He can still see her, on his better days. When he resurfaces from the Alzheimer's caused mist stifling his mind for a fleeting moment, his eyes recall her beauty, her face glowing with love and happiness.
He can hear her laughter, trailing softly behind her, as she runs along the medieval Charles Bridge in Kafka's Prague, under the two rows of statues, fifteen on each side, looking too heavy for the age-old bridge.
He can recall her, as she lets go of his hand and runs into the crowd, her voice barely audible above the noisy Vltava lapping at the arches of the bridge, consuming it slowly but inexorably, like the disease devouring his sanity.
He can hear her calling, "What is that?" even as he sees her coquelicot dress being swallowed by the horde of tourists hungry for sights and adventures, as she skips under The Lamentation of Christ, Saint Joseph, Saint Ludmila... then kneels at the foot of one of the statues, he does not remember which, caressing the lucky dog, its bronze body rendered golden by the touch of an infinity of hoping hands, belonging to people believing in miracles...
It failed to bring luck to them, that's what he thinks. The trip to Prague was the last one they took together.
He does not understand how lucky he is not to remember how she was consumed by the awful disease in the months following that trip. How fortunate he is, that in his mind she is only lost in some kafkaesque version of Prague, the ancient city she loved so much, walking a few steps ahead of him, within his reach but unreachable, leading him along empty, cobbled, winding roads and crooked lanes lined with mute doors and blind windows, disappearing around the corners, leaving him with an echo of her laughter, and a glimpse of red-- the hem of her dress...
She never leaves him, has not left him once in all those years, but she never pauses either. However, he can see that lately she's been slowing down, giving him time to catch up with her.
He knows that once they will reach the seemingly unreachable castle he sees perched on top of the steep hill towering above the city, dwarfing the rest of the word into insignificance as the time flows by, she will be awaiting him by the gate. They will walk beneath its stone vault together, cross over into a better place, a realm made of unending dreams, where nothing will separate them anymore.
It will not be long now...
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