All My Lovin' to Black Magic Woman.

The whole world is shrouded in fog.

I can almost see C.'s truck from the front window. Almost.

But the world is fog, and dark. Cold.

Work gets pushed back as we are driving towards it, so we stop to eat breakfast. The whole world stays in its shroud. It is hiden from everything. Even in the city the fog blankets the world. Softenes it. Makes it humble. No one is hard in the fog. They are all blurs and soft lines. We move slowly in the fog. The world is effectively gone.

Ma. calls, and we begin to drive towards work.

And as we approach the top of a hill the sun comes through. It is bright and the fog burns. The edges of things reform, but somehow they don't look harsh. Houses come up from behind trees, stores seem to materialize out of the mist. The sun is beautiful and warm, and somehow the fog has left behind a kind of softness, gentleness on the day.

We get to work. This house that we have already been painting for an entire day.

Work is just that. I move, and paint. Lift ladders, scale the roof, strain, stretch, sometimes panic at the height. But there is peace in my heart. Something has come over me. I hum The Beatles.

"Close your eyes and I'll kiss you,

tomorrow I'll miss you."

And then I get a text from V.

"All my loving."

I quote the song back and forth with her. She loves music too. And she loves me. It is this perfect storm, and on this day it is exactly what I wanted, maybe even needed. Something about the soft edges of the day made me want to talk with her. To hear the silk of her voice. At lunch I call, and she fills my mind with images of sliding across living room floors in socks, dancing to music that we both love.

I hear the music, and feel my feet slide across the floor.

"When they said, 'Come dancing,' my sister always did."

From the roof tops the sun warms me. I can see the whole neighborhood. From the top of "The Beast" the flock of sparrows fly under me. It is still tall as shit. And I'm still scared out of my mind. But somehow, that soft edge is still there, and the day, though long, still passes.

At the end of the day Ma. hands me a twenty. A tip from the people whose house we are painting. I text V. about how good of a day it was. And the tip, and how if I were going home to her I would be bringing home dinner, or a nice bottle of wine, or something nice with my windfall. We pull away from the job site in C.'s truck and a new kind of softness falls.

The sun is setting.

The mountains are black and purple, the colour of a deep tissue bruise. Black Magic Woman comes on the radio, and I can't help but think of my V. She is at home. I'm on my way to a room, that feels a bit like home but isn't. And as the song fades away, all I can think is, "Come dancing."

Slide across the floor.

Kiss on the cheek.

Curl up in bed.

Do it all again tomorrow.

File under Virtue.