lines...

There were so many lines around them. Balls of wool infused with the touch of her memories that she used to keep herself warm on those winter nights. A shawl that an old woman would knit every evening by the light of a dying candle. Her blind eyes and a gentle smile with which she would greet all of us in the morning. Her fairy tale appearance, golden hair kept in a loose bun, wrinkled face and hands that were constantly moving, even when she would take a moment of rest from the work she busied herself with throughout the day. I watched her year after year sitting in an armchair like a queen and a procession of perishable cats and dogs would march in front of her throne. I always thought that she would last forever while everything else would disappear. Everything else remained, only she was not there at night by the window anymore.

The lines on her hands. Some called them the lines of faith, but she often wondered if it was a game of fortune that brought her here or was she a refugee trying to escape mundane life that faith had predestined for her, just like she did for thousands of other women she knew. 

The lines around her eyes. Each day a new line would appear and every day she would grow more worried with those strikes of time that had no mercy on her. Would her face became a painting to be admired by a man sitting across the table, or will it be discarded like a piece of paper with an unwanted message from the past. A letter that you had written to yourself when you still had time to be without counting the minutes of the hours of the days of the years passing by.

The lines under her pen as she tried to clench the memories that evaporated every moment from the numerous cups of tea she liked so much.
The invisible lines of memories. Tenderness. Glasses. Clay cup. Glasses. Brown mug. Glasses. Stolen smile. Glasses. Short sighted eyes that could not grasp beyond the silence that covered her with a black scarf. Glasses. Tea. Glasses. Eyes on her as she touched the belly of a pregnant gypsy woman. Glasses. Words that got stuck in her mouth when she was thirsty for listening. Glasses. She always thought they made him look even more gentle and vulnerable than he actually was. Glasses.
 He changed glasses for lenses ans she could no longer see the lines in them, only cold closed circles sitting somewhere far behind the computer screen. She often thought she would give everything for that one cup of tea when he sat close to her on a chair. He wore glasses at that time.