Spring

Lily watches breathlessly as a spray of white swirls upward in a loose spiral, water flipped carelessly to the sky by a shining silver tail. At this time of year, the tail most probably belongs to a bold (obnoxious, irritating) merman putting on a display to impress a potential mate. Part of her wants to follow, to find out how the merman's story ends, but the lake is much too cold in the springtime for swimming; she doesn't need to touch it to know.

Still, she wonders whether, if she did dive beneath the surface, if the chill would pass through her, exhilarating and clean, washing away her stagnation and directionless desire.

It is only a fantasy, however, and she knows that an ill-advised swim certainly isn't going to give her any answers. The urge passes easily, come and gone and forgotten all at once, never more than a half-thought and even that is gone by the time a fine iridescent mist is all that remains of the disturbance. The tiny droplets hover in the air, sparkling delicately, fragile in the dim light of the crescent moon before they too settle.

The lake becomes calm once more, its depth hidden behind the shine of reflected stars, but she does not see them.

A long time ago she'd been told all the fairy tales, in which women were the seers and the weavers and the goddesses and she wonders what happened to that power. She feels that ancient magic everywhere, the invisible touch of spirit on skin. It is sense and mystery and magic. It is ritual, like fixing her hair or darkening her eyelashes. None of it is for the outside, not really, but because it evokes something that whispers to the soul in symbols and archetypes.

The water is before her and the moonlight above, and in the quiet still space of this night she can hear her own shaking breath, even though the forest is alive with its own song, so very close.

A stag, proud and regal, emerges from the wood. He looks directly at her and freezes, perhaps catching her scent, and his strong legs flex as though preparing to run.

She holds out her hand to his beauty. Instead of fleeing, the noble creature slowly approaches to lie beside her, tame to her hand. She is somehow almost not surprised when his graceful form falls away to reveal the boy, skittish and wild. It hits her, suddenly, that everyone believes she is his birthright, but they have it backwards.

It is James, and he is hers.

"Lily," he says, "please."

"Yes," she answers and knows that because she is finally true to herself, she is whole.