Dion had waited for her on the sidewalk by a bakery and a flower shop, with his black jacket and his sagging thick cotton pants. To his rear, the loud roars of people. It was cold, even with the bustling noises and faces. He couldn’t focus too much on it though, there was something else, something important here.

She had come through with a coat covered dress, which disappointed him a bit. A brief feeling, killed by the sight of her face through the anonymous crowd.

He inched his hand closer towards her arm and she did not protest.

"You could have dressed up," She smiled. "You look like a furniture mover."

"Sorry," Dion said. "I don't have much of anything else. All of it -"

He remembered why he was poor and clothes-less and why he wore the second-hand garments the nun had provided him. It was that whole dying business at Soloman’s Keep. That thing, right.

"I packed light before I moved. It’s all I had.." Dion said.

"It's fine," She tugged at him and leaned him closer towards the stalls. Observing each one, the bright colored stands, as a kind of carnival game in and of itself. They could hear the voices of tourists behind them, a group of twelve lead by a young woman. They could hear children and natives laughing, food in their mouths. The streets were cleared of snow, thankfully, and the lights were bright even on this dark night.

The cold air was relieving to breathe, his cheeks were hot. His palms sweaty.. He passed glances at her.

They stopped. In front of them was a game of sorts, plushies of bears and swans and lions displayed behind the stall, on shelves. In front of them were pellet guns and the ducks. Lots of wooden ducks, with bullseyes, center through them.

The man behind the counter said something eagerly, in German.

"He says, do you want a try?" She yanked the gun closer to her, the cord hit Dion’s leg.

Dion smiled, yes. He frowned immediately when she stopped looking. He picked up the gun. He felt cold all of a sudden, drained. His hands shook. His vision nearly blurred and he felt in one ear, a loss of balance that made him lean heavily on his left leg.

He aimed, trying to put his eye to the struggling iron sights of the pellet gun. He raised the toy and thought to shoot. He couldn't find the trigger. His finger tapped empty space.

Dion was breathing loud now. And the more he thought of relaxing, the worse it got. He tried putting the butt of the gun against his shoulder but he couldn't lock it on his bones and muscles. He tried shooting. A pellet flew out, it nearly hit the man behind the stall. Stefania took the gun out of his hand, nervous too, but smiling, warm. Warm in this cold hour.

"It's alright." She said." I was bad at these too when I first started."

He settled as the responsibility of the trigger was out of his hands. He watched her now, his composure coming back as he watched her wield the toy and shoot, with focused eyes and a stiff body. The ducks rang out as they died. The man behind the stall still looked angry, even as he handed her a lion.

"Do you want it?" She asked.

"Shouldn't this be the other way around." He said, looking over the small plush.

"Not with your aim." She said. He felt hurt, not by what she intended but what she revealed. He had to look away and ease his face before he could speak to her. He returned, facing her, with a half-smile.

"Where'd you learn how to shoot?"

“My grandfather before he died.”

“Sorry.”

You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

“Don't worry, I wouldn't have told you if it still meant something to me.”

“How long has it been?”

“Ten years. I never really knew him, and most of what I did know came after the fact. A military man, my grandfather. A poor lover, too, my grandmother told me.”

Her voice dropped at grandmother. She recovered, not fast enough for him not to notice.

“Well, to me he was just the old guy with a shotgun I would spend a weekend or two with.”

Residual fear was still in him. He put his hands in his pockets, now his pants shook.

“Did you know your grandfather?”

“No, I never really never knew anyone in my family.”

“That’s not too bad.” She said, “You never learned to be disappointed in your family. That’s a good thing.”

He couldn’t comment, he was trying to understand her and himself, her strange awkwardness with her family and his own constant fear. Guns felt strange to him, she felt strange to him. She tugged his arm. He realized he was staring down and finally got the opportunity to become aware of the plaza.

They stopped in front of the Christmas tree. There were benches lined up around it. Men on ladders were putting the finishing ornaments and ribbons on the tree. Giant flashy balls and trinkets, lavish scarfs, gold and pale like the rings of Saturn. There was a celestial quality to the color scheme, the gold and the pale silver and the ruby red. There was something celestial about Stefanie too, the silhouette of her body set against the lights all along the street and floor. An angel.

Her beanie topped head, the slim frame. She smiled at him and walked towards a bench and laid her hands against it, leaning forward. All his anxiety subsided for that brief moment as he looked at her, and the more he did the stronger he felt. Until his stomach was burning with an unconquerable fire, until he felt in his heart the will to power. He clenched his fist. He stepped forward. She, still leaning, whimsical, smiling at the tree and the lights and the slow falling snowdrops.

He came up next to her, moving left and right, letting the fire in him burn faster and brighter. Until - Finally, when it seemed to rise up towards his lungs and out his mouth, he could not contain it anymore.

“You look beautiful,” he blurted. In an uncomfortable kind of courage.

“Huh?”

He couldn't repeat himself. That’d be too disgraceful. His face blushed. He’d just show it, yeah. He took a deep breath, extended his hand and tried to grab her own.

She pulled away. His face froze, eyes wide open. His “unconquerable fire”, pissing away into smoke and ash.

“What are you doing?”She wasn't horrified necessarily, more so amused, curious as to how he’d respond.

His throat was clogged, he formed empty words with his mouth. He wondered, when he found respite from his self conscious thoughts, he wondered how someone so small could make him feel so weak.

“I’m sorry.” Dion fumbled the words.

“You don't know how to read the mood do you?” She said it with a kind of authority. There was a gap of experience between them, one tallied not by years but by broken hearts. She obviously had many under her belt, obviously.

“At least you’ve got balls.” Her laser gaze scanned over him. His left leg quaked. “I think?”

He slapped his leg to stop it from shaking. He was whispering words, interrupting them with his breathing. He felt like a deep sea diver in a cage, with the lone shark circling. She tried taking a bite.

:”You know if you weren't so cute I would have left, right?” She said.

“That’s shallow,” He mumbled, a quiet rebuttal.

“Oh? You’re putting up a defense?” She laughed. Her voice was deep, hearty.

“I just thought I'd try,” he said.

“Like so many men before you.” She sat on a bench, calm and curious and Dion felt angry for some reason. He didn’t feel wrong, he didn’t feel sick or perverted or ill-intended. But he felt bad, annoyed.

“Now don't get mad,” She tapped the seat next to her. “I’ve been with a lot of guys who want a lot from me and I just want to know what you’re all about.”

“I get it.” He was demure. His eyes fell to the wet floor. “I messed up.”

He couldn’t sit next to her. Or answer her. He turned and started walking towards the crowd. She grabbed the cuff of his shirts.

“Who said you messed up?”

“I thought?” He fidgeted his fingers. “I mean -”

“I said you tried. Poorly. But I like that.” She held his hand, her grip was strong. “And I’d like it if you try it again later. When I know you better.”

He wanted to retaliate, a tinge of frustration clung to him. But he felt the warmth again, as he felt something peck his cheek. Something like a bird, a sweet, small songbird perhaps.

She kissed him. He stared into empty air.

She smiled. She really was pretty (he thought, and whose other opinion mattered anyway?) and her face was a bit sagged on the left, and one of her eyes was a bit lazy, and she had some funny sharp-shaped teeth. And he loved that. And she was beautiful. And he couldn’t stop thinking that.

So stupid in love, so stupid in her eyes was he that he could not see the figure. For beauty and love and all good things were blinding, stupefying. He could not see the hooded figure, he could feel the danger and the pressure of the stranger glaring at them. He could not see this person run across the plaza, into an alley, glaring at Stefanie and Dion. He could not.

He couldn’t look at anything else but Stefanie. Ste-fa-nie. The name made him shiver thrice. Ste-fa-nie. The woman he lost himself into. It was good, in a way, to be hypnotized by the beauty of someone. It was finally good to get out of his head, to feel something warm melt the bitter cold of his soul.