“Let’s go skiing in the park,” I suggest.

“I’ll pick you up in twenty minutes,” he responds.

He pulls his car up in front of my office, and I climb in, banging my boots together. He drives us across the city core to my apartment. The streets are empty as though it’s Christmas.

I change my clothes and pull my skis out from under my bed. We take the elevator down to the lobby, and the building manager is sweeping the entrance area of the last hour’s snowfall. She leans on her broom and laughs as we clip into our skis and head off down the middle of the road.

We ski around the lagoon and through the rose garden. We ski out through the forest, towering firs and leaning cedars, to the lake. We ski along the seawall, and the tide is low and the air smells like brine and kelp.

These magic moments, alone in the forest, alone in the city. Three million people here, and I somehow found the one person who wants to ski through the city and into the park with me.

I tell him this. I tell him that he is my favourite as we are skiing through a grove of rhododendrons.

He turns to me.

“I like how this is all going. I like where we are going. I hope that it lasts forever.”

My heart jumps. I ski quietly and snow falls around us.

We emerge from the park and ski side-by-side down the centre of the road past apartment buildings and towering leafless maple trees.

I feel a radiant warmth pulsing from within me. I am all light and beauty.