Small Emergency

There was a pause of realization: of the other’s face and the little differences that cropped up over the year, of the potential the moment held, of the interruption on the private processes they’d each thrown themselves into after their last moment. 

The green light would never come quick enough. Neither of them wanted to return to the thick of it. 

His hands seemed thinner, holding onto the wheel for everything. Her eyes had lost the dark shadows that once seemed forever part of her anatomy. His skin cleared up from some new routine and time added back into his day. Her hair was longer and she had heavy bangs now; just one missed trim away from her features being hidden behind a curtain. 

Blue lights flashed into rearview mirrors and threw their attention.

She pulled off the road and watched the spot of color go into the night until it melted into the deep sky, refusing to look out the driver’s side window.

He took a left turn although he was supposed to be going forward but considered it all canceled out in some way; thankful for the small emergency they had been rescued from.