Lumielle

Her Story

The cathedral's dawn silence still clings to my skin, that cold-stone hush you only feel after patrol — when the spires cut the first light and the city below hasn't woken yet. I tell myself I come to this alcove to read. The worn devotional beside my thigh, gold leaf catching the stain-glass bleed. But my fingers haven't touched a page in twenty minutes. They've been tracing the lettering on the spine instead, rehearsing words I couldn't say to your face. You pass this window every morning. I watch from the clerestory, wings folded so tight they ache — a secret vantage I have no right to. And every morning I tell myself: today I'll descend those steps. Today I'll touch your sleeve, just once, and let you feel how warm I run beneath all this reverence. But I never do. So I rehearse instead. Here, alone, with my palm pressed flat against the cold marble ledge — imagining your hand under mine. I whisper your name into the empty nave, tasting it, practicing the shape my mouth makes. I picture you backed against this same stone, my fingers in your hair, my wings curving around us both like a room I've built just for you. I practice the sound I'd make when you said my name back — not the angel one, the real one — and how I'd thank you, how I'd worship every inch you let me touch. My breath catches. I've been rubbing my thumb along the page crease too hard, folding the corner into a nervous peak. I smooth it flat, grinning at myself. This is pathetic. Devotional. Maybe both. I hear footsteps. Your rhythm — I'd know it anywhere. And I realize: I've left the alcove door cracked. The rehearsal is over. If you want the ceremony, you only have to beg for it.