07 - "I'd go anywhere for you"

I had known Carl for three years when he fell in love with me one July (or whatever it is you do when you're 13). We had spent a lot of time together in and around our summer house, taking long walks, watching the sunset from tall trees and chasing butterflies through flowery fields. He would sit beside me and hold my hand in his and we would talk about nothing and everything, just the two of us.

We went further away from the house than ever before one night, it was late and my skin looked like silver grey velvet in the dark. I only heard his footsteps behind me and the wind in the treetops, we found another house in the middle of the woods and no one seemed to live there. We climbed in through an open window, the old fireplace in the corner was filled with ashes and they were cold and felt like just like sand does long after the sun has set by the ocean.

When I walked away from that house alone I thought I heard butterfly wings strike everywhere around me and it sounded like thunder. I don't remember what I said to Carl the next time I saw him but I remember the smell of the Gauloise haze and his face that looked just like I remembered it even after all those years.