"Dine with me,"

she said, just as I did, a fraction of a second later.

She sat down at the table as I did. In complete silence, we ate for several minutes. her with her right hand, I of course, left-handed, leading with the sinister side.

I opened my mouth to speak, looking up at her, her eyes catching mine, and I could see her lips parted, a word frozen on her lips. We both stopped, watching each other, like cats on a windy ledge, unsure as to what particular social nicety was to be observed.

Finally she laughed, her laugh bright and tinkly, like rain hitting a window pane. She brushed a wayward strand of hair from her forehead as she looked at me, one finger delicately playing at the rim of her plate, a stray swab of marinara coming precariously close to her pale, cotton-white skin.

I brushed the hair out of my face and matched her laugh, fingertips drumming against the flatware, not caring what sort of mess I risked.

This was the moment, and we felt it, with the moonlight streaming in from the window behind her, illuminating her figure--the one she thought was too much, but that I found particularly well matched to my own. The moon drained the color from the room, washing the space in its own brand of lunar tones--mare yellow, refracted blue, and hemming every edge in a peripheral haze of ultraviolet rainbow.

She looked down demurely. I followed her eyes, briefly glancing at my own shadow, laid out in front of me upon the marble table, nearly touching hers.

Our eyes met. She leaned across the table, kicking her chair back. My own chair toppled back as I rose to meet her. The clatter of wood on tile, the flash of moonlight, everything was forgotten as my lips met glass. Chilled by the night, it was cold against my mouth, draining the heat from me. I imagined it drew it into her body, but I had no way of knowing. A chill shudder ran through my body--no one else could understand this, and that is what wove excitement into this night.

The gold frame was a window between us, an impassable door, on either side of which sat two identical meals, half-finished. Two moons shone through two windows, and two sets of lips met on either side of the glass. We pulled back from the silvered glass simultaneously, our breath coming out in succulent puffs, fogging the damnable surface. She pressed her finger to it, drawing it down, watching achingly as I pressed my finger to hers, following the intimate ballet across the condensated floor.

In a moment, in a week, she was done, I was done, eyes lifting from the message on the glass to stare at each other for the rest of the night. We would watch each other for hours more, but the message would last only until our breath cleared from the mirror's surface.

"uoy evol I"