It was the perfect winter morning.

Silver mists flirted with a crimson sun. A purple tinge searing the white skies was a testimony to the fun they were having. Orange leaves rustled their goodbyes. Lifelessly they flitted to the foot of the tree. They crunched, and the tree winced invisibly. Silently watching as the leaf, which was once the reason for his very existence was ground into dust under the unknowing heel.

She could hear the crunch, and she could feel the pain. Yet, she could not stop herself from putting one foot before the other. Crunching, crushing, realizing. If only she could do that with memories too. Memories, which were faded and worn. If only she could grind them to dust as easily as the autumn leaves.

Memories which shackled her happiness. Like the green heavy moss on the barks of ancient oaks, they refused to let go. And she stood there, just as mute and just as heavy, letting the past creep on her. She was addicted to her past. A past which had almost killed her.

Crunch!

Another leaf ground to the dust.

Another moment gone. Another past created. Another memory born.

Are memories immortal?

Do they ever die?

Crunch!

More dust.

Her breath danced on clouds of vapor, as she continued walking. The warmth of life mixing with the cold of death creating a new moment… which vanished. She had to stop killing the future before it s time. She had to let hope reside. To live in the past, would mean to die. For one cannot survive in the cycle of that which has already happened.

So why did she keep returning to that moment of decision? To that fork where you could choose to live or choose to exist?

Her heel clicked against the cobblestone. She breathed a sigh of relief. The crunching leaves were beginning to torment her. This was a new path. Shining, gleaming, black. The winds warned her before they blew the mists away. Naked sunlight streaked through the clear skies and sizzled on her scars.

Another reminder that this was her second chance.

She ran a finger along her cheek, tracing the scar that ran along it. Twenty years had done naught to erase it. Nor had they managed to ease the pain of the memory of its birth. The scar had taken her parents away. The scar had left her alive.

Was the scar good or bad?

On the horizon she could see the fog kicking up again. A hazy line which blurred the golden edge of earth's stolen kiss. An intruder. Unwelcome.

Her head dropped and she sighed. The swirls of her breath danced around her pink, glistening lips. An image flashed through her mind. Blood, hair, rugs and piece of glass sticking out of her cheek. The sun glinted off the glass and scattered a million colors on her bleeding cheek.

She shook her head to clear the memory.

Crunch!

She was back under the tree again.