Sometimes Sofia would lean forward and watch the pale figure walking across the square, stooping slightly against the wind. Everyone in the small town knew the visitor was the famous writer from New Zealand who had come to this place for a gentle winter and perhaps to write again. The figure was often alone and rarely entered any shop except the poste to check for letters and buy the darkest chocolate. Sofia had spent several hours following the thin outline of the woman’s body with a piece of charcoal as the woman had sat at Pascal’s reading. Her lips knew sorrow Sofia decided and smudged the mouth, so that shadow settled the expression of exhausted hope. Sofia played with her aunt’s blue earrings and held them in her palm. Lapis lazuli for her seventeenth birthday and here she was at 23 watching a dying woman drink coffee alone. Sofia had never seen anyone more magical. more beautiful.
She would open her front door and run barefoot across the square bowing slightly from the waist and presenting the most beautiful face she had ever imagined, with a pair of darkest blue lapis lazuli earrings.
