A dim light kisses her shoulders as I watch her gaze upon the sea of street lights crashing on the other side of the crystal. The world that swims in darkness outside seems so far away. Her bedroom is a different planet. I feel like an explorer on a journey through this unfamiliar place. And now, after traveling on strange lands covered with the dust of her scent, I set up camp in the valley that sleeps at the feet of her bed. I watch her much like a kid would watch the flickering arms of fireworks in the night sky as they desperately try to outshine the cheeks of the moon. Lazy seconds rise up to the ceiling along with the inviting, dancing smoke of her cigarette. She sits like a muse posing for a painter, but there are no colors that capture her distant eyes or the beautiful dark tone under that same ugly light. Her only response are occasional, nervous glances with eyes that refuse to give away anything.

As time tumbles down around us, the small paper roll between her lips continues his short race to meet her mouth, like a lover reaching ever so slowly to kiss her. The blinking of the shy embers at the tip of the cigarette rises and decreases like the tide of a calm sea, or the beating of a dying heart, or the melody of a slow song, or the rocking of her chest as she breathes in colorless air that comes out of her mouth tinted in slithering shades of gray. My muscles feel like the rusty cogs of a long abandoned machine. My mouth is sealed. Fearful that if I make the faintest of noises, the scene that glances over me might break like a mirror dropped to the ground. So I stay still, like a lioness with her eyes fixated on her pray. Letting a word escape now would be like screaming in the middle of the concert of a brilliant pianist. And so I bunker down and wait until the storm of my feelings is over.

The moon leaps slowly across the sky as the cigarette’s life comes to an end. She puts it out with a swift, silky movement of her arm and turns her smooth face to me. There is a fine line of confusion in her eyes, as if she couldn’t understand why I would even want to spend the whole night looking at her. If she only knew.

And then, with sudden force, her face shifts into something that lies between pain and relief. She mutters words so softly. They feel like the memory of a dream long forgotten in the ocean of my mind.

“I don’t think I can do this anymore.”

The moment has passed. The glimpse is over. As I walk away, I glance up one time to see if I can catch a small vision of smoke escaping through her window. I see nothing. I drift away on a red boat that swims on waters of regret, and then I slowly melt into the sea of street lights that keeps on crashing against her crystal.