The floor was cold and the wooden door and frame was hard on their backs.
Neither Jessica nor David were able to move.
Even if they had wanted to, the emotional weights that had suddenly landed on top of each of them, refused to let them up.
So there they sat.
Jessica’s heart was thudding so rapidly that she became nervous that it would give her away.
David rested his head in his hands.  He shouldn’t have come in here, he should have know that it would have triggered his, thus far suppressed, emotions.
The impact that this single woman had had on his life was beyond what he could ever have imagined.
In his mind, he could sense that her image was replacing that of something dear, the memory of his mother’s face.
Although rather than disappearing, he would now often see, out of the corner of his eye, not just her face, but her entire person, it had been this way since he had acquired this home.  However any time that he looked directly at her, she would be gone.  Sense and reason told him that it couldn’t possibly be his mother that he was seeing, but his heart still longed for even the slightest glimpse, even though the image never lingered.
So when he looked to the settee across the room, it didn’t startle him to see her sitting there.
A soft vision in white, with a translucent glow radiating all around her, giving the impression that one could look right through her if you didn’t realise that she was there.  She was there, and yet she wasn’t.
David knew she was there.  She spoke no words, but her gentle gaze spoke volumes of love and understanding for her son.
He knew she was listening, waiting to hear what he had to say.
“I’ve been so lost,” his voice rang out in the darkness, “I don’t know how much longer I can go on like this, being kept so deeply in the dark.  There is so much that I wish I knew and yet I’m sure that if I did know, I wouldn’t want to.”
The following silence seemed to completely dull Jessica’s senses, as though the air everywhere but the room behind the door, had thickened, leaving that space clear and open.
It sounded to her as though David were addressing someone as he spoke.  Was there really someone else in there with him, or was he talking to himself, to his own imagination?  If the latter were the case, it didn’t take much to guess that he would have conjured up a figure of comfort such as Jennifer or herself.  Although, much more likely, it was someone much more intimate and trusted than either Jennifer or herself could ever be, a reincarnation of his lost mother.
Jessica’s every sense focused on the person on the opposite side of the door, wanting to hear what he was thinking, fearing what it might mean for the both of them.
“Ever since I left father’s estate, I promised myself that I would never be swayed into marriage or even a relationship with any woman for any reason other than love.  I found that person that allows me to see naught but a future with her at my side and marriage is the last thing that we are thus far able to even consider.”  He sighed, “Part of me thinks that I should be angry with her, with myself, for allowing myself to fall in love in the first place, but I can’t even do that properly.  All that my mind will tolerate is the memory of her touch, her scent, the feel of her lips against my own.”
Jessica’s entire body tingled at the mere mention of the memory of their stolen kiss, her fingers reaching, involuntarily, for her lips as though she could capture the sensation in her hand.
A few moments silence followed in which David allowed a few solitary tears to roll down his tired face.
His mother seemed to emanate deep concern although her appearance hadn’t changed at all.  He could feel her gaze pierce his very soul, she already knew all that was in his heart, just as she already knew what it was that he would say.
Opening his mouth to speak, he hesitated.
What more was there to say?
“I love her beyond life and time itself with no exception or explanation.  Jessica Faileas owns me heart, and will live in it long after I have left this world.”
He stared ahead into the empty darkness, eyes straining to see her face again.  To no avail, the vision has faded back into the shadows, leaving him alone.  Rising first to his knees and then to his feet, he cried out with a vague hope that she was still listening.  “All I need to know is if she’d alright.”
As the words echoed into the night, David knew that the words had been heard.
Through the silence, Jessica could felt that her heart were about to burst.  How it ached.
Her eyes stung from the dryness that came from the lack or tears, her breathing, though steady, and quiet, made her chest pound painfully.
Time passed; seconds, minutes, hours.
Neither could tell how long had passed.
The thought that David had clearly not checked his messages recently, brought Jessica to wonder at what his reaction and response would be to her message.  If only she could somehow be present when he read it. 
Maybe T could help, he could watch or tell her how to, but no, she had told him where to go.  There would be no more help from that tricky…  The mystical route that he had begun to take her down had now narrowed to the tiny particles of unexplained information that he had divulged before the fight, and Buail, that still lay strapped to her thigh, reminding her of it’s presence by a slight pinch every now and again.
Another thought had entered her mind, it was brief and she was barely able to grasp it before her mind spiralled back to the crushing weight of the present.  Had any of the others received their messages, or even responded yet?
The thought wasn’t enough though, it only brought the possibility of more pain, and waves of sadness and severe loneliness began to drown her.
Closing her eyes, Jessica focused her breathing and began to dig, right down into the darkness that was still swarming about on the edge of her subconscious, anything to stop herself from loosing control.  Deeper and deeper she delved into the memories and thoughts that only a few days ago, would have made her shudder and cry at the thought of.  Those very thoughts she now bathed herself in, washing away the feelings of ambition for her own happiness, forcing down the urge to burst through the door and into his arms.
Opening her eyes caused a rush of dry calm and mute emotions to fall around her.  Never before had she ever been able to feel so placid over something so emotional, and the calm scared her.
With one swift movement, she brushed aside all thoughts of the man on the other side of the door and pushed herself to her feet.
It wasn’t until she was out of the door and safely down the corridor that she allowed herself to receive the thoughts of the possible responses that awaited her discovery.
Quickening her pace, Jessica headed for the library.

David stirred from his trance to find that darkness still lingered in the room.
He momentarily considered returning to bed, despite the fact that he would never get to sleep.  Restlessness moved his feet in the direction of the door.
Without quite knowing where they were taking him, he followed his feet as they moved themselves, one ahead of the other.
After several minutes he found himself turning into the library.  In the silence of the night he could clearly hear the whirring buzz of the printer as something, only a page or two, was run off.
“Hello?” he called out ahead of him, not realising, until this moment, how dry his mouth was, and making his way through the shelves toward the noise, “Jennifer?  What are you doing up at this…” his voice trailed off as he rounded the corner, “hour?”