Submitting novel Chapter 23

The wallpaper looked interesting. The small little flowers with thin tendrils wrapping and reaching out to the other flowers, sitting against a dark green background. A little faded out, a little unnoticeable until someone looks at them, really looks at them. Maybe because they are bored, maybe because they are a keen observer of the surroundings or maybe just because they want a distraction.

His face was so close to mine. The slow warm breath fanning my cheeks inhaling me as if I was a flower, a Rose, held in his arms as we danced to the soft melody echoing in the piano room. His well fitted black suit against my red satin dress. Rustling, touching, brushing against each other. An arm wound around my waist, hand reaching to the small of my back another gripped my palm in his. Small baby steps. Left, right, sway, back, front, round. 

The wall. 

The wall is so pretty. So interesting. It should be enough to help me drift away and not be here. Not in this moment. The wall.

"I want to talk to you." Why was I doing this? Why did I have to do this? I kept wondering as  I nodded my head slowly unable to predict that this simple movement of action would make the cold tip of the nose graze against my cheek lightly, eliciting a shiver down my spine. His presence anywhere near me always made me hyperactively alert and tense. This was too close, against my liking. The closest I have been to him after  a long period. 

Ivan has a good habit of interrupting my interactions with Dimitri every time and yet, as the third music came to its end, Ivan was nowhere to be seen. Non-existing, doing what he wants to do with such ease, a privilege I was denied and forgotten. 

"Yes." It wasn't what he was saying. It was what he wanted me to say.

"Yes." A bare whisper escaped my lips which he heard all right as he hummed in approval. 

"It's a funny thing you know. We believe in what we are shown. No matter how bizarre it is, as long as we get the evidence. People never believed and even mocked the Wright brothers when they wanted to fly because humans can't fly. Those people never believed because their minds were constricted to a certain impression that only wings can make them fly. But we don't have wings, we are not born with them. We are not birds." He twirled us slowly, leading us away from the doorway and deeper into the room. Closer and closer to the floor to ceiling glass doors that faced outside to the woods. 

"We will never be. Yet the need to be something or someone else is just so immense. Because we are not happy with what we have now. Wants are unlimited. A Famous economist, Marshall, said that human wants are countless in number and are varied in kind. As soon as one want is satisfied another want takes its place. This endless circle of wants continues throughout life. We will never have enough or be satisfied with what we have. No matter what we do." A few more steps and I would be able to see the sky if I tilted my head backwards. The hiding sun, maybe some birds or even the ashy sky would be enough to satiate the lost touch to the outside world. 

"The point being, we should be happy with what we have and accept things that are out of our reach. You should understand that by now. Some things are just not under our control." He leaned over, dropping me and still holding as my back arched towards the door and there it was, the sky. Dim, bright, ashy sky. So open and aweigh. Endless, never-ending, free and out of reach.

He pulled me back up again, the light in my eyes gone as I was met with dark pools of green. I didn't dare breathe as he somehow moved closer to me than he already was, consuming my senses, blurring my vision with overwhelm. The warmth searing me as his lips met mine, slowly and gently like I was one of those clouds that will vanish away any moment now.