Re: [New Year’s Eve: Hannah & Jeremiah]
It came natural to her. The moving, the people, the smiles, the leaning in and leaning close. She knew where to stand, what to do, and she knew how to be. It was ingrained, taught, learned young, but there was a layer atop that, and the layer was her. It was bubbly and bright and bouncing toes, and she wanted to move, to laugh, to twirl and draw attention. She wanted to gleam and glitter and be copper bright in this crowd of perfect petals, and Jeremiah twirled her out, and she thought it a fairy tale. "I wish I could write," she told him. "I would write this all down, and maybe it would all come alive in my head when I read it back again." But she wasn't made for writing or typing or telling. But she would remember. She would remember him, and she would remember the flowers, and she would remember the way the chandelier threw lights all around the room and touched people unbeknownst with glittery fingertips of glow.
She noticed the fall of his gaze when she posed her question, and she was sorry. But he smiled, and he talked, and she let him have the claim that tonight was the best. She knew it wasn't, but that was okay. It was okay to pretend, and tonight was pretending from beginning to end, and she would let him. She would pretend too, and in the morning she would return to her realities, and he would return to his, and maybe someday they'd share them, those realities.
For now, her hand was in his.
"I like that. I like leaving last year behind, and maybe this year will be wonderful. Maybe we'll find things that will really, really make next New Year's Eve the best," she said, fingertips curling against his shoulder, as if she was clinging, as if this floor beneath was water and she might drown without the grip. "Maybe we'll look back, and maybe the year will have been so perfect, and we won't have anything sad or bad to say," she suggested, and she liked the thought of it. She liked it in the same way she liked words on pages in impossible stories. She wanted to believe.
She tipped her head, and she looked at him. Her eyes were clear, clear, like water transparent enough to see all the sea life between surface and sandy bottom. "Tell me about things you've done this year, people you've met. Good people. People you like, and things that might happen in 2019 that will be good," she suggested.