It was a bitter cold evening but it was from more than just the arctic winds typical for the area at that the time of the year. The cold was amplified by solitude caused by the separation from loved ones. Sure it would end. Sure there was the excitement of a new future when we were all reunited. But right now, at this time, that all seemed like such an artificial hope, so distant, almost unreal. Tonight, now, there was no warmth to be taken from that hope. There was only the cold.
My feeble attempts at warmth were not working. The fire in the fireplace met the need for external warmth, but it failed miserably at creating inner warmth, an atmosphere. It failed as a substitute for another time. I was still cold inside. I missed my wife. Sure, I missed her touch, her loving, but there was more. I missed her smile, her beauty, her wit, her laugh, and even her tears.
Just as my remorse began to digress to self-pity, that horrible apartment buzzer in this poor excuse for a temporary home broke the silence. A visitor? Here? Certainly not. Surely it must be a total stranger looking for another apartment. My button must have been pressed accidentally.
With zero expectation, I opened the door. The light directly overhead was out so my intruder was just a silhouette formed by the lights from behind. A magical corona surrounded the person before me. The swirling frozen vapors escaping from other apartment vents made the total effect even more surreal and mystical. The visitor stood in a hooded coat that went from head to ankle. I knew it was woman. Her ankles blended into beautifully feminine feet that disappeared into mild lavender shoes with pronounced heels. "Steam" left the darkness of the hood signaling steady, confident breathing at a rate more controlled and more assured than my own.
"Well, aren't you going to invite me in?" stated the figure in mock annoyance.
My breathing stopped all together. My mouth fell open and I was dumb struck! Could it be! Could it actually be HER! Was it at all possible that the person who held my love more totally and completely than I could ever consciously surrender was actually standing before me! IT WAS! My feeble brain finally snapped to the image of those ankles. It recognized that voice and even clicked with delightful remembrance of the scent of her breath. As I was about to speak, my memory further confirmed the identification by recognizing the very faint hints of that familiar perfume.
I could only muster incomplete stutterings such as, "Sure... uh... How... Where... uh... How long..."
"Shhhhh", was her confident interruption as she walked by me and into the room. "There will be plenty time for that. There will be plenty of time for conversation", she said as the fur-lined hood of her coat slipped down behind her head.
She stood close to the fire that lit her from the side. Her golden hair came alive in the firelight. Her eyes sparkled like crystal blue precious stones and her lips silently called to me with their deep full red color. Unlike earlier, I now praised the weather for adding to her beauty with the blush of the outside air on her cheeks. She was more beautiful than I could ever imagine.
Continuing her thought, she whispered, "I did not come here to talk."
In one smooth motion, the coat fell away from her as if simultaneously pulled by invisible strings from all directions. All I could do was repeat that same stupid stammering reaction that I had at the door.
Before me stood the vision of my wife. Her hair shown in the firelight and tickled her shoulders. Her lips bore a mischievous and confident smile. She wore only a heart-stopping teddy that was the identical soft lavender of her shoes. The thin lace-edged straps went straight down from her shoulders, widening as they went but with an obvious disregard for modesty. It was only after they reached to just above her navel that they finally met to create the body of the seductive garment. The resulting gap teasingly exposed and highlighted the wonderful roundness of her breasts without the ultimate in revelation. The laced sides of this perfect silk man-killing weapon ran high over her hips, leaving the thinnest of "Vs" covering the alluring union of her magnificent legs. I felt very silly in my green plaid "lounging" pants and a T-shirt.
"Well, aren't you glad to see me?", she asked, swaying slightly from side to side. I continued my moronic stare. If she had just waited a moment before posing that question, it would have become highly rhetorical. The answer was already developing and would soon be obvious to us both.
She stopped her swaying and held her arms out to me. Without a sound, she mouthed the words, "hold me" but they reached me by screaming directly into my brain. I moved to her and wrapped my arms around her. With each tightening of my embrace she surrendered in a swoon of equal amounts. I whispered my love for her as my nostrils filled with her scent, so strong in her hair and delicately laced with perfume. Her body increasingly pressed into mine as I held her closer, her form becoming more evident to me. She was beautiful and I loved her so much.