Rufus was usually keen on getting gifts that best suited his loved ones. The man, after all, seemed to hold all the money in the world. To buy an expensive gift was nothing but a penny dropped into a vast well. Because of this, he knew each one had to have a meaning behind it. He desired it so.
A medium size box was placed under the tree for Ambrosia. A silver bow is centered at the top. Rufus had gone to great lengths to figure out the exact type of materials that settled inside it. Among the paper sheets was a hat. A particular hat that bore the same size, shape, and materials that she had worn on that day they trod the beach.
It was one of the fonder moments of their courting. When everything she did seized his attention. His handwriting was on the card that was nestled between ribbons: Perhaps we should revisit. This is for our next trip.
Nestled at the foot of the Christmas tree, the gift lay in wait. A hidden treasure Ambrosia discovered only after the last echo of footsteps had faded, once the calm had returned.
She had spent the eve exchanging polite smiles, partaking in breezy banter and shaking hands. With every toast and every speech, as boring as they were, she had raised her glass and found the appropriate words, acting with the exemplariness expected of her stature. Her whole life was scripted by contracts, alliances, and rivalries, but was she truly fooled by that ? Sooner or later, these smiling faces would be replaced by others. Some might return for several years, but eventually, they were destined to vanish. The majority of people were disposable, as she had been taught from the earliest of ages. A lesson so ingrained that she had convinced herself not risk the attachment to any other.
In the soft glow of ambient Christmas lights, the gift was a surprise in itself. Moments lingered as she observed the box and its sophisticated satin bow, but what caught her eye was the unmistakable handwriting on the card. The letters of her name calligraphed with a precision and elegance she knew well and recognized at the first sight. She let her fingers ran over the smooth surface, mixing emotions swirling in her mind. Should she, even for a fleeting moment, consider turning away from the present ? A stronger heartbeat and a more compelling temptation answered her internal query.
She held her breath, her fingers untying the bow and unwrapping the layers of silk paper with a controlled eagerness. Her eyes widened as she uncovered a hat, carefully nestled within. The original had been tossed into the unruly embrace of ocean foam long ago, yet Rufus managed to find an identical replica in every aspect. It was not a simple hat but a treasure trove of memories, a fragile relic she handled with the utmost care. She gently placed the hat on her head and gave it the right tilt, mimicking the exact same gesture Rufus had done long ago.
As her reflection flickered in the mirror above the fireplace, a soft smile adorned her face, the softest of this evening. Memories flooded back, delicate and tangible; memories of shared laughter, profound conversations on moonlit shores, and whispered confidences lingering until the first light of dawn. As far back as she could remember, whether near or far, Rufus had always been in her life’s tableau. But she was a Van der Wald, she knew this wasn’t what was expected of her. He, too, belonged to the faces that were not supposed to stay in her life. Like every time she thought of him, she looked at the stars high in the sky, with the unsettling thought that he, too, was thinking of her and remembering all those evenings they spent stargazing together. She remembered the way he seemed to know the name of every star, and how she had listened, finding interest in every constellation when it was with him.
Cruel was the lesson of realizing that the one with whom she had shared the most memories would be destined to become nothing more than a memory himself.
The icy night had enveloped the mansion of its silence, and one by one, the lights in other rooms had gone out. Snow fell in lazy swirls, cloaking the surroundings in a pristine veil. She read and reread his words to the point of knowing every detail of his letters. She remembered cocktails in large pineapples adorned with tiny paper parasols, she recalled the memorable arm-wrestling match where Rufus had won the hat.. Had she ever realized until then how much she missed him ? Suddenly she felt the visceral need to hear him, to have him talk about anything, to hear the sound of his voice.
Soon, the first light of dawn would appear, a new day with new faces, again and again. In these undecided hours, she yielded to the decision to seize her phone. Each beep resonated like a clarion call slicing through the profound silence. In this ever-shifting universe, a question lingered : could it be possible that some faces were destined to carve such an enduring mark ? With a delicate and hushed voice, the same that once whispered him confidences, she uttered a solitary word, echoing in the silent expanse. “Perhaps..”
