“Funny thing about waiting,” he said. “It ceases to be a way to pass time and becomes time itself.”

“Waiting is time?” she asked.

“Why else would we have watches? Calendars? Days, months, years? If we never had to wait, we would never need to count the space between where we are and what we want.”

The trees were bare and there was a chill in the air. His words reminded her that there was still a space between the present and spring.

“I can see you counting now,” he said. “You know how many days lie until spring, but you have no idea how many are left before your spring.”

She didn’t try to deny his words. Experience and seasons had taught her to listen. Everyone could be a teacher.

“We’re all searching for that spring, that moment when we realize our purpose and potential.”

She listened, and words that once entranced her fell into a jumble of letters. She watched his lips move, heard his voice, felt the air move, could even smell the mint and Campari on his breath… but his words were scattered.

When his mouth opened, she saw the well within – the one he tried to fill with the sound of his own voice. His words faded like a wish into the darkness.

In his eyes, she saw a mirror – a reflection, but not her own. His eyes, like his words and his voice, gave her what he thought she wanted.

She watched his mouth and could almost see the hand within. His face stretched as knuckles cracked and fingers probed. Still he prattled. Still the silence brimmed with sound. Still he stuttered and jilted like a marionette.

She inhaled, breathed in all of the lies and the truth and space between each. His mouth moved – she saw her own hand behind his words; saw her fingerprints behind his eyes.

“Stop,” she said. His last words hung, then fell. They both listened to the sound fall and fade.

“Don’t,” he said at last.

“Sometimes,” she said.

Silence leapt to claim itself. Two hearts beat in the emptiness and she spoke before the rhythm of hers stole his once again.

“Sometimes, we carry on. We hurt ourselves. Every day. Because we don’t want to hurt those around us.”

His mouth hung open. She could almost see her fingers, inside his skull, holding his lips apart.

“Sometimes… we keep going, until the pain of continuing outweighs the pain of stopping. I can’t keep going,” she said.

His mouth closed.

The silence was greedy, and stole even her pulse. She counted; one, two, three, four… on the fifth, she heard the hard snap of scissors. She felt the first string sever and fall loose to the floor. A part of her fell with it, but another part of her sang.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I was never yours, and you were never mine.” The scissors snapped with every word. She saw him wilt, saw clarity seep into his eyes.

“I can’t keep going.” Snip.

“I love you,” he said. His own words sounded foreign, but she could still hear her touch.

“I don’t love you,” she said. The final strings snapped; the backlash brought tears to her eyes and opened a rift in her chest.

His eyes were clear, like the pools she remembered.

Before she could fall again, she built a bridge with all that was left.

“Goodbye,” she said.