I watch her redress herself in the candlelight. Her skin radiated off heat from its creamy tone. She looked beautiful then. It is a beautiful sight I wish I can hold on to forever. But she will be leaving me soon and I will have no recollections of her sight in this moment. I will forget her soon and she will continue on searching for me repeating the phrase that bonds us together: Eyes of a blue dog.
"I don't want to leave," she says, her eyes filling up with tears. And I don't want to leave her either, but it is something we have learned cannot be changed. "I love being with you," she says as she lay back down on the bed. I tell her the same and join her on the bed. She is topless still, but she doesn't care. She looks at me, losing herself in my eyes as I do the same in hers. I dread the moment I am ripped from her and we are parted for some time. We can never tell how long, as it always changes. But I cherish those few moments when we reunite. The same phrase always accompanies these meetings: Eyes of a blue dog.
Our relationship has been like this for as long as I have known her. It is not our destiny, to be together, she has told me once before. She was trying to help herself not feel so poorly when we parted at the time. I didn't take what she said personally. I knew it was her feelings speaking, not her. She is crying now, with tears streaming down her cheeks. I have never seen anything so beautiful as the siren sitting before me, right here, right now. My heart breaks every time I think of not being able to remember her soft touch or not being able to see her face when I close my eyes. I long to here the words that bring my memories back: Eyes of a blue dog.
"Sometimes I feel invincible," she tells me, not moving her eyes from me. "I feel like I can do anything. I feel like I can travel and see you. But I don't feel that right now. I feel cold." She is unlike me. She does not have the limited memory that I have been dawned with. Hers, I fear, is more painful. She is burdened with the memories of our pleasantries together. She is reminded always of me. I am amazed by her strength. I am amazed she has the courage to continue searching for me, without giving up hope or me. She says she misses me terribly during our time apart. I apologize to her, sincerely. She says she goes everywhere repeating those words to bring me back to her: Eyes of a blue dog.
"People call me crazy," she says finally tearing her eyes away from me. I now can clearly see just how much pain she feels. "They think I am mad, as I am always whispering those words to whomever I meet or whomever I see." She tells me of instances where she has asked waiters and janitors those words. She tells me of times where she has not been able to stop her hand from writing those words on a napkin or on her bathroom mirror. "It begins to take hold of me and possesses me. I find myself writing it everywhere, unable to stop myself." She tells me of one instance where she scrawled the words on the clean tiles of a supermarket with her red lipstick. The manager came out and yelled at her to clean it. Although all it took was a flick of her wand, she said she still felt extremely embarrassed but never regretted it. She said it was magical to see them in such large size and clarity. She thought I would come to her after seeing them. Them meaning those words: Eyes of a blue dog.
She once told me she had tried to develop a way to find me. She is a very talented witch, as a matter of fact. But still she could find nothing to explain our unexpected meanings, as well as the fact that I could not remember a single thread of our time together until we actually were together. And she could still not explain why those words enchanted us so. Being the hopeless romantic I am, I suggested to her that they were some sort of a call signal. That maybe one day she would tell me them and I would be flooded of all these memories and we would eventually find each other and be reunited for the last time by those fateful words: Eyes of a blue dog.
Yet we would never be together. She had a husband at home, one she didn't love, but needed to survive in her normal life. I knew no one was waiting for me at home. Obviously there could never be the person I wanted to be waiting for me. I told her that, for me, love was hard to come by. She smiled and nodded, like she knew some secret I didn't. She mentions her husband often, which stimulates an unwritten anger inside of me. I can't help it. She senses it and apologizes. I know I am wrong, that I shouldn't feel angry about it for I do not remember her for more than a mere ten percent of my lifespan. She has never shown any sign of her feelings to this. She understands and accepts the consequences we carry with our love. But I still cannot. I find myself during the day thinking I should be remembering something, some important phrase of words that I have heard so many times before: Eyes of a blue dog.
It is when I finally hear those words that I melt inside. It is like some pressure has been lifted off of me and I have been relieved of it. Those words have only come by me a handful of times. It is the second time I hear that is fateful. She hasn't said them yet, but I feel it is coming. I feel the words longing to be spilled from her lips. She has that sad look in her eyes again. I know this look. The end is near but and I grab her hoping she can push it away. I tell her I don't want to leave her and that I want to stay with her. But this will do no good. She is slipping away from me, but I hold onto her tighter. "Stop," she is saying as she shakes her head. "I will see you soon," she says. I shake my head and tell her no. I squeeze her, but I am losing her faster now. She puts a hand on my cheek as she is fading away into the night. Finally I am dawned with the phrase that exhilarates and haunts me at the same time. She says it slowly and sultry making it linger in my ear for moments after she has gone. "Eyes of a blue dog."
With that I open my eyes to the sound of my alarm clock on the bedside table. It is 6:00 am, time to go to work. I feel strange, like I do some mornings. I had a dream, which I can't remember. This is nothing new, as it happens quite frequently. I pull off the covers and roll out of bed. I sit for a moment and feel like I am missing something important. I shake my head and stand up to take a shower before I head out the door. Days pass and I feel lonely. Finally it is Friday. Another week has gone by with countless hours of meaningless thoughts and mindless chatter with people I have no interest in. Something is missing in my life, I realize, but I cannot decide what it is. I return home after a long day at the office. The house is quiet and dark. There is a napkin on my dresser with something scribbled upon it. I pick it up and look closely. It is a short phrase that begins with an 'E' but I cannot decipher the rest of the line. I stare at it, for a few moments longer, until I can read what it says: Eyes of a blue dog.
A/N: This story is my take on Gabriel Garcia Marquez's short story "Eyes of a Blue Dog." Sorry if its kind of confusing, but that's just how it goes.