Four feet and some odd change, seventy pounds at best, skin wrinkled and falling off bones, she was the most beautiful creature I have ever known. I cannot with words capture her beauty. She was a magical being, whose presence alone could lift your spirits. However, she is here in my mind, and I feel the need to let you see.
A tiny child with tears falling, from big brown eyes, stream down his cheeks. This ear infection is bad, a pain beyond his comprehending. A hand sewn quilt, pieced together from scraps of old clothing, French knots dotting the surface, wraps him in its warmth, but he aches. The pain, why? Why does he hurt so much? Why won't it stop? A tiny hand, not much bigger than his own, wraps over his ear. Warmth seeps into his head and pain melts away. Large brown eyes close in an instant, and he is swept away. When his eyes open, the pain is gone. She called it wishcraft. If you wanted something badly enough, and wished hard enough, you could make it happen. She wished away the pain.
Years spent, just sitting with this frail creature, until the tiny hand she was holding was twice the size of her own. She would hold my hand for hours. I never understood why, and did not realize how much I would come to miss those days. She seemed fascinated with hands so large and soft. No matter what evils where upon me, my little beauty was always there, and I always had 'the nicest' hands. I can hear her voice cracking still, it is music to my ears. If I close my eyes, I can still feel the warmth that washed over when she was in the room.
The warmth was there, every day but one. Nine AM I am with her. She is in the hospital. She looks so tiny. So tired. When she sees me, she gets out of bed, and goes to sit in a chair. Taking the blanket from the bed, I try to wrap her as she once did me. Work beckons, so I only have a few hours to hold those magical hands. Gone was that sparkle that always greeted me. The warmth was missing. She was there with me, but she was missing. She was happy, but there was just something missing. I spent the remainder of the day striking every metal object in sight, and trying in vain to want and wish hard enough. She wouldn't make it through the night. I had a rather frenzied battle with a brick wall. Damn the fates, why couldn't I do it. She fixed me. Why couldn't I fix her? As I sat alone in the dark, hands battered and bleeding, a warmth washed over and a tiny cracking voice whispers 'you always had the nicest hands.' One last time she wished away the pain. |