Snowflakes

She stood by the frosty window. A small smile turning up the corner of her lips. A warm mug of coffee clasped to her heart. The wonderful warmth and rich aroma starkly contrasting the cold blue light of the morning sun that filtered through the clouds, that backlight a beautiful dance of snowflakes. The April blizzard had been dragging on for a week. On this peaceful morning she wasn’t sick of the snow she was fascinated by it.

A soft clink alerted her to his presence. He was setting his own mug of coffee on the table behind her. No chair scrapings followed since he was coming to join her staring out the window. Now, his disgruntled morning visage was one of her favorite sites—however, even it couldn’t pry her eyes from the elegant tumble of tiny crystalline fluff balls outside.

She was so engrossed in the simple hypnotic scene that his arms wrapping her into a tight hug almost startled her. He pulled her close to his chest not unlike how she herself was clutching her coffee. “What are you thinking about, beautiful?” he whispered in her ear. She chuckled although she loves it he is ridiculously corny.

“Snowflakes,” she replied though a content sigh, the warmth of him spreading through her.

He pecked her cheek. “I thought you were ready for baby green things and sick of the snow?” He mumbled engulfing her in coffee breath—which surprisingly was not as pleasant an aroma as coffee on its own. However, his proximity completely compensated.

“Each snowflake formed on a tiny imperfection in the air,” she mused, sipping her hot coffee. “Imperfections that formed beautiful—perfect—snowflakes. Like pearls! So much beauty seems to come from imperfection: snowflakes, pearls, people.” Setting her cup on the window sill to interlace fingers with him. They watched the snow falling and the steam rising from her mug. Complete opposites.

“What imperfection forms people?”

“Not people, beautiful people. If people were all perfect they would be boring, and ugly.”

“Why would perfect be ugly?”

“People are soft, caring, kind… those are not good for survival… perfect people would be sharp, hard, mean, ugly people.”

“Imperfectly Perfect.” He smiles. She could feel it. He held himself different when he smiled. She loves his smiles. She loves having someone to tell her random musings too.

She finally peels her eyes from the beautiful cold splendor of the morning. She turns to find warmth. His smile gentle and content and perfect. With his sleep tousled hair and tired relaxed eyes. His warmth dazzling her. He was rivaling the scene outside for beauty. “Perfectly imperfect in imperfectly perfect ways… like you, love.” He laughed a lazy "it’s too early to be this goofy" laugh. In that moment, that laugh was the perfect song. In that place—in that time—life was perfect. All the stress, all the failures, all the imperfections had led up to this one beautiful perfect moment. She gathered her cup and sipped the now cold coffee. Imperfectly perfect moment she mentally corrected as she settled in next to him on the sofa to watch the snow.

She was happy. She had coffee, cuddles, a view, and someone to share her crazy lines of thought with. Someone who she thought was perfect. He kissed her forehead. “You’re perfect too. With your life altering realizations about snow, your messy hair, your coffee breath, and your pjs. You are one of the beautiful people.” He always knew what to say to melt her heart… and one up her compliments.

There they sat. Not worrying about the future. Completely unaware that their lives were about to change. The snow tumbled softly muting the world outside. Hiding the truth. The imperfectly perfect beauty of it all fleeting and surface deep; while deep below much more sinister happenings threatened everything. But for them—his perfect moment was just that, blissful, soft, morning coffee on a frigid April day. When life gives you a reprieve from the chaos you should be like them—ignoring their impending doom so that they can properly savor the imperfectly perfect moment.