A/N: written for the Oscar Wilde Challenge! Enjoy :)

Clare (a few years after Henry's death)

Henry. Why? Why .. how.. wh..? The light in my life has been all but extinguished. All I have left is Alba, memories and a touch of hope, a hope which is slowly disappearing. When will you come? I'm still waiting love, always.

So why do roses represent love when they end up dying? They are just one of the many reminders that taunt me with what has been lost in my life. Why do bad things happen to those we love? More importantly, how do we survive without their presence?

. . .

I never understood what my grandmother went through after my grandfather's death. The full extent that I understood of it was that she would be alone, in a big empty house. The part I didn't include in this calculation was the emptiness that was consuming her heart. She was being swallowed up by the unbearable silence surrounding her in that once cheerful mansion. How did she stand to live there anymore? Since she didn't spend too much time there before she came to live with my family and I, there wasn't as much for her to suffer. Being with the family kept her preoccupied, distracted from her reality. If only I could find my own escape.

. . .

Illusions have clouded my vision. My imagination would get the best of me while I stared out the window watching the sunset, day dreaming my so called existence away.

Tap.tap.tap. I would hear things now. Nobody was here except for me. Alba was out doing school work at the library. Not only did my eyes deceive me by letting me see nothing more but memories but now my hearing was leaving me. I thought I heard something .. nearby. Maybe the angel of deliverance had come to take me away, or possibly the angel of death… come to finally take my breath away.

The Book of Life begins with a man and a woman in a garden. It ends with Revelations.

. . .

I eventually turned and faced my fate, head on or whatever it was that had come to seek me out. What I saw was not what I had expected.

Henry.

He had been the same as I had remembered him.

My Henry.

Here.

Now.

Was this the end for me?

. . .

He began to trace paths on my face, my arms, my skin. He wanted to ask questions about my here and now but yet feared my answer all the same. The feel of his face in my hands was indescribable. My hands began to touch every part of his face, his arms, his hair, committing it to memory. It was as if I had finally awoken from an eternal slumber. My prince had come to finally rescue me.

Our lips barely touched, yet moved instantly in sync. His stubble tickled my lips making me smile against it. The memories I had had of doing this had all soon been forgotten as they did him no justice. The real thing was filled with so much emotion and longing that it made the kiss that much sweeter. He hushed an "I will always love you" in between our kiss. I managed to whisper "I've missed you and have always loved you" before everything turned dark.

. . .