THE SILVER WALTZ

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"The moon is yellow, but its light is somehow silver," said ....Myra.....  She was alone on the verandah overlooking the lake that stretched towards the invisible horizon.  She wasn't exactly talking to herself since she expected Nick not to be far away, probably within over-hearing distance. Nick and ....Myra.... were engaged to be married. However, instead of Nick, Daniel arrived on the verandah...

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"Did you say silver?"

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Daniel was ....Myra....'s second cousin.  The family was here for a funeral of one of its minor members, someone hardly anyone else in the family knew. Most had even forgotten the name of the dead person. Just the excuse (or duty) required for a gathering.

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"How about a dance?" asked Daniel.

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"There is no music," said ....Myra.....  She did not want to be seen by Nick in close proximity to Daniel. There was history here.

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"The best dances are silent ones," laughed Daniel.

They both heard laughter from inside the house. Nick was evidently sounding off about one of his business deals.  ....Myra.... would be in safe financial hands with Nick. Daniel, by contrast, was a waster.

....

Against her better judgement, ....Myra.... allowed herself to be taken into Daniel's arms as they swayed gently under the moon to an unlearnt, even untaught, choreography.  A silver waltz.

It was as if the dance itself was a living creature that held ....Myra.... and Daniel in its own arms – wrapping them in a current that only lakes could embody in contrast to that of rivers or seas. The dance perhaps was its own breeze on an otherwise perfectly silent night.  The party in the house was deadened by its own weight.

....

*

Nick looked through the large lake window, as if this window were owned by its view rather than by whence the view was seen. 

Like all the others in ghostly cotillions of shape around him, he had also forgotten that the one for whom they mourned was the single self they each felt themselves to bear.

Business was never good in a world slump.  The voices around Nick died to a soft-shoe whisper – as his last joke turned in on itself.  He was no longer the soul of a party – but the body in a wake.

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Sleep was his only means of existence. And he slowly dreamed himself drive across towards the lake in a silver ghost.  Not just forgotten, but never been.

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Meanwhile, the very last waltz became its own lonely romance as two mindless shades, for merely a single eternity, did strictly come dancing around an invisible lake.  Neither had names, because neither looked back here to find them.

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