time moves on but were

Cereza’s face is relaxed and her hand is steady on the knife as she slices through the squash she picked out for dinner. Each slice is precise and even, and she pushes them off the cutting board onto a separate plate with the flat of the blade to make space as she works. The bow of her lips, the cut of her jaw, her eyes, the grey of a summer storm, are all Rosa of course; but the hook of her nose is an exact match to Balder’s own. It is almost startling to recognize a part of himself in her.

When Rosa first let him hold her, she was just a shock of dark hair and a powerful set of lungs. He almost doesn’t believe the woman standing before him is real.