Three of Hearts

A girl was losing her ruby.
Alone and crying she wandered through the gardens of suicide, looking for someone to make the sun shine again. She felt every pill, every razorblade and nook that came her way. She felt the pain rising from the flowerpots and the flowerbeds and gradually it became her own. It clung to her skin like a tattoo, like a drowning creature, and seeped to her veins, poisoning her mind like a plague.
The obscure, uncaring sun began to set, looking over the land and seeing nothing but sadness and despair.
As dusk painted the sky with purples and blues, the girl strayed far from the gardens of suicide. She had wandered into the forest of mists. It was a forgetting place where everything was pearly grey; the trees were grey, the sky was grey and the mist swirled and gleamed grey. The sun had never shone in the forest of mists - it was too scared. It was there that the girl let her frightened ruby grow dull and morose. It, too, became a shade of pearly grey, the shade of the forest. With her ruby gone, the girl started to become uncaring like the forest itself. She did not smile nor frown, no matter what came her way. She walked the countless pathways hidden in the mist, meant only for the eyes of those who knew. Silent, she chose random directions and let the forest show her the way. She felt like she had finally gathered all the pieces in her puzzle. She didn't realize, or then it just made no difference to her, that there indeed was one important piece missing.
All of a sudden, she felt a twinge in where her ruby lay, lifeless like an ordinary stone. Something pulled her to a path that led south-west. Involuntarily, she turned towards her new path like a moth turns to a candle. Without wondering where she was due on her new course she kept on walking, further and further to south-west. Silent hours passed, and finally the girl came to a glade. And in the middle of it sat the missing piece from her puzzle.
At first the girl crept cautiously like a cat towards the centre of the glade. Then she threw her shoes away and started running and screaming. Upon reaching the missing piece, the man in the centre, she spoke softly: "My soul's twin! My brightly shining sea, I've searched for you far and wide!"
He just looked at her silently.
The girl spoke again, louder this time: "Why haven't you come to me, my sparkling diamond? I almost forgot your face, your whole existence!"
He looked at her with infinite eyes and said: "Your ruby is gone and you've turned pallid grey."
The girl felt tears welling inside her upon hearing those words.
"Will you still accept me, my knight in silvery and golden armor, even if my ruby has become morose and dim in my chest?"
"It saddens me to see you like this," the man said. For a moment, he, too, looked tepid.
The girl now cried and whispered: "It will come back to me, I promise this! My ruby will return because you, my daybringer, it always has returned to me! Will you accept me then?"
The man was silent.
"I will paint the skies fiery red and blazing orange for you if you accept me again! The seas and rivers will turn to blood and fine red wine on my command if I can once again be yours, my greatest treasure in the world! And every flower on the face of our Mother Earth will be like a Saint Mary's tear! All this I will make for you if you only desire it!"
The man saw the waking flare of the ruby in her eyes and in her teeth as she spoke of her powers of change. He smiled and said:
"I don't want those. I want you."