DAVID WHELAN presently lives and works in London.

                                                               eden park


A great slip of snow muffled the slopes of the park. Crisp and quiet, sounds soft and hushed, grey trees stark, white where they might have been green.

They drove down a sweeping arc, past an old bridge that must have spanned the river, long ago. The first one-and-a-half stone arches reached out into the pale air, and then stopped like it had been thwarted; the rest of the road torn off by some uncaring storm.

He said, "Look; a bridge to nowhere." She spun the car around. Yes, yes, yes. That was exactly where they wanted to go.

Across where the foot of the bridge would have been was a sidewalk. She spun the wheel and rushed the curb. The car hit it with a bang. The little Honda bucked as though it might have taken a crippling blow, but it rose to the challenge and bounded onto the closed, abbreviated road. She urged the motor on, and skidded to a stop just ahead of a railing, where the bridge ended.

They leapt out of the car, and crunched to the edge of the bridge. Below them, beneath the immaculate snow, the dry riverbed. Ahead, the slow Ohio River. A snowflake meandered in the mist by her face, and he caught it on the palm of his black glove. "It's beautiful. So perfect, so sharp." She looked up at him, tender light glistened in her eyes. He pulled her to him and folded her in his arms. Her eyes closed, a gentle smile glowing on her face as she nuzzled into his leather jacket.

In that crisp moment, the world sparkled anew.

For that moment, they forgot about his flight later in the evening.

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Copyright © 2003 David Whelan