Blessing

"You have been my friend. That in itself is a tremendous thing. I wove my webs for you because I liked you. After all, what's a life, anyway? We're born, we live a little while, we die. A spider's life can't help being something of a mess, with all this trapping and eating flies. By helping you, perhaps I was trying to lift up my life a trifle. Heaven knows anyone's life can stand a little of that."
Charlotte, Charlotte's Web

~ E.B. White

10pm

Snuggled in her warm bed that rainy night, she recounted the day in her mind. The movie, the walk in the park, the ice-cream at the cafe. The sneezing, the unfinished conversation at the sushi bar, the sudden comment at the traffic lights. And as if she has never ever realised it before, she suddenly felt really blessed for him in her life as she remembered a verse from the bible - I always thank God for you because of his grace given to you in Christ Jesus¹.

8pm

And even at quarter past eight, she did not have the slightest desire to head home despite the fact that his eyes had become teary, the sneezing more frequent and his house was a good 45 minutes away from the cafe. It was strange too, for the chatty duo did not talk much that night. Perhaps they were preoccupied with things on their minds, things which only they knew. But time was running out.

5pm

"Shall we take a walk in the park?" she asked and despite his getting-more-frequent sneezing, he subscribed to her incompassionate request.

1pm

She spotted him almost immediately outside the crowded cineplex and a sudden surge of unexplainable melancholy gripped her. He has only been gone for a while and she wondered how it was going to be possible without him for the next year.

Footnotes:

¹ 1 Corinthians 1:4