Alice

The onset of winter always put the mathematician into a contemplative mode but perhaps not this season. 

Against the punishing cold wind and in hope of finally filling his growing void, he is climbing up a steep mountain with an illuminated top. Many lone strangers are on the same journey, it is important that they arrive punctually at the prophesied time. White snow descend from above to become subjects of mortality, becoming and becoming until the return again. At the mountain peak, everyone seems to be following someone through a narrow secret passage. Like robot sheep, they solemnly march deep onto a path less travelled. The mathematician is surprised to see so many strangers have the same torment on their face. He has brief conversations with some of them: the tattooed soldier who is here for the girl, an old lady who lost her child and the insane...the talks are uninspiring and heavy with strong emotions of all kinds. He then thinks about her and the void stares back... 

After what seems like eternity, he finally sees it: although vibrating at a frequency that is alien to him, the mathematician recognizes its gracefulness and elegance almost immediately like an equation that suddenly becomes clear and complete, almost logically so. He hears people crying and dropping like flies before the overwhelming sensation but he is calm. His fingers run though it, feeling its every existence throbbing at his nerves. Up close, he sees what it really is - a trick, an illusion, a Buddha education. He knows she is not here but she is. No longer seeking, the mathematician leaves before everyone else. 

Meanwhile, the trickster is much pleased with her trick. she lets out a cynical laugh and labels them as sentimental fools.