loren
"Mom, sometimes I just feel like you're not listening to what I'm saying..."
"No. I listen. I always listen." She interrupted.
"I feel like you don't care about me when you.."
"I care! You don't feel that way. That's not how it is!" She but in yet again.
"How can you tell me how I feel," I try to explain "You don't know what it is that I'm feeling and you won't even listen when I try to tell you."
The wind gently surrounded me in a cold loving embrace and as I held my arms out the smallest of butterflies landed on my outstretched hand.
There it sat, looking so desolate and pathetic. How had I held on to it for so long? There wasn't any room for it anymore, not in the house or in my heart, but it still hurt to see it finally go. That couch held my memories like it once held us and to see it go was like giving up my last piece of you. Never again would I sit on that couch crying about how we spent our hours and days wasted right there, wishing that you would come back and we could have those days again because now the couch was finally leaving just as you had.
There she was just sitting there, curled up, as if she was hiding from the world. Her knees pulled all the way up to her face. Although it looked like she was completely still I could see the slight shake of her shoulders. The next thing I knew I was crouched beside her, pulling her into me as if I had known her for years and this act of comfort was completely normal. I half expected her to pull away but to my surprise she leaned into me and wrapped her arm around my waist.
Today was the celebration, not the one everyone thought it was. I was not celebrating the coming of a new year but rather the fact that I had lived through another one; the fourth year of life I was given after that fateful night. While everyone lifted their glass of champagne, I closed my eyes and whispered a little prayer to no one in particular.
Miles of highway stretched out before me and miles behind as I drove away from everything I knew into the great unknown. I felt just like the deer lying on the side of the road, who never saw it coming. Was I prepared for all the world was about to hand me?
"What?" she asked looking up from the page.
"I said I think we should give it a break." Her blue eyes stared back at me. "Us" I explained.
"Why would you want to do that?" She questioned me. "You should know by now if want me or not."
For a moment I sat there and realized that a thread was hanging off my world. In attempts to remove it and make my world right again, I pulled the string and slowly watched my whole world unravel.
All she wanted was to hold him one last time but having to sit there silently across from him was torture. He was punishing her for his past, his terrible past. All she wanted was to love him.