Around us, the spring grew thick with wonton desires, after all, spring was the season of love and of belonging. Whether or not, we belonged together was to be debated, but all the same, desire drove us together under the familiar warmth of the rising sun. The day fought to overcome the curtain of night and seemed to prevail as the first shafts of dawn beamed down through the misted limbs of the forest inside the Edge. Peering up and above the skeletal remains of winter’s deathly kiss, I found myself enamored with the sun and how jovial it appeared to be in the early morning hours. How could I deny such warmth and happiness, especially in the company of someone so tempting that I found myself salivating from the mouth in order to lay soft kisses upon her skin? Perhaps I appeared to be a bumbling fool, but nothing would stop me from finding my way to her heart, to her.

Love was something I had never experienced, but I knew that with Tamira it was something I could not question. I loved her. I cared for her- she was ever present in my waking thoughts and again in my nightly dreaming. But behind her image of lustrous brilliance stood the dark reminder of all things in her that she had not experienced. The passion of temptation, hot and burning beneath her skin, so strong that if ignited, she might implode.

However, Myriad… she was not so daunted by the intimacy of love and the affections that followed. Perhaps, she was the reason I found myself here, loose mouthed and scraping at her heels for just the smallest of indulgence. Her gaze brought a weakness to my knees, much like her lighter half and I sometimes found myself believing that the two were indeed, only one. But as she grazed against me, our flesh connecting and warming from contact, I knew this was not the one I loved- just the one I lusted. The divergence between their personalities was something that left me reeling, spiraling into the frosted realm of heartache that would one day burn and combust into one final decision- which one would I choose?

The thought haunted me momentarily before her brassy tunes tangled the silent web of confusion that wrapped around our beings and tied us together to this singular essence of time. Nothing else existed, aside from our hopeless banter. Would it ever change? Would we ever stop circling and finally just commit? Somehow, I doubted both. Though, it was a fleeting reality that was quickly forgotten as she veered away, beckoning me as I had formerly done to her. I smiled weakly, knowing that now matter how I tried to avoid it, I couldn’t resist her.

Her hips swung provocatively before me and I was light on my heels, eager to follow, eager to touch her… I felt so wrong and yet so right, merely disregarding the nagging issue of Tamira and brushing it away to the back of my mind. I felt guilty… guiltless- this wasn’t my fault.

Or was it?

She was cool as ever, turning to lace depthless eyes upon me; dark pools of desire mimicking my own before her words tilted toward me despite the tension. Something about them alerted me to her weakness and I was reluctant to accept reply, choosing instead to wallow in my own small victory. She longed to give in as much as I, even if she was just as hesitant to admit it. I wasn’t sure where “giving in” would lead us, because it would break the invisible line of comfort between us that we had created in order to give definition to what was right and wrong. Each of us clung to the idea that if it were never crossed, we would never have to deal with the ramifications. No matter what Myriad believed about Tamira, they still shared a physical body that would ultimately trap one or the other into whatever convenience was contrived from our foolishness now.

But, I was helpless to avoid her, helpless to resist anymore and so through wanting lips did such weakness prevail- I had lost this game, ever a pawn in her endless mystery of desire. “Then give in to me…” But, again she ran, deeper into the forest, like some ghostly beacon of light, leading me from heaven and into her hell. But, I smiled as I did so, tracing her path of shadows with a hot, red, essence of my own. You can’t run forever.