Awakening

I woke up in that room in the basement of a dilapidated house, in a town from which
most of my memories have faded away over the years.
The room was shrouded in darkness, but from the end of the corridor a tiny spot of
bland light lit the mattresses on the floor where I lay. Between some cushions and a
blanket I caught sight of that blue shirt and all the other abandoned clothes you had
worn. I didn’t move and listened into the dark, but there was nothing - only a dull noise
in my head. This kind of loneliness and the absence of everything you were made up of,
hit me, crawled through my skin, and let me lucidly feel the pain of losing you.
Just hours, days or years ago we fled together from all that was outside, from all that
could restrain us from being with each other, from everyone who might have even dared
to leer at us. We found shelter and everything else that was needed for love, to love, here
in the cellar.
I stumbled a bit when I stood up, and went towards where the pale light came from in
order to seek you. I climbed the cellar steps and left the house entering the world out
there, where a gloomy morning was rising.
It took me a while to orient myself since nothing reminded me of the town I used to
know. Now, all was gone: the streets, houses and people. I was surrounded by an
entirely flat landscape without any plants or trees; the ground covered with dust. I
descried an infinite cliff in the distance. Its edge abruptly divided the landscape into the
level I was walking on and a wider plain far beneath, which spread out to the sunless
horizon.
I squinted and perceived dozens of tall birdlike creatures circling with wide spread
wings above the edge of the cliff. When I came closer to it, I saw a frame separating from
the dust; it was you, standing at the edge. And although your back was turned to me, I
instantly recognized you. At that very moment I wanted to call your name, to reach out
my hand and touch the bare skin on your shoulder, but in the next second I realised that
you were clinging to one of the birdlike creatures, which was nearly as tall as you. You
held her tightly; your body against her wing covered back, your arms wrapped around
her, squeezing the feathers of the wings slightly, your cheek to her cheek. I tried to
gather my thoughts and to grasp what kind of being you were holding in your arms: a
beautiful, winged woman. Her plumage was grey, fluffy and shielding like an innocent
cygnet feathering. It smelled powdery and a bit oily. She had her eyes closed.
“I can’t let her go,” you whispered to me, “just look how perfect she is” you sighed, and
your breath lifted a lightsome feather from the plumage.
Seeing you like this, listening to you like this, hurt. I was not able to move or even
breathe. I could only stand it and watch the scene, frightened.
You swayed her gently to and fro while she subtly moved closer to the edge. Then, in a
careless moment you loosened your grip and she freed herself from your embrace,
opened her eyes and flung herself over the edge, headfirst down to the ground where
she was going to get inevitably smashed. But at the very last moment she spread her
wings and caught a thermal updraft that made her glide marvellously heavenwards.
Once there, she got smaller and smaller, until she became one with all the other circling
beings in the cloudless distance.
“Indeed, absolutely perfect” I heard myself saying, as I had re-found my voice. I looked
back to you. You are gone. Leaving me behind at the edge of the abyss.