Winter's Angel
In the winter of their lives, once must learn how to say goodbye.
She sits in her rocker chair at the window and stares at the gentle falling snowflakes. Her hair matches the color of the flakes perfectly. Once as brown as chocolate, and so thick, it is now thin, wispy and clings to her head in a desperate attempt to stay.
She doesn't rock in her chair. She sits and stares. Her body is spindly and fragile looking, not like the deadly, lithe body of her youth. Her hands are still chapped and calloused, though it had been years since she had handled a weapon. The skin was the same earthy tan, though it was more wrinkled than I could ever remember.
My own visage was much changed. My once supple hands are now stiff and creak in this cold. My knees don't bend right, and ache all day. My own hair was white, though I was grateful to still have it. The image of the now bald Neji almost brought a chuckle to my throat, but I didn't want to jar her. I swallowed the sound.
I supposed we should be grateful to make it this long, to make it this advanced age. Others were lost in the prime of their youths. Her own 'youthful' teammate Lee had been killed when he was just twenty. Poor Chouji was killed just after the birth of his first child.
My eyes travelled to the bookcase. I looked at photo on top of the case from behind my tinted frames. The picture showed an old couple, three middle age couples and a smattering of children of various ages. All my lovely children and grandchildren portrayed at their neatest. I feel the urge to drop to my knees, and give a pray of thanks that I hadn't have to see any of my own children die, like Shikamaru and Ino had, or grandchildren for that matter.
My eyes travelled back to the still figure before me. I looked closely at the face that had occupied my mind, my heart and my side all these quick years. If I could, I would've had another eighty years with her.
Alas, it was not meant to be. It started out with little slips. Forgetting her glasses, or mixing up the grandchildren's names. She started to forget conversations, and recent events. We really knew something was wrong when she forgot who Riku was for a full minute. She even slapped the poor boy for insisting she was his grandmother. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer's.
Her once brilliant hazel eyes were now dull and cloudy. She didn't follow the snowflakes has they fell, but stared past them. The sight of her lifeless eyes, once so intelligent and bright, nearly broke my heart.
There are times I wake up in the middle of the night, and for that moment my consciousness lingers between dreams and reality, I think that it's possible that today, she's returned to me. Then I awake, and realize, it'll never be.
I look again at my beloved's face, and realize she's facing me. Her eyes clear for a moment, and she smiles. My heart jumps and I scarcely hope that my wish had come true. Her eyes radiate with love for a moment, and then she slumps in her chair. The gentle rise and fall of her chest as ceased.
I resist the urge to run over to her, to save her. Before she got this way, she made me promise I wouldn't help when the time came. She didn't want to burden me for any longer than what she was allotted. She wanted to die naturally, and comfortably at home, by my side.
I walked over to her, and check her pulse, though through my kikaichu, I know she has none. I lean her head back in a comfortable position on the chair, and close her eyes.
I stand there for I don't know how long, staring as she once did at the face of my beloved, of my angel.
My beautiful Tenten Aburame.