never thought

I sat, curled up, in my favorite chair. I never thought I'd be in this place. I kept expecting to see her face, to hear her voice. The kitchen was silent now. No clanging of pans come from there anymore. The proof she was busy fixing a meal; a sturdy pillar in my life.

I reflected on how much fun we had in that kitchen. It was small, so if both of us were in there we'd end up almost dancing together, side-stepping each other as we reached into cupboards. I'd slip my arms around her waist, pulling her possessively to my body.

I remembered feeling her soft, silky hair, tickling my nose buried deep in her hair. The aroma of her shampoo floated past me. I breathed, expecting it to fill my nose with its smell. Instead I breathed in the scent of emptiness.

I sighed deeply. There my mind went again, filling my senses with reminders of her only to have them flee like frightened ghosts in bright daylight.

A knock sounded on the door. My body sprang up of its own accord and I raced for the door. My mind hoped against hope that my life was only a passing nightmare. I swung open the door. I saw her standing before me.

"Isaac. You must have been waiting on the other side of the door for you to open it that fast."

The image before my eyes skittered away into the depths of my brain at the husky male voice.

My younger brother, Taylor, stood in the doorway. It wasn't her.

"Oh. Hi."

"Don't look so excited," He remarked dryly and brushed past me into the house.

My heart fell to the ground, shattering into even smaller pieces if that was possible.

"Yeah, well." I closed the door, wishing it had been her.

Taylor angled a look at me. "You still miss her, don't you?"

I caught my upper lip between my teeth and nodded. The sunlight coming in from the window glinted mockingly off the slim, gold wedding band on Taylor's left hand. I turned away, uncertain again if I had done the right thing in taking my wedding ring off.

"Listen, would you mind going?" I knew my voice was hard. I had to be hard to live. My heart couldn't stand another harsh beating from someone I loved. I swallowed hard. Every little thing reminded me of her. Of the happiness I had with her. Of how alone I was now.

Taylor nodded, understanding shimmering in his eyes. "Sure thing. I just wanted to see how you were doing."

"I'm doing fine." I muttered sarcastically. "Fine, fine, fine."

A slightly stunned look flashed over his face. He turned to go. "Okay." The door shut quietly behind him.

I sank back into my chair. A memory floated into my mind. I didn't want to remember, but I had to.

I had been sitting here. She was cradled against me. My arms had been holding her tight and close. I felt her sigh. I closed my eyes in happiness. She reached for my hand and wove her fingers between mine. Her head turned on my shoulder. She gazed into my eyes. One finger traced my jaw gently. I remember meeting her mouth in a kiss. A kiss that had stopped time for both of us.

A tear slipped from under my closed eyelid and trailed down my check. It slipped into the groove of my mouth, sharing its sad saltiness.

"Tracie. I miss you so much. Why did you have to leave me?" I moaned softly.

The dark, bottomless hole dug deeper in my soul, drilling it in half. I felt the bough break under me. It was as if I had been sitting up in a tree in my happiness with her. Now I felt the ground, hard and unmerciful under me. It was too much like life.

My thoughts wandered back to the day I had received the news of her death. She had been in a plane crash. And we had been in the middle of a fight.

The tears coursed down my face as my mind unforgivingly brought up the memory of us parting at the boarding gate.

I had said bye with my arms at my sides. I caught the glimmer of pain that had flashed across her eyes. She reached out and hugged me close.

Stepping back, she had whispered brokenly but with anger underlying in her tone. "'Bye."

I watched her walk, shoulders squared, down the hallway leading into the plane. She never looked back to me. I stared after her, longing to rush after her and hold her. Kiss her and ask for a truce: the ending to all our arguments. But something held me back. I knew now it had been my pride.

A deep, racking sob shook me as I wished I could turn back time. I wanted to hold and kiss her. I never got to give her a good-bye kiss.

That night as I lay in bed, I chuckled softly at a passing thought. I waited to hear her smile in the dark. I didn't hear it. Her arms didn't slip around me. Her peaceful sigh didn't ease into my ear. The truth slapped me hard again, sending me sprawling on the floor, scrambling to pick up the pieces of my shattered heart.

As I cried, I wondered vaguely if I was ever going to stop crying.

I could almost hear her say, "Stop crying, Ike. Get up and kick life into action. Stop waiting around for it to move and make it move! Get on with it." I couldn't. I just couldn't. Not without her.

That night I traced her name in the dark. My dreams wove comforting webs, painfully haunting, reminding me of the truth. I woke up, discovering my dreams weren't reality. And that reality was hard. Tightly, I grasped my dreams, unwilling to let them slip away and disappear into nothingness.

Tracie. Tracie. I longed to say her name once more and have her hear it. I yearned to fulfill my urge to come up from behind her, slipping my arms around her. To hear her say, "I love you," once more. To tell her how much I loved and needed her.

It hurt to think of her. But it hurt even more to forget her. I wondered if healing would ever come. I knew it would. Vaguely I knew someday I could gently strum my guitar and croon a love song, shining with emotion in front of screaming, unknown faces who would never know the depth of my pain.

Someday I would remember Tracie with a smile, thinking of her teasing grin and her laugh brightening the room and fueling the love in my heart. I knew it would come. But I had always thought it would be when I was sixty, old and grey and ready to die and join her. I had never thought I would be young and brimming with life. I never thought of this. I had never wanted to think of it before.