Shards Picked from the Floorboards
by Malina Douglas
(this is part IV. Read
Shards Picked from the Floorboards
from the beginning.)
Molten Gold Memory Poured from the Sky
She didn’t trust him at first. Not till after they had danced and she felt the sway of his hips against hers, when she had pressed her palm to his shoulder blades, felt the movement of the muscles through the dampness of his shirt, when he had murmured words like breadcrumbs over the thud of the bass, led her out of the dark steaming club, and onto a wide, smooth street.
There was something in his eyes that asked her to believe him.
Looking back later, she was not sure why she took the risk but she let him lead her, in steps light and smooth, their conversation nimble, spurred by curiosity as she teased out the facets of this intriguing new man beside her, this Anton, and from beneath the smooth square jaw, strong brow and soft lashes his character emerged, in small gradual portions like a gem shifted towards the light.
She remembered how they spoke, in a late night café of blue glowing lights and vinyl seats, drinking tea spiced with brandy and cupping her mug between two hands as she gazed across the table at him, his blue eyes drawing her inwards like the tug of an undersea current.
She dove.
Into his childhood, seaside trips in the roselight of cherished memory, when his father was still with them. His dreams of sailing brushed aside to study medicine, his fear of heights and love of skiing.
Little synchronicities that fizzled like sparks between them. How he had studied at the same university yet never met her because he finished three years ahead of her. How he’d bought a flat in the neighbourhood she had always dreamed of living in. The name of a film he’d jotted down three weeks ago and not got around to watching, that turned out to be the film that she loved most.
They marvelled over the parallels of their lives, living as if leaving gaps for the other to nestle into.
They talked until she set down her mug, long since empty, set her hands on the table and he took them in his, and she was surprised how warm they were, how soft, and still holding one hand, he led her out of the café, down a lane and up a hill, the hill he had told her about in a voice that transmitted his excitement, and the feeling imbued her body and quickened her stride.
She sat beside him on the hill’s cusp as the dawn bloomed, pale as a fingernail, then flushed as it set the sky alive, leaned into him, his arm around her shoulders pulled her closer and when she turned her head their lips met, as the sun rose and its soft warmth brushed her cheek.
They stayed, till morning light lit up the dirt path beneath them, glistened off the dewdrops that beaded the grass and leant a golden glow to Anton’s skin.
Their surroundings took on a strange, wondrous quality, as if Nadiya had been reborn, and they walked down the hill with their hands interlinked, past pastel buildings and rows of doors sealed, to the entrance of the metro where his fingertips slid from her shoulders like the feathered brush of wings.
Nadiya woke, noticed the chink of light through the curtains, and rolled over. She was alone.
She lingered in memory because that was all she had. A meeting that had blossomed into love, to marriage, to a year that had flitted by in swift, light-filled frames.
Since her parting from Anton, she had met the days weary and sullen, never earlier than nine. Days bloomed into weeks like the mould on the tile of the shower. Tears streaked her face and rimmed her eyes red. Shards of love turned inwards and her body swelled with hurt.
Missiles and gunfire were tearing apart the fabric of her homeland, and Anton was with them. She had a hazy impression of him running while explosions bloomed around him, but did not know the details. It was better, she told herself, not to know. But at times it was worse.
She walked through the city in a haze of memory, a city borrowed and worn for a while that she hoped to soon shrug out of. A city of secondhand history and foundations that rattled like bones, patched with sleek constructions to fill the holes left by buildings destroyed, with a domed church like a frosted cupcake.
Dresden.
A city rebuilt from ashes and thick with ghosts, that drifted after Nadiya and gnawed on her sadness, though she could see only shadows and feel only emptiness.
Nadiya slipped out of bed when the sky was like a dreamer stirred from sleep, the cerulean of Anton’s eyes, lightening by degrees.
She stepped out to streets steeped in silence, wound her way to the edge of the Elbe, sat on a bench and gazed, as a distant sun flooded the bank with golden light and tinged a spread of scalloped clouds peach. As it softened the edges of the buildings on the opposite shore and poured peach light into the mirror of the river.
Nadiya felt something catch within her. She gripped the armrest of the bench as tears streamed from her eyes.
All this time, thought Nadiya, the city had been unfurling its mornings as if waiting for her to see.
She did not know how long she would wait to return to Anton. Only now could she begin to accept it. That she was here. That beyond her stifled longing was a place she could love.
It was an opportune time, when the city was fragile, poised on the cusp of waking, the day was malleable, and only now, when her groggy eyes were impressionable, was the time Dresden’s beauty could touch her most deeply, when a love for her surroundings could be birthed within her heart.
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