The Polaroid

The photo is crisp, although somewhat faded, its glossy surface skewed by highlighted creases, which appear like white lines under an incandescent ceiling lamp. That lamp flickers - the only light source in the room, and the plastic Polaroid flicks in and out, an image of a man and his lady, arms around one another, in winter, in snow laden fields. He had misplaced his ring that day. He looks. He remembers. He looks again. He remembers the smell of makeup, the touch of wool coats and feather-soft hair felt through the thick of winter gloves, and the low of Appalachian winds, which whistle their eerie howl between dead branches. He closes his eyes and pictures the sunset. He had misplaced his ring that day. It was a cold day, and windy, with white tornadoes and sugared pines. He can see the naked callous on his finger. The sting on the lobes, the numbness around the nose and chapped lips - that lamp flickers again, and in those black moments, he feels it over, and over -- and he misses her. Deeply, he misses her.