Love Letters

By chopin

&

A gust of wind.

He stepped into the room.

It was a rather drafty room, and no wonder—the windows were ajar, the white curtains billowing in like ghostly strands of hair.

It was a small room; nothing one would brag about.

In the middle, there was a small piano and beneath it there was a rug.

A coffee table next to the kitchen.

Scattered sheets of blank paper.

Shaking his head, the door slammed, and the man was gone.

&

He lit the cigarette, but didn't put it in his mouth.

The day was so cloudy; rightfully so, in fact. The lady in front of him looked at him beneath hooded lids as she counted her money.

This man. This man had on a black suit. This man had expensive black shoes to match.

This man had a secret to uncover.

Her blue eyes blazed, and she wrapped her coat around her fragile body tighter, noticing the small lines of worry and stress that tugged at his gray eyes.

The gray-eyed man took a long drag, before setting his cigarette in the ash tray.

" Thanks." He said curtly, placing his hat on his head.

" Look again, child." His eyes diverted to the small woman, a frown crossing his pale face.

" Pardon me?" He asked incredulously. But the lady only smiled.

" Look at me, boy, and tell me what you see." She instructed.

He shook his head, more so to himself, wondering if she was insane.

" Miss—"

" What do you see?" She repeated. Stubborn as a mule, he noted. Taking his hat off, he ran his hand through his hair, looking at her with squinted eyes.

" A persistent old lady with a ridiculous coat wrapped around her. She's poor, and owns a store. She just sold me a cigarette—and will now leave me alone." But at his rude remark, her odd smile only grew.

" Ah, you naïve thing. You looked at me and told me I was a two dimensional character who held no secrets, no life story, and no purpose." Her voice dropped to a mere whisper. " But let me tell you, things are never what they seem at first sight. Things that cannot be seen with your two eyes are still there, none the less."

" And you would be surprised to learn that once upon a time, I was not useless old hag, but a great musician who performed small violin pieces to select places. No, I was not famous, but I considered my life a life of glamour. And then, not so long ago, but long enough so that the hairs on my head were not yet gray, I tried my luck as a psychic, and there, I found another gift."

" It may be nothing extraordinary, for it was mere empathy, but child, I did have a purpose, telling people what was troubling them, for their mind denied what was quite obvious."

The man's eyes turned dark as he stared at the old woman suspiciously.

" So, what's your point?" He asked, almost breathlessly. He could not deny that her tale was somewhat entrancing. She sighed, clapping her hand over his.

" You are on a mission. To discover for yourself what you have also been denying. To discover for yourself what you can, if you wish, call a well-hidden secret."

" Go. Go back, take another look, and ask yourself what you see."

And there was that crooked grin. The crooked grin that told him that she knew many things he didn't, and oh, it was infuriating.

But she refused to say any more, and he was forced to go away, for she was attending to another customer.

" Go back, take another look, and ask yourself what you see."

He looked up at the darkening sky.

But there were no answers.

&

No, it had not been one of his better ideas. He was an obsessive little fellow, and once his mind was set on something, he simply couldn't let go of the idea, much less completely forget about it.

The same room again.

Except this time.

It was getting dark, and the last of the sun's rays floated in through the still open window.

The light reflected upon the piano's surface, and on the key's he saw the finger marks.

And the rug beneath the piano. All the same.

But no. No, it wasn't. Because the rug had a pattern, an intricate pattern, like most rugs did.

And on the rug were distinct colors of dark red.

And he imagined her laying there, beneath the piano, gun sprawled out next to her.

His breathing grew more frantic, and he straightened up, trying to shake the images away from his mind.

But he couldn't.

And the coffee table. The paper, the notes, and the coffee stains upon them.

The floorboards creaked as he strode over to examine them, and he also noticed the pen that lay next to the notes, and the flower vase that stood in the middle.

So she had been a writer. Messages were scrawled upon the creamy surface, and the handwriting was messy and hurried.

Once upon a time there was a boy and a girl…

He hated me. He always will…

Does he love me?

Forget him…

…and they lived happily ever after.

Love.

I want him to love me.

I want to die.

Draco Malfoy.

He dropped the notes.

In horror.

In realization.

In memory.

He remembered how it all started, he remembered the first and only time he kissed her, he remembered noticing the looks she sent him; first the looks of hatred, then disgust, then uncertainty, and then pure, unadulterated love that was all his and he remembered how he had laughed because she was in his trap, because

She was so pathetic.

And he remembered her telling him that she wrote poems about him all the time, and how she could play the piano for him, because she could play very well…

It's your fault.

He watched as her writings, her confessions, floated down to the ground, just like she had ended up.

His mind was now a whirlpool of things that didn't quite make sense, hundreds of pieces of a puzzle that wasn't quite put together yet.

The lady, the notes, the piano, the rug, her

He stood there, and let himself feel the regret, at least this once.

But there wasn't much to think or say.

Because things like this seemed to be ineffable.

And there was absolute silence as he grasped the fallen scraps of paper in his hands, as he sat down on the bench of the piano.

Silence.

He looked out the window, the brilliant shades of orange and red nearly blinding him, and as the cool wind blew in his face.

And sitting there, wondering—

Tears escaped from his eyes.

-fin-