Running through the forest her breath came fast and shallow in almost gulps. The sounds of the earth crunching beneath her were thwarted by her suppressed laughter. He was on her tail and she needed to be as soundless as possible. She fought the urge to smile because it would only make her wish to laugh more, and she was not giving up so easily. The race was on, and she was not getting caught behind.

The forest was teeming with life, though there was not time to sit and admire any of it. The animals stopped and watched the pair as they pursued their destination together, one right behind the other in a dance of sort. The light shining from the treetops tinted green from the livelihood of the leaves, and the wind blew them softly together making a soft song through the air as the couple pressed on cheerfully.

Quickly she burst through the bushes into the glowing field of wild grass and flower. It was a calming but playful atmosphere covered in the warm glow of the setting sun. Her feet hastily took her to the middle of the clearing, just before the hill but this time with more of a skip to her step then a hurried run. Her eyes gazed around as she searched, knowing exactly whom she was searching for.

Only moments later did he press through the bushes not far off from where she had, and stared straight towards her. A look of tenderness and love formed itself on his face and he moved towards her. It was a luminous feeling that overtook her as his arms clasped around her and effortlessly picked her up as if a feather. The simplistic soundtrack of warm childish laughter filled the air with a warm iridescence.

Slowly he looked down at her as she leaned her head back onto his shoulder. It fit perfectly. Swaying slowly to and fro the couple danced cheerfully. She could feel the warmth of his smile as he leaned his cheek against hers, and he could feel how comfortable she was being so close to him. The pair was not a pair, but one. One single soul trapped in two separate bodies that refused to stay separated.

Their mood changed from an intimate one to something much more playful. Spinning around in playful circles at arms distance the two laughed. They cared not about becoming dizzy but of the fact their movements could not separate them, no matter how much gravity and force wanted. The two came to a stop, catching their breath as much as they could. Eyes locked, matching their interlocked fingers as he started to lean closer to kiss her.

A true ease of mind, the ability to give one’s self a sense of carelessness for nothing else in the world but the one captured in our gaze; And how quickly that can all go awry and terribly tragic.

The flames engulfed everything sooner than the ability for a single kiss to be given between them, the sound no longer a pleasant ring of laughter, but the utter terror of planes overhead whisking by at speeds no animal would ever dream of going. The footsteps being heard were now those of running soldiers trying to find any survivors of the chaos and destruction.

Her eyes fluttered open at the sound of an officer calling to her, what he was saying never really getting through to her. Quickly to her feet, her eyes darted from area to area, until down at the bottom of the hill laid a young man, her young man. Regardless the yelling going on around her all she could do was push forward, running down that hill just as fast as her little bare feet and gravity could take her. Her dress fanned out slightly; almost poetically as she sat beside him, her loss was clear but unaccepted. Cries of pain, heartbreak, and sorrow overcame her as she laid her head on her forgotten love’s growing cold chest.

Tears steam down her porcelain face, the purest tears anyone has ever shed for any instance or rush of emotion. She looked at his face, her small hand brushing against his cheek that still held some of that familiar warmth to it. She fought her tears away to see him, but knew he was not really there. Her denial so strong she merely sat and cried, unable to process anything around her.

Quiet sobbing shakes her bones to the edge of breaking, and slowly her skin began to delicately crack like an old fragile doll, weathered and torn. Soundlessly her body came apart, crumbling effortlessly. Her body was soon nothing more than dust blowing away in the wind.

The dust of long forgotten love stories yet to be told.