The morning frost that permeated the early spring atmosphere, nearly made your veil shimmer as though a thousand delicate diamonds were woven into the very fabric of lace, cascading down your tendrils in an ethereal flow of ivory linen and frozen breath. The season blossomed with the prospect of spring, as the snow had melted from the cobblestone and the soft sounds of nature returned to the countryside. But within the confines of Small Heath, between the smoke stacks and the cold brick and the forever burning stain of coal, winter persisted.
It's presence formidable as it engulfed your each and every breath, with the sharp sting of a cold that nearly met the surface of your bones. Birmingham was left behind in the bitter season of melancholy grey and perpetual frigidness, as if Mother Nature had forgotten all about the civilization down on the rough and solemn streets of Watery and Garrison Lane. Leaving you all to watch the rest of the Earth erupt into budding warmth and shades of new life that erased any trace of the winter's misery.
The sky above you remained grey, an ashen hue enveloping the atmosphere like a single breath of smoke, spread out across the city for miles to come. The sun, having risen at the break of dawn, settled somewhere amidst the abyss of unrelenting grey, without a single hope of shining through the haze. Not even the clouds, that had carried with it last night's heavy rainstorm, were identifiable. The sky was bleak, as though it was the only sight appropriate for the city where God hadn't wished to dip his hands, but there was something about it today, that you found utterly beautiful.
For even as the sun did not shine through the haze, illuminating the cobblestone below in a generous warmth and guiding light, the depressing atmosphere did not open up with the fall of vengeful rain. There was a calm that emanated from the still and silent sky, the blanket of ashen grey quiet and undisturbed, allowing those below a breath not only tainted by the bitter spring cold, but the slightest hint of tranquility.
The night before, the heavens had shaken with the harsh roar of flooding torrents of endless rain, thunder booming throughout the clouds, with the sharp crack of lightening breaking up the darkness of the twilight hour. It pounded the pavement, soaking any poor soul who lingered in the streets to the very bone. Rolling down the old and worn brick siding of your flat, all but concealing your view as it streaked in currents down your windowpane and carried on for the entirety of the night. For just as dusk settled over the city, the thunder rumbled in the distance and approached with the incoming downpour, that washed over the cobblestone just as the lasting evidence of daylight became extinguished from the sky.
But just as dawn arose, after an endless assault of viscous rain that echoed through each and every hour of the night and early morning, the rain subsided.
All that was left behind, were puddles mudding up the streets and the crisp scent that lingered in the first frozen breath you inhaled. It had not been cold enough for the droplets falling from the open heavens to turn to that of flurries and sparkling snowflakes and yet, as you exited your flat that morning, it felt as though the temperatures dropped even further. That if you were to shed a tear, right there on the spot, it would have fallen to the cleansed cobblestone in the delicate flutter of a snowflake. But beside the puddles and the lingering scent of dampness in the air, what remained in the morning after, was the breath of calm that had bewilderingly exhaled over the city.
Your heels had splashed through the unavoidable puddles lining the cracks and crevices of Watery Lane and yet, you hadn't a single care for the droplets that soiled the very tips of your ivory Mary Janes. If it hadn't been so frigid that day, you were convinced the shoes would've more than likely been hanging from your fingertips, as the pads of your toes pattered bare on the cobblestone.
You met him behind the building where your families had gathered, ushering their endless plethora of children and kin out of the doors and back towards home where the real party could begin, their echoing shouts of commotion and laughter drifting all the way to the back alleyway behind the venue. But as you rounded the corner, all noise that punctured the atmosphere ceased to exist, as though it had all but vanished from the world and from your sense of sound.
