He sat on the park bench, whittling a branch fallen from the Oak tree overhead. The sun illuminated his fair hair, and sweat glistened above his furrowed brow. Hunched over on the bench, she noticed him working at a rapid pace. She had only seen him focused like this once before, three months prior to their end.

He heard the crunch of a leaf beneath a foot, several yards in front of him and glanced up, watching her auburn locks wrap a ribbon of flames around her long neck, warming her on the coldest of eves. He set down the earthly sword and could feel her green eyes piercing him. However, despite the pain, he did not ask her to leave. He did not ask her to do anything.

She sat down beside him in silence. They both knew they couldn’t hold each other. They shouldn’t waltz in moonlit fields as they used to, they would no longer breathe in each other’s words on brisk and lonely nights. They could only sit beside each other, letting their hair fall from their head and the roses fade from their cheeks, until they would become transparent to the world.

“I love you,” croaked Impulse. She reached out to touch him, but found that she could only burn the arms she longed to hold.

“You mustn’t say such rash things,” hissed Thought. He lay a hand upon the now-inflamed skin, watching it disappear before him.

“But it’s true, and I do not want to live without you!” She advanced, only to force him backwards on the bench.

“It is only true if you convince yourself of it. Don’t you see what we do to each other?” Thought extended a handful of white hair, and the two watched as it blew into the woods, carried by the wind. He waited to be carried along with it, but only managed to exhale his disappointment.

“If we are to die someday, I wish to do it now- with you.”
His eyes, reminiscent of the night sky after a storm, stared into hers, unknowing of how to respond. For the next few minutes, the two lovers watched each other, as they continued to fade away into the breeze.
Impulse had won, and Thought was left with no time to regret their romance.