Three of Spades

In a way, she felt like they had already kissed long ago. More than a kiss. The sum of hundreds of stolen glances, private smiles and small conspiracies was much greater in her mind than a dozen kisses. She wondered how long you had to look at someone before you had reached the equivalent of a kiss? How many inscrutable moments were necessary to constitute the right to ask for something tangible? What was worth more: the reality of lips finally meeting, hungrily, in haste, or a collection of remembered incidents that could be replayed, extrapolated upon, and made perfect by the passage of time? The idea of it exhausted her, drained her of reason, and kept her alive at the same time. His power, neither absolute nor fatal, was nonetheless akin to the spadille itself, and definitely of the same suit. He trumped her like a metaphorical Three of Spades. And from her beating core to her jangling senses, she loved every minute of it.