The muffled five am world. You are late. They will know you have been out. They may know you have been with me. Do I care? It ruins your world, not mine. And how careful you have been to this point tells me it might have been important to you… the world you don’t want to ruin.
I pull away, leaving clear evidence. If anyone was to do a forensic work up on the scene they would say: two tire tracks in the snow, a person exited the car, stood and shifted weight for a while, paced, then left and the car drove on. The passenger was likely a man due to the size of his shoes.
I look in the rearview mirror. You are almost to the pull-through in the hotel. You have to meet your team in fifteen minutes for coffee and the planinng session which gets the athletes to the hotel on purpose. I know, we agreed. This was a mayfly love affair. Seven days, we agreed. The forensics team could never know we deleted each other’s contact information while you were pacing in the two inches of snow over slick compact white from the night before.
My breath fogs the still frigid interior. My face stings the wet runnels of tears, ugly tears, ugly snorting mucus dripping crying are burning my face in the cold. -12 the mirror says. I look again. You have stopped. I have been rolling so slowly because I can’t see through my tears. You are turning. This is not some fucking movie where everything works out. I touch the brakes; what if it is? What if I turn around and you get in the car and pull me into the arms that still smell like me and we leave, just go, take what’s ours and fuck em all…
Sideways. I’m sliding. You turn fully, or I do, I am, the car is revolving in slow motion. I see your face lighting up. It is real. It is unbreakable I think as my heart hammers hard in my chest, so hard I hear it in my ears. I will get
And then, silent as the snow, there is not the road and you but the sky, I am confused, but still spinning. I am falling. We are falling. I am not moving toward you, though I can see now that you moved toward me, howling as you ran and slid and lights came on.
The forensics team arrived after all. An unfortunate incident you saw from afar. The officer takes your statement as I fade, I was long gone before this anyhow.
I drive down the mountain, as you shove your phone in your pocket and the warm door of the hotel sweeps you inside to shitty coffee, cold eggs, start times, and still, the smell of me.