Swan's love lasts a lifetime. Once a partner dies, the other lives in oblivion, eventually dying of heartbreak - 'Til death does us apart.'

Sometimes a lone, mourning swan finds another love. It doesn't fly around in search of love, though. It falls. In love. Some other lonely swan would see the fall and hover around timelessly. If and when their mutual desire grows beyond them, it falls too. In love.

The mute swans are not mute. They are silent. They hiss and grunt when they are in love. The swans sing in love. They sing the same song when they die. They fall in love with death - the last 'Swan Song.'

Sylvia did not sing anymore. For someone who was so often drowned in her own flood of words, Sylvia was short of words. It was a strange famine. Words were in abundance. Her thirst was missing. Some others would have called it writer's block. She could have called it love. But she didn't. She didn't know it yet.

Sylvia took her little brown notebook and walked in search of thirst. To the sea, of course. She would sit on the beach every evening and stare at its infinity. She hoped that the rivers that emptied themselves in the ocean would fill a bit of her emptiness with words, with inspiration. She hoped that the sea would let her borrow some of its thirst.

Sylvia loved the sea. She could feel the salty sea breeze that danced with her hair. She felt the little sand particles on her bare feet, how they found their way between her toes, befriending her—connecting her to the sea. She liked the hymn of the waves. The sea spoke to her without talking. The sea heard her without her talking. She empathized with the longing of the sea, how the tides tried to reach the moon without ever reaching. She lay supine on the beach and saw the ethereal, infinite sky: sky and the sea, two infinities. Together, yet separated. The sky covered the sea like an umbrella. To protect her.

She was away from the noise of the city. But some windows face away from chaos. Nigel saw her from one such window.

For days, she sat there, thinking, writing, searching. For days, he watched her, thinking, painting, hoping. He hoped that time would prepare his heart. The day arrived. The daylight stayed far too long, and his longing grew. The sun kept waiting for him before it immersed itself in the sea. That day, he walked to her.

She saw him. It was easy to spot someone walking on the emptiness of 'her' beach. His tall, slender body was walking to her with a strange reluctance. He was dressed like her, in carelessness. The white shirt had a couple of buttons open, and the sleeves were rolled up without symmetry. She saw the effortless walk of his bare feet and his hands in the pocket of the light grey trousers that were casually rolled up without symmetry. His light brown hair was wavy - like the waves. Her mind ran through many adjectives like it always did. Words were returning to her. She allowed them to.

To Sylvia, he looked like he was walking inside his own home. He looked belonged.

Nigel saw her. He was doing his best to make himself look normal. Not in love. She was sitting cross-legged on the beach with a little wood-brown diary on her folded legs and a pen casually sitting on the rim of her diary.

He saw all her colours. He saw the soft rust-red of her auburn hair, oblivious of the surroundings, and continued its conversations with the wind. He saw the alabaster white of her shirt, which reflected the daffodil orange of the sunset. He saw the sage green of her long skirt that occasionally lifted itself to reveal the sepia-yellow sandals. Sandals, mismatched and innocently unaware of the balance of colours. A small leather bag lay by her side.

To Nigel, she looked like a palette of light colours, somehow rendered beautiful by the dying sunlight. She looked like a rare sunset.

Unknowingly, Nigel had put his hands in his pockets. Maybe for the warmth. Actually, the hands had nowhere else to go.

He stood beside her. They looked at each other's hair, ear, nose, and lips. They avoided the eyes. There was a brief pause. The 'brief' felt longer amidst the hymn of the waves. She was accustomed to the silence. He was not.

"Hi, you might not remember me. I was at the bookstore for 'Limerence'. I was sitting over there reading, and I saw you. Just came around to thank you for the book." He had forgotten and messed up the rehearsed words.

She lowered her glance, then raised it. She didn't see the book which he was not carrying.

He didn't see the book either. But he saw the movement of her eyes through her glasses. The eyes were grey with a tint of blue - the colour of the sea. Maybe it was the reflection of the sea. He must have thought it aloud.

She gave a nod of inquiry with her brows closer to her eyes. She pursed her lips to hide the little smile that he had disarmed.

"Oh! I seem to have forgotten it somewhere," he said with an immediate regret that followed his words. "I mean, the book is safe in my house over there." He was pointing towards his house, looking away from her eyes.

Her eyes followed his finger and saw the house. She also saw the little dry colour stuck under his nails.

"I was just looking for some colours", Nigel said, moving his hand through his hair before putting it back in the safety of his pockets.

She smiled, picked up the bag lying to her right, and kept it on her left. She tapped her palm where the bag was and then shifted her gaze back to the sea.

He sat beside her. The sun, quietly witnessing the conversation, immersed itself into the sea, satisfied. It left behind a golden hue, a diffused proof of its joy. The shadows, too, diffused themselves with the two bodies sitting on the beach.

Sylvia was writing with urgency and smiling in her usual silence. Some hidden door that had locked her words had opened, immersing her in her world. He looked at her and the sea. They both looked infinite.

He was missing his sketchbook. His fingers were creating meaningless sketches in the sand. Sun had left the moon to accompany them, and the water level rose towards the moon. Something else rose, too. But no one saw it. It grew inside two people sitting by the sea. Desire.

But nature sees things that human hearts hide. Clouds gathered around to witness their quiet falling into each other. A slight drizzle started. She closed her diary and kept it inside the bag. To protect it. He had no umbrella. Clouds must have noticed it. They decided it was time. It started raining.

He rose and subconsciously gave her his hand to rise. Her hands were still warm. He looked towards his house, and she nodded. They jogged towards it, two bare feet making footprints that started apart and moved closer together as the rain poured.

Somewhere above, the clouds giggled at their little success. He had a hand at the small of her back and held her bag in the other. To protect her.

They reached his studio. They carried the rain with them, wetting the wooden floor. For a moment, they stood in the same place quietly. Her rain was beneath her. His rain was separated from hers. Then, his footprints spread the rain everywhere as he searched for the towel.

He handed her a towel and got one for himself. They dried themselves. He had disappeared briefly to change into dry clothes. He appeared, then felt a pang of guilt, and disappeared again.

He reappeared with a shirt and a vintage-coloured skirt. She looked at him. He understood the nod and said, "mother's". Then she disappeared with the towel, shirt, and skirt. The towel was his. The shirt and skirt were his mother's.

He filled a pan with water and turned on the heat. When the water started boiling, he added coffee. He closed his eyes over the pan to sacrifice vision and enhance his sense of smell. After four minutes, he killed the heat and covered the pan, waiting for the grounds to settle at the bottom. Then he wiped two cups and gently poured the coffee off the top. He was trying to make a perfect cup of coffee.

He occasionally glanced at the washroom where she had disappeared. Then she emerged with wet feet and dry hair. Dressed in his mother's clothes. Sylvia in Sylvie's.

It was at that moment that he could no longer lie to himself. He had fallen in love with her.

She had smelled the coffee before opening the door. She washed her clothes and squeezed them in the washbasin, which had many colours. All the taps, the door handle, and even the switches had a hint of colours that his hands had left. She touched the fixtures, the switch, and the door handle.

He handed her the hot cup of hopeful coffee, taking the towel away to the washroom. She looked around.

Sylvia had never seen such beautiful paintings before. She was not familiar with visual emotionism. The painting seemed to have started in his mind, and he had transferred his emotions directly onto a blank canvas. She could see his point of view and felt his passionate intensity. She could sense his focus and attention to detail in manipulating raw and blended colour pigments. It was hauntingly beautiful. Haunting the way it made her travel through some memories from her past. Beautiful, the way it sparked a strange emotion within her.

It was at that point that she could no longer lie to herself. She had fallen in love with him.

She didn't realize that she was humming some very old tune. She didn't realize that he was next to her, humming the same tune. The water from the little rain she had left on the floor had now joined the rain that he had left. Two rains were one.

Author's Note:-

Mute Swan - During a courtship display, mute swans utter a rhythmic song. The song helps synchronize the movements of their heads and necks. They symbolize love with respect.

Emotionism - A form of writing where the author believes that words and stories exist on paper. He immerses himself in one emotion and then uses a pen as an eraser to reveal the story.