“I know it was them,” said one woman to another as they disembarked for an afternoon of shopping in Hamilton. “I mean, sure, he had gained weight, and her hair was graying, but they still looked so happy.”
“You know,” said the other woman. “I’m certain when the waiter brought their drinks, he called her Mrs. Montague.”
“And last night? At dinner? He said something about the light coming from the kitchen and then called her the sun. The sun! Isn’t that the most romantic thing you’ve ever heard?”
She awoke to find herself living inside a snow globe, her house encased in a bubble of clear, impenetrable ice. She had gone to bed knowing the world needed to be shaken up a little, but never imagined just how beautiful it would be when it actually happened.
“I am my own white knight,” she said.
She picked up her skirts and strode away from him, her glass slippers clicking along the sidewalk.
Behind her, the mice took one look at him and decided loyalties. They picked up the pumpkin with their tiny paws and carried it after her, toward happily ever after.
The store swam about her, the mist of perfume, the waves of shoppers through the aisles, the pearls at the jewelry counter. She had come with a list, but it slipped from her hand like a shell falling back to the ocean floor.
On a nearby shelf loaded with crystal, a music box played, tinkling like a boardwalk midway somewhere down the beach. She gasped a bit, wishing she could catch her breath in the riptide of the season.
Around her, the apartment building echoed with the lives of the other dwellers. She heard footsteps and laughter, the clatter of a dish hitting the floor, a door slamming. The radiator jangled for a second, then sighed.
Late in the night, she smelled mushrooms, sautéing somewhere in butter and red wine. She breathed deeply, the scent so earthy it was as if she could sift the other occupant through her fingers.
Her arms widened like a mouth, her eyes as round as a trout’s. He wanted to go there, but feared what she might ask later.
Instead, he went somewhere to find himself a slice of pie, a slice that would never talk back, that would stick around for a known quantity of time, provide only the most expected amount of sweetness and softness before disappearing.
“I want to run along with you,” he said. He was just lacing up his shoes, and her hand was on the doorknob.
She looked down at him, felt the ready-buzz in her muscles. “Why don’t you just wait here until I get back,” she said, and she exited, her legs carrying her into the pink of the morning.
100 Proof 