Elizabeth Drouillard
Special to CSMS Magazine
She never called him by his name—not in the quiet sanctuary of her thoughts. To her, he was the midnight egret. He came without warning, always when the world was asleep or weeping. There was something in the way he moved—measured, deliberate, as if he feared shattering the silence that clung to her like grief.
He never lingered. A glance, a word, a hand brushing hers as he passed—then gone. And yet, his absence carried more weight than the presence of any other. She couldn’t explain it to her friends, who spoke of love like fire or thunder. He was neither. He was the soft ghost of a dream, the elegant white bird glimpsed only at night, gliding just beyond reach.
In a world too loud, too cruel, he was her hush. Her secret. Her midnight egret.
Note: Elizabeth Drouillard is our new collaborator. She is a short-fiction writer who lives in Northern Virginia.
