come away with me

It happened at dusk. At the gloaming.

I was up in a hot air balloon, looking down on a plantation house surrounded by ancient pecan trees. The fire was hot on my face, the moon rising among the clouds. I disembarked as darkness struck and strolled past the torches lighting the path to a grand tent. As I came around the corner, I heard music. It was Norah Jones singing Come Away With Me, and I stopped where I was, alone beside a carriage house, hidden in shadow.

That moment held a sort of magic, and I was transfixed.

If I had been in a movie, there would have been someone waiting under the tent, arm held out invitingly for a slow dance of forgotten steps, of a cheek on a shoulder, of shining eyes. It was the moment when everything misunderstood is made plain, when unanswered questions are finally resolved. The kind of moment where a spotlight shines on you, and everything else melts away, and you're in a little bubble, smiling a secret smile. A hundred different stories went through my mind about magical things that could have been happening.

But they didn't, because I was alone.

The moment was there, and I was there, and that was all.

I stayed where I was until the song was over, swaying gently, arms wrapped around my waist. I watched a few people dancing under the tent, the lights twinkling around them like stars as they laughed. And I couldn't help thinking that somewhere, someone was having that moment where everything changes, that someone was experiencing magic.

It just wasn't my turn.

But there was a certain magic in that, too.

Even when nothing changed, something changed.

I'll never hear that song the same again.

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