| I think she must have come back that night, she
came back and it was just the beginning. There was marriage and children,
a home with a white picket fence and a golden retriever name Rusty. It seemed like the sun was always shining on green grass of that backyard. It seemed like birds were always singing. He was happy, truly happy and every other dream he ever had faded because he knew that he’d found his destiny and that there wasn’t any greater thing he could have done than this adventure, this great adventure of marriage and fatherhood. But the next ten years sped past like the bright red cars that streaked across the street in front of his house late Friday nights. The years sped by and she fell ill. I won’t get into details but suffice it to say that hope turned to prayers and prayers turned pleading before it was all over. On a bright summer day in august she died and by that time it was a mercy. She had suffered enough, they all had. When they laid her to rest he shed no tears. By that time the well was dry. He still had their children, little twinkling stars, a light to see by now that the sun had set forever. He did his best to be there for them as the years went by, but he kept one day to himself, That one day belongs to him and his wife. It isn’t the anniversary of her death, or their anniversary, its her birthday. He sits in that chair and he sees her. First, just a shadow walking out of the sun, then, a ripple in the air, and as the day deepens she grows stronger, and sits there at his side and they talk in a language we forget when we learn how to speak. She is almost whole by the time the day ends, by the time he says goodbye, he can see her, just as she was before she died, before she got sick and she hasn’t aged a day though he has. She is almost whole right before the sun sets and then she fades away, and they touch hands and he can almost feel her, like those moments when he cradles her so close to him in dreams, that moment when he realizes its all just a dream and she really is gone and he feels himself slipping back into the waking world and her slipping away and he wishes that he could stay forever. The sun sets and he walks away, and he takes small comfort in knowing that he will back again next year, and she will be there, always be there. That’s why he returns. She lifted her head, and the wind was still in her hair, that light in her eyes... |
