There is a woman standing by my window.

She stands there, unmoving; wind from the open window blows around her, causing her hair to flutter and her dress to dance. Still, she is unmoving. She has been standing for hours, gazing out from my window – gazing out at the ocean below, with the crashing waves and foaming tides, at the cliffs so many miles away, and the shadows of houses in the distance, as we stand here by my window, so far from civilisation.

I cannot imagine what’s passing through her head as I gaze at her. What feelings could she possibly experience? I could not blame her for any of them. I could not blame her for her sadness, after she stayed at home too long; I could not blame her for her anger, after what happened there. And I could not blame her for hating me, after I let it happen. I make no pretence of my innocence, and neither does she.

A single tear falls from her dry eyes, and falls upon her dress. Her dress, her white dress with the pure lace ribbons and the flowing silks. The dress he bought her. I cannot help but fear that the dress she wears now is why she stayed, why she felt safe. She is a beauty in that dress, her appearance innocence itself, angelic in nature, though under white silk there is no longer the pure girl I once knew.

I love her. I cannot help it, and I will not fight it, but it is there. They told me, so many times, that my love should be given to another, to one who could reciprocate, but I deny them. Through her early joys and the later terrors, I have always, and will always love her.

Her hand rises, the first movement this hour, and perhaps this day; we have stood here a while. It grasps the top of the window frame, her soft hands betrayed by savage marks, her arm flexes. I want to say something, to call out to her and tell her what she must hear – but she is used to me now, she knows me. She will not let me speak.

I see the woman by my window rise from the floor, her small legs lifting her similar frame up to the open window. I see the ocean rise up in my view as she prepares to forget, and I finally I know.

I know she has chosen me. That she will not let me go, even when she forgets him, and the world, and life. From her eyes I watch; I watch the cliffs become greater, the house on the hill become even smaller before, and the ocean below become so immense I fear it will swallow us.

And then it does.

And now there is no woman standing by my window, just an empty house, and its shadow.