Sleepyhead

As the day breaks, the light through the tinted wall-to-wall panorama window slowly turns blue, colouring the steep hillside, scattered spruce, all covered in heavy snow. And above it the sheer rock of the mountain face. Nora lies on her left, away from the window, her features hidden in the soft shadow, the blonde hair picking up the blue-grey sheen from outside. It’s a picture of such perfect peace and beauty that I feel a sob in my throat.

I fight for control, contain myself. Nora mustn’t realise there is something wrong. Nothing must look out of the ordinary. If she even so much as suspected, what I’m about to do, all my efforts of the last five months would be for nothing. And I certainly won’t let that happen.

With two steps I’m at the bed, looking down on her face. I kneel by her side, my left hand feeling the slight dampness of the sheets, the lingering warmth of our bodies from last night. The noise of my skiing clothes must have woken her, as a faint smile shows on her lips, just visible in the half-light of dawn. I take her right hand lying on the pillow, feeling the pulse of her blood running through her veins. Nora’s smile broadens, her eyes sleepily squinting at me, a soft cosy growl giving away her happiness.

I glance beyond her, across the wide wooden veranda, studying the slopes, the first light of dawn promising a perfect winter day, the air so clear you feel you can reach out and touch the mountains, a chocolate box picture.

‘Aw, come back to bed, please. It’s still so early.’

Her blue eyes look at me from across the valley of content cosiness. The soft shimmer of her peachy skin is alluring, threatening to weaken my resolve. It would be so easy to let myself fall into her comforting arms, enjoying her one last exquisite time. Celebrate our lives, our youth.

It mustn’t be. This is perhaps the worst thing of all, not being able to explain myself. To explain what is necessary, what must be done.

Instead, I smile at her, kiss her soft cheek, taste her on my lips. This will be what I’ll remember of her until my death, a faint intimate taste of vanilla.

While I kiss her I look once more out of the window. Suddenly the mountain view is disturbed by tiny black flecks. The wind must have caught the contents of the ashtray on the table outside, taking the ashes of the three sheets of paper that I’ve burned last evening while Nora was taking a shower. Three sheets of paper that I’ve carried with me for five months; crumpled and with dog ears. I’ve read them so often the folds were already coming apart. But their massage remained, no matter how often I took them from my pocket, read them, refolded them. I’ve taken them everywhere, a reminder of what I had decided to do and why it was necessary.

Yesterday, I’ve burned them.

Today, I won’t need them any longer.

Steeling myself for what I have to do now, I stand up.

‘See you later, sleepyhead.’

Nora blows me a kiss and I turn around, not pausing, endlessly thankful that my voice didn’t betray me as I close the door behind me, going to my last downhill run.