Fantasy Bits and Pieces

Bits and Pieces: The Fantasy of a Lifetime

By Carolee Ross

We go on about our lives,

Each involved in the daily pieces

That make up an existence.

The dentist, the doctors, the Sunday barbecues,

The storms, the sunshine, the exquisite and the mundane.

But once in a while,

We look up and stare at nothing in particular,

And remember

A beautiful day in April

When she was the most beautiful girl in the world

And he was the only boy.

When we were both

Very young and very passionate

And very poetic

We wrote tomes of love letters

We kissed as though kissing was illegal,

We touched, we loved, and we felt

And everywhere we went,

People smiled to see us love.

But when she went home

To finish college,

He stopped writing

And she stopped calling

And hoping

And wondering.

And so, she went about her life

Marrying another, raising two children,

Paying the bills, answering the phone,

Burying her parents, getting a few degrees.

And then they met again,

A once in a million chance, 29 years later.

He was a top executive

Living on a house by the Potomac,

In his second marriage

And second set of children.

And she was divorced and struggling.

As usual.

Can it be?

Is it really you?

Memories rushing back,

Midnight at the horror movie show,

Sodas at the ice cream parlor,

Walking on a beach filled with palms,

When Florida was still young

And the Cubans still lived in Cuba.

He went home to his mansion

And she went home to her

Crumbling house,

Living on freelance pittances

And waiting

Waiting, waiting, again, almost 30 years later.

He was in and out of her life again

Proclaiming that they'd never be apart again

That she was still the girl in the photos

Still the girl standing by the 50's auto,

Still the girl who dazzled him

But now she was a convenience

In his compartmentalized life.

There was a brief, passionate flurry

Of hurried kisses,

Short, brief, intense, lovemaking bittersweet;

And then the excuses

He had to leave because:

He had to catch a plane

Or call his kids

Or prepare a report

Or drive to a meeting.

And then, she was tired

Of reliving the past

Of promises unkept

And waiting

And realized

That the Prince was really a frog.

A frog who sucked the pond dry,

Who reveled in fantasies

And didn't know how

To live the pieces of life

On an everyday basis.