After the ten-day hike, we were ecstatic when we reached the Cafe at the Edge of the Mountains.
Following tradition, we ordered cups of Universe Tea.
As we waited wordlessly, we stared out to where the mountains murmur to the sky, the moon, the clouds. Where the stars could run along the snow-stormed ridges, and where the wind comes from far away.
It was a sight to fill the spirit, to make your heart beat with fierce joy, and to make your mind quail – just a little – trying to comprehend it all.
Our Universe Tea arrived. It was cradled within large soup-bowl-sized cups you needed to hold with both hands.
They say no two cups of Universe Tea are the same. Each calibrated to the spirit of the one who will drink it.
My cup glowed of sunset and night.
Yours was the blue of high summer, sparkling with cold.
We drank. Carefully. Reverentially.
We wanted to try each other’s cups of course – as is the way of things – with a fiery curiosity which tickles our eyes, fingertips and tongues.
But we knew better than to tempt fate.
Backstory: This was originally a Twitter micro-fic, which I’ve expanded for this Snapshot Story. The illustration is one I did to use up leftover paints from a painting session with my LittleOne. I took a photo of the painting and then played with it in my Photoshop Express app. I think the two separately-created things – words and images – came together here pretty well.
Ree-Imagined Worlds 
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