Dreaming of Spring

We managed to fit a whole year into a day. Spring sat nicely between eight o'clock and breakfast time, gently shaking off winter's frost and teasing the sun from the horizon. With the sheets still possessively wrapped around us, we crawled out of bed and looked out the window. April had painted itself across the morning sky with strokes of green, and we wandered downstairs with light footsteps.

In a breath of rain and flower-scented breezes, early summer tipped its hat at noon. Our fingers sticky with maple syrup, we groped hopefully at the memories of cherry pancakes and orange juice. A summer storm brewed past one 'clock, drenching us as the clouds fell from the sky with a soft moan of pleasure, quickly becoming a roar on the windowpanes.

The rest of the afternoon was hot and sticky. We lived in a world of lemonade and cherry stems, twisting our lips into crazy contortions as we attempted to tie knots with our teeth. Laughing out loud when we finally succeeded.

The hands on the clock inched past August, and the grass was dewy against our bare feet, welcoming a touch of moisture after the long afternoon. It was a summer of butterflies and wildflowers; we found an earthworm under a maple tree and spent September and most of October watching it happily burrow in the musty leaves. A ladybug took the time to walk across our toes, and we smiled when we caught a caterpillar looking at its own reflection in a pool of raindrops. It posed and preened until the water eventually slipped from its leaf and fell to the earth like a spoonful of tears. A chilly gust then hurried us inside, politely reminding us of the coming cold.

The evening darkened. Flames licked their way across the newspaper and damp firewood, sending shadows across the twilight-painted walls of the living room. Autumn leaves pressed their orange and red ears to the windows, listening to our whispers and the crackle of the growing fire. The clock on the mantle-piece told us that November was almost over and it would soon be time for bed. But with the room growing darker – and our cocoon under the quilt growing warmer – our eyes gently closed against the world and we remained on the couch, wrapped around each other, listening to our heartbeats gently slowing to match the flicker of the fire.

But time would not wait, and we soon found the fire turning to embers and our mugs of hot chocolate becoming cold. Snow flurries became more insistent and clung to the windowsills as a delicate gust of winter carried us up the stairs. Stars sifted from our hair and lay strewn across the moonlit carpet. We gently picked them up one by one and placed them on the windowsill where they glimmered and twinkled like crystals. A soft sigh escaped our lips when a December chill slipped past the door and nestled under the covers. Lifting back the sheets, we swept it back into the hallway where it sulked in the corner, bemoaning the fact that it was almost January.

The bed was toasty when we climbed in, wrapping our arms around ourselves against the icy storm that blistered the trees with frost. Our bodies slid together as our heads slipped onto the pillow and our lips touched ever so slightly. The house settled around us, candles puffing out in wisps of blue smoke that drifted to the ceiling to hang in the rafters. Eleven o'clock became a sleepy sort of February as our breathing steadied and our thoughts drifted away, tangled limbs safe under the covers.

The end of the day finally here, we spent the whole night in each other's arms…

…And dreamed of spring.