The air smelled of apples and fresh cut grass. Our foreheads were touching and your breath danced on my face like summer breeze. Your fingers travelled in all directions while I tried to tame the words that threaten to escape my mouth before sounding pretty and perfect. I felt like a moth trapped in a lampshade.

‘I love you’, I said and met your eyes, a ‘but’ at the tip of my tongue.

You stopped the word with your lips. ‘I don’t want to hear the but’, you whispered in your ragged shallow voice that echoed through every cell of my body. You kissed me again before I had a chance to reply. All those elegantly arranged words in my mind began to untangle into letters and the letters transformed into fluttering wings of butterflies. I tried to catch them. I did. But they were dancing in no order, creating colourful chaos and they were mesmerising. After a while I stopped trying. I just watched and enjoyed their show, the ‘but’ lost in a swarm of butterflies.

I cannot change the facts. You are there and I am here. As actors have their lines and scenes, we had ours and with humble obedience we read the script that had already been written. We didn’t want to ruin the play with our improvisation. The fleeting moments when our eyes were drawn together by magnetic force – those were just that – moments, butterflies in summer. It’s funny how I can’t quite say what colour your eyes were. They were calm and deep like a mountain lake and  I could amost smell the kindness of the trees while I was looking into them. There was a hidden world guarded by the gates of our lashes and we were silently reading stories to each other.

Would it have been different if we had met in a place where our roles were not predetermined, dictated by the situation and enforced upon us before we even entered the stage? I can change the settings but I cannot change the facts. You are there and I am here. Though, perhaps we would unbind the ropes of our lines, defy the restrictions of our roles, and allow our eyes to free their secret stories. They would talk about gentle touches, hugs that would warm me better than a fluffy blanket, a kiss tasting of sweet honey that would leave our lips burning for more. Maybe I would move into the world behind your eyes.

I think your eyes were blue and grey and little green too, like a storm that is painting day skies few shades darker, with raindrops crouching in the cluster of heavy clouds. Yes, that was the colour of your eyes. My skies love rain. When I look up, I will meet your gaze as the clouds start to cry. And I will cry too.