The house sat at the end of the street, the Sun setting in shades of pink and lavender behind it. It used to have pots of newly planted daisies on the porch, and the lights worked months ago, now the pots are smashed and the lights have burned out.
The house that once held a deep sense of home, love and joy is now a place marked with loss, misery and loneliness to Daryl. The place he used to share with you is coldly abandoned.
But in the first time in weeks, Daryl finds himself trudging slowly up those wooden porch steps. And opening the door ever so gently, almost afraid of what lies in the other side.
But what he's met with isn't something scary, in fact it's the exact opposite.
He's met with the soft home like feeling you'd created in the small Alexandrian house, something simple but comforting.
Stepping into the living room, lemon and lavender engulfs him, reminding him of how it used to always smell when you sat beside him. The lavender from your skin, and the lemon from the cleaning spray.
The small cream love seat couch sits up against the far wall, facing the window and record player on the bookshelf. Something you were very adamant about having.
Sitting down on the smooth leather, Daryl leans back into it. Closing his eyes he takes in the feeling overwhelming him, a peacefulness mixed with faint pain beating in his chest.
A soft giggle makes his eyes shoot open, and with a single beam of light shinning in through the window he sees a figure he knows. A figure swaying to a low hum of a record playing, a figure dressed in denim shorts and one of his long flannel shirts that falls half way down her thighs. Her hair tossed up in a messy curly ponytail, and her bare feet padding on the hard wood floor as she dances.
It's you.
Daryl's mouth goes dry and he swears his heart stops, you're dead he knows this... But you're here and before him now.
Turning around with a warm grin spreading across your lips, you bounce playfully to the rhythm speading up on the record. What he sees next makes him feel as though he'll faint. He sees himself, dressed in the usual linens he wears but this time with a soft smile playing at his lips.
There are no words, no voices to be heard except from those of the singer on the track. But there is no need for words; this moment... Daryl's lived it before.
Months ago, the last spring you were alive, this moment happened. He remembers because you beamed with a joy he'd never seen before until that time, and he remembers it as the only time he's ever danced.
Grasping your hand in his he twirls you into his arms, and Daryl lets out a soft sigh. Everything he's seeing he's feeling as well. The feelings relived but bolder and more intense.
Tears sting Daryl's eyes as he watches the scene play out, when suddenly the music falls silent. The beam of light fades and the two figures are left in shadows. In the silence and the darkening room, Daryl hears your voice and he's amazed by the beauty your voice used to hold.
"My two left feet." You whisper lovingly into his ear, and Daryl recognizes it as the same thing you told him right when you two finished dancing that day.
This all is like reliving, rewatching a perfect movie scene... Except it truly happened. Reliving a perfect memory. A perfect day.
Daryl is left in the dark silence, heavy tears pooling in his eyes. The vision of you and him so long ago it feels, was much too short. He wants just one more second with you, to keep the picture of you forever stitched in his mind. To never fade.
