t minus 8 days / / hide and seek is nothing without your heartbeat 

the cotton around his eyes is soft as it tickles his skin; a scarf that serves as a blindfold takes away his sight, save for the few rays peeking in through its bottom, slivers of light.

gently, he guides her cold hands to his cheeks; the shivers, they bring warmth to his body.

her fingers trace up his cheeks and find the cloth tied around his head. she grips it with both hands, and their breaths waltz into one another, mingling as they're proximity threatens a wildfire with its promiscuous flames.

"a blindfold?"

"yeah."

"but we're supposed to be watching the fireworks. don't you want to see them?"

he tightens the scarf around his eyes and leans back into the trunk of the oak; many times he wonders if she notices when he's staring at her heart-shaped face, framed by natural waterfalls of mahogany and gold, dazzling the trees, which yearn to be a part of the same waters that are destined to become their undoing.

she wonders if she's ever looked into his eyes.

he shakes his head. "i want to see you. and the best way to do that is to see from your shoes."

she nods. the sound of the first firework ripping through the evening air tears through the night, followed by faint explosions, rendering the sky in red and yellow,and then smoke,but the sound is numb to

her

his

ears.

for all they hear are the beats of each other's hearts, and all they desire is for the music to remain eternal, but all that is beautiful must end, and all that must end leaves scars ever so permanent, casting shadows upon canvases of clarity, leaving desolate ruins where souls once used to be.