Ass(ets)

free speech

Their days began to stretch out in the languid and hazy ways that only the summer months can bring.

The calendar may have been winter turning to spring, but Ella and Noah held on tight to that feeling of summer.

For in the beginning everything is simple. The budding flowers of a relationship hold so much potential. They signify the endless possibilities of what can be. And in the summer, as each bud blooms vividly, we see the beauty in each other.

One evening Noah, with an arm slung around Ella's waist, delighted at the night that was to follow. They were eager. They were hungry as if for life itself.

They saw friends.

They drank.

They danced.

And once this was all over they strolled hand in hand down winding streets.

There's a certain look to a person in the late hours. Those hours that belong utterly to the night, but are truly the morning. You revel in the disheveled state you find yourself in, because you know of the moments and events that have taken you this far into the night. You know of the joys of tonight you have experienced, and so they linger.

They linger in the slight ruffles to once sleek hair.

They are seen in a single and almost imperceptible crease to a dress.

They live on in the once perfectly applied lipstick now ever so slightly smudged.

And they remain forever in the eyes which are as wide as wide can be.

Noah does not need to tell her she is beautiful. Indeed, in this moment Ella doubts she looks beautiful. Not the beauty her mother craves in elegance and poise. But there is a beauty within herself right now. It is not a superficial glaze. Her beauty is in the chaotic tumble of living and breathing life that seeps from her. Noah thinks this is wonderful and so he says so.

"You don't see it do you?" Ella tilts her head.

Noah jokingly inclines his head in an exaggerated manner. "What should I be seeing?"

"This mess. Everything is a perfect mess. You. Me. James. Everyone. Isn't that funny?"

"Does that matter to you?" Noah asks surprised.

They pause in movement as they reach her door. They pause in conversation as Ella reaches for the right words.

"I'm not sure. Sometimes. How can everything be... as wonderful as you said... when we're all lying to each other constantly."

With that said Ella slides the key into her lock and the conversation is forgotten.

But as the evenings spent together roll into one in their minds, the afterthoughts of their conversation linger.