once more.

But not yet.

This pile of bones was not yet so old or forgotten, lying in the shade of the evergreen tree. It still had songs etched in its radius, spirals spinning in its spine. These bones had danced not long ago, had held lovers and children, had grown thick and then wispy. Until they grew nothing at all, but melted away to this tangle of twigs that had once been life.

Memory is a funny thing. What stays with us is not our reality, not the cold hard facts of a lifetime, but a memory. A story in your head with good and evil, truth and lies, and a symphony of deep emotion. For you, the story may be dark and tragic, a wayward journey to a broken heart. And for another, it is a tale of light, of brave warriors leading the charge towards love and joy.

This story is one of those.

The bones, of course, knew only sadness, being bones. They could not hold the joy. They had not the blood or the flesh that it takes to carry love to the heart, and indeed, there was no heart for it to travel to. Each bone lived disconnected from its fellows, and whatever kindness fell upon one quickly rolled off. Too late, they thought to themselves. Too late for me to feel.

For him, though, it was never too late.

He came to visit the bones each day. He sat with them, and told them stories. He sang them songs, and told them jokes. Each morning he left a gift on the bones: roses, chocolates, sips of coffee. Sometimes a beautiful pebble, or a feather. Sometimes a poem, or a letter. And each night, he pressed a kiss to the bones as the moon rose over their white nest on the ground.

At first the coffee ran straight to the ground, and the chocolate melted in the sun. The roses wilted. But the words…the words always seemed to stay. Soon they had filled up the whole ribcage. They lined the long legs, creating secret spaces where the petals swept in. Sepia stains marked the paper where sweetness has dripped upon them. The wrists filled out, and the fingers grasped at the letters they could not read. Kisses fell on the cheeks beside feathers, and pebbles circles the sockets of the eyes until they swam with shades of green and grey.

When the bones were so full they bulged, he sat there for a day. Memories tumbled from his lips, stories of laughter and song, silliness and stillness. When the sun grew golden in the sky, he slowed his speech, and placed his hand over the ribs. He spoke words of admiration, the beauty of their life, and the beauty of her death. The power they had once commanded over his heart. As the last rays of daylight flashed on the bones, he kissed them gently, and turned to go.

And then he heard the breath.

Lying white and whole in the moonbeams was his love. She lay as though she had only slept these many months, breathing sweetly and deeply. As he knelt beside her and caressed her skin, he saw silvery words etched on her thighs, and her ribs, and her wrists. Words he himself had written, now indelibly scripted on her body. She smelled of roses. He kissed her chocolate lips, and watched her eyelids flutter to reveal not the blue eyes of her past, but a tumbled mosaic of grey and green.

He picked her up, and carried her home, speaking love to her with every step.