A/N: This is the Prelude, a side story of sorts, to a new work that's coming up soon that is regrettably still untitled, but definitely in the works. The first chapter will be posted in the near future, by the end of the year...
...which is not really very far away. (frowns)
nevertheless, enjoy this little prelude.
Prelude
It was another ordinary day for Esther, really. All she was doing was strolling near the lake, enjoying the sunlight of the afternoon sun, when she spotted two new people entering the park.
She stopped beside the lake and leaned heavily on her cane, absently massaging her left foot as she observed the way the sunlight played on the hair on the newcomers. Her eye caught the ebony black shade of one of the newcomers, and the blindingly blond colour of the other's.
When she caught the eye of the black-haired man, she retuned the tentative smile he offered to her and observed with some amusement when the blond-haired man raised a questioning brow at his companion and threw an unfriendly stare towards her.
She decided that it didn't matter if that man had nice hair. His manners were horrendous.
However, Esther was an artist, and artists do not complain about how prissy their painting subjects were. They just shut up and paint.
Straightening up from her crouched position and reaching for her bag, she hobbled to the nearest bench and shifted till she found the perfect backdrop as to which she could paint her subjects on. Hand poised above the plain white canvas settled on her lap, she wondered if the men would be able to hear if she mentally willed them to move to that bench just over there.
She watched from the corner of her eye as the black-haired man frowned disapprovingly at the blond-haired man who was talking with rapid hand gestures. Black-haired man muttered something that Esther couldn't hear, but watched with amusement at the reaction of the blond-haired man.
With a glare of contempt at Black-haired man, Blond-haired man sat down heavily on the bench and was followed by Black-haired man.
It was perfect.
Esther grinned and her hands started skimming across the canvas, tracing the outlines of the couple in front of her. She captured the way the light played on their hair, the way it accentuated the sharp points of Blond-haired man's face. She traced the rough angles of Black-haired man's features and the glint of irritation in his eyes from before.
A shout of laughter took her away from her sketching and she looked up frowning, searching for the source of her distraction.
It was as if she were watching a scene from a movie as she watched in fascination when both Black-haired and Blond-haired man both laughed with mirth dancing in their eyes and delight lighting up their faces. She saw the irritation in Black-haired man turn to amusement, and Blond-haired man's arrogant oblivion to Black-haired man's irritation transform into a pleased expression. Esther thought that it was beautifully endearing, the way that the two men were looking at each other.
She smiled, took out another canvas and started sketching all over again.
It was only a week and four days later that she managed to catch Black-haired man and Blond-haired man at the lake again. This time though, they weren't scowling at each other, not laughing each other.
It was a different kind of expression on each of their faces. Blond-haired man's face held an irritation that was not different from the one he wore when Esther first saw him. However, this irritation held a certain emotion that she could only describe as frustration.
What really made her uncomfortable was the thought that Black-haired man's face held a certain expression that could be described as resignation. A horrible type of resignation that one harboured when everything else had been tried and there was just no way out of the situation he was in.
It was the same expression Howard had worn when Doctors told him, her beloved husband, that he was 5 hours away from an unavoidable death.
They had told her, "We did the best we could, I'm sorry."
She hated the feeling of helplessness that engulfed her when they told her that Howard was dying. She didn't want to let go, wanted to tell the doctors that they were mistaken, that there had got to be another way and they were just not trying hard enough to look for it.
And when Howard had told her that it was really okay, she thought damn it, it was not just okay. She was losing the person she loved in a matter of 5 hours, and she could do nothing except sit by his bedside and watch stoically as the seconds passed by in rhythm with the beep of Howard's heart rate monitor.
She thought she could recognize Blond-haired man's frustration, maybe because she had experienced it herself.
As she took out her canvas and started sketching again, she captured the desperation, fear, anger, resignation.
She captured the fear behind Blond-haired man's eyes, if nothing else, the fear of losing a loved one. The fear that cried out: Don't leave me here alone. Don't leave me when I need you the most. Don't leave me.
I love you
When she set her pencil down and looked up, she wasn't surprised to find her vision blurred with tears.
She wasn't surprised 2 weeks later to see that the Blond-haired man had come to the park alone without Black-haired man. She saw the grief, the helpless grief that crippled people.
She sat at her bench and watched as Blond-haired walked past the bench that Esther always drew them from. She saw the struggle that passed in fleeting on his face, and watched him sit gingerly on the bench, refusing to look at it.
Blond-haired stared out at the lake above his clasped hands, absently biting on his thumbnail.
Esther watched with undisguised curiosity as Blond-haired man took out a note pad and scribbled furiously on it, biting his lips in concentration or to keep his tears at bay, she didn't know.
Blond-haired man stared at the note for a minute, sighed and placed it beside him on the seat.
He stood up and walked away.
Esther walked to the bench and picked up the note, watching as Blond-haired man walked away from the lake.
H,
You said that you 'Understood' when I told you not to do it. What I should have known was that you were going to fucking do it anyway.
I'll miss you like crazy, you prat.
I love you.
D.
Esther didn't understand a word of the note, but she folded it up and placed it in her pocket. Just in case.
Just in case that Black-haired man comes back to read this note.
Till then, I'll keep this for safekeeping.
She never saw Black-haired man nor Blond-haired man at the lake again.
To be continued...