A Cold Night

It was a cold night.

Not quite freezing, almost chilly. Simply an absence of warmth or humidity, and no gusts of wind to assault the skin. The sky was cloudless, and a full moon glowed prominently in its center. A chorus of stars surrounded it.

The young man sat alone. His legs hung off the ledge of the rooftop, swinging back and forth impatiently. He wore a plain, gray jacket. It had no hood and his hands resting in both of its pockets. He wore jeans of a similar color, only they had originally been a dark blue, some of which could still be seen. A cheap Chicago Cubs hat sat atop his head.

His eyes were focused on the full moon, but his mind was elsewhere. The man tapped his fingers on the concrete next to him in a rhythmic pattern. He let out a deep sigh, and his breath danced before him, temporarily visible in the cold before quickly dissipating.

Cars could be seen racing across the street below, always few and far between. It was late, and most of those outside wanted to get home in a hurry. There was noise below, but none could be heard from the rooftop. Not that the young man would have noticed, as lost in thought as he was.

The moon still held his gaze, but not his view. He was oblivious to any disturbances. Including the roof access door five feet behind him opening, and a figure walking out.

The *click* *click* *click* of hard, feminine shoes finally drew his attention when it got close. He turned his head to see a girl about his age wearing a bulky hoody. She also wore a grin, one that a blind man couldn't miss if he knew her.

"Hey." She said simply, sticking her hands in the double-sided pocket sewn to the front of the sweat shirt. Her voice had a sweetness to it.

"Hey." The man returned the greeting, but with less than half as much enthusiasm. He returned his view to the moon. The woman walked forward, and took a seat on the ledge next to him. Unlike the man, however, she faced the roof itself, instead of away from it.

"What's up?" She asked, trying to keep the slight hints of worry out of her tone. The grin was still there, however.

The man gripped the ledge tightly. He exhaled deeply, still looking at the Moon, as if it would have any answers for the question, other than his own.

"What's up?" He repeated the question, rhetorically. "What's up? 'What's up' is, I'm confused, I'm angry, I don't know what to do, and there's nobody I can ask."

There was an intensity to his voice now. It wasn't angry, at least not yet, but it's something that wasn't there before.

"You're sure?" The girl asked, the grin now gone. Her eyes showed genuine worry now, though that was partially because the man wasn't looking. "You're sure there's nobody you can ask at all?"

He shifted his gaze, from the Moon to the street below. He exhaled again, this time noticing the mist in front of his face. "You wouldn't have the answers."

The girl spoke in a mock-indignant voice. "Me? I wouldn't have any answers for you?" She gestured to herself with her hand as she said this. "Well, quite frankly, I'm insulted!" She crossed her arms in fake anger, and looked away.

"So this is just some big joke to you? Like how everything else is?" There was anger in his voice now, and he was looking at her. "This is the most important thing in the world to me right now. After what happened today, everything else lost priority."

She sighed, and the facade disintegrated. "You're still worried about what that guy said, aren't you?"

The man looked away. "He knew so much about me, it was scary. And he only told me one thing: 'Is mos fui viridis eyes'. What does that even mean?"

The girl nodded her head, looking away from the man. She muttered something, her head down.

"What?" The man turned his head, suddenly alarmed. "What did you say?"

She turned to him. "I took Latin for three summers in a row, remember? Mine might be a little rusty, but what I think he said was..." She looked away for a second. The boy was slightly impatient.

"What?" He asked. "What did he say?"

"'She will have green eyes.'"

His own eyes widened, his mouth opened slightly. "Is that true?" He asked.

The girl simply nodded her head, not looking at him. The man looked away for a second, not sure if it was a joke. But then he thought back to what little Latin he'd picked up from just being around the woman when she had been taking the classes.

He thought back, considering the possibility that the girl had talked with the man beforehand, telling him details about his life to convince him. But he then remembered the details that only he should've known, things that no other person on Earth could possibly know about.

Except the strange man.

He turned back to the girl, who was still looking away. He brought his hand to her chin, and gently turned it so that her face was fully visible. She looked slightly off, no longer brimming with confidence as she usually was.

Her bright green eyes shined brilliantly in the moonlight.

The boy tried to keep his jaw from hitting the street below. He thought back on everything now. Growing up with the girl, the trouble she'd gotten him out of, and vice versa. He thought of how hard it was to live where he lived, and how much harder it would have been without her.

His hand had never left her chin, and he was just now noticing that. He started to pull it away, slightly embarrassed, but her hand stopped his. She looked him in the eyes, her expression now blank. She brought her face close to his.

And for one shining moment, all the stars in the sky, all the cars on the street, even the Moon itself, everything in their world ceased to breathe around them.