Marlene McKinnon stands there, crushed between Dedalus and Frank, hoping that Fabian Prewett would just take the damn photograph already so they all could scatter around the room and she could breathe again without having someone's elbow pressing against her ribs.
She really doesn't know why the photograph is taken today of all the days. It's a normal day, not different from any others. Yesterday would have been quite as good as this one. But of course, like the little, tired voice in her head reminds her, it's better today. Tomorrow they all might as well be dead.
Fabian asks them to move closer to each other and Marlene sighs before squeezing herself more tightly between the two men. Fabian is a nice fellow, and like everyone else in that room, Marlene likes him. That is probably why he is the one taking the photograph – no one grumbles or wouldn't even think of hexing him, no matter how tiny ball he wants them to curl to, and when they raise their glasses, they do it for Fabian, not for the camera.
"Now, SMILE!"
Marlene holds her glass tightly and doesn't really smile, just arranges her lips to a position she used to have on her face.
Who knows, today might be her last chance.
That night she looks out of the window to the dark alley. The house is quiet and the floor is cold, and so are her feet (there must be some mean elf or spirit living with her and always stealing her woollen socks), but she ignores it and takes the cup of tea from the table.
She has lit a candle and stops now to look at its flame. It lives, sometimes stretching towards roof, sometimes shrinking to so little and pathetic, almost dying, but rising again – it flickers but still exists.
It's cold and dark and the world is a great mess of words and wars and deadly silences, but she forgets all of it while she holds her hand close to the flame, feeling the heat. For the first time in two years she can believe that maybe some part of her will be alive even when all this is over.
It's a tiny spark of hope on a night when the clouds are grey and heavy from the soon falling rain, but even the tiniest sparkle can make the difference.
Marlene doesn't blow the candle out.