Timing

Timing is everything.
Missing the bus could cause you to be late and hence, punished. Bad mood, bad day, bad choices,
Consequences.
Missing the perfect timing to confess will cause the person to doubt you for real, and you will never be the same again.
Missing the apology thinking it isn't needed will hurt the person so much your relationship cracks and sinks like the Titanic.

Just a moment earlier or later changes everything.

And when you realize what could have been if you were just a little earlier, you get this feeling alike to a starving disease, gnawing at your heart and eating vulnerable pieces off it, all the while crashing through the defenses of the stronger parts.
You picture what it would be like if you had skipped a thought, a beat, an action.

If only you looked at that thing earlier---even by one second--- you would have arrived at that thought earlier and it would not have been too late.
Regret?
Yes, but no.

Would you not have fantasised about the hundreds of possibilities that could have occurred to prevent this tragedy?
Would you not have wished to be the one couple in a tragic movie, that gets to live on happily ever after?
Would you not have been irrational like a human?

The thoughts dart around inside your head, the thousands of voices all speaking the same thing, the tears threatening to overflow but your eyes remain dry, dry, dry like the desert, dry and desperate for something possibly impossible to reach.
The angel and devil quarrels but they aren't as aggressive as before. The characters put on their superhero suits and personas but they don't save you. They can't.
Everything comes to a standstill and you sit and watch the color drain from everything.

You wait for the colors to come back.
Come back like the rain always does, like the rainbow after a storm, like a hug after an argument.
But it doesn't come.

And still, you live.