“What are you running from?” The events of the day prior replayed and replayed, over and over again in a ceaseless cycle. His eyes were brighter, bluer than she’d ever seen them. Tinted with the glow of the stars, accented by the glistening of the snow beneath them.
“What are you running from?” “What are you running from?” “What are you running from?”
Even now, it haunted her like a ghost. It wasn’t demonic, it wasn’t forceful. It was empty, translucent to her half-hearted replies, sorrowful, ghastly. Eerie, even, at this early morning hour.
What was she running from? Why was she running? Why had that question disturbed her so much? She’d finally found a soft place to land after years of running. Not only was she accepted, but she was beloved. Not only was she competent at her job, but she exceeded all expectations with her work ethic alone. So why now, three weeks before Christmas, the first Christmas she wouldn’t have to spend alone in years? Why now, only mere hours since the pair had returned from the mountaintop barn?
She stared at the letter in her hand, her feeble lettering cast in loose script over the front of the lined notebook paper. Twelve letters, one comma, three dots symbolizing something more. Something greater that she couldn’t express, a hope that this letter and her intended actions would not diminish a future hope, a future joy, that was even half of what he’d given her in a few short months.
Scott, i’m sorry…
She said a silent prayer to herself--at this point, she was her only savior. She stared towards the staff dorms with more pain than she had thought she could pour out of herself. She’d cried a thousand tears before, and had turned her heart away from her fickle emotions with a gilded anguish. She was already prepared to cry far more than one-thousand and one in the days coming. Before, she’d had nothing to stay for, nothing to hold onto. This time, the very thing that had held onto her, the very person, was the reason she couldn’t stay.
“What are you running from?” “What are you running from?” “What are you running from?”
His voice echoed in the back of her head one more. How did he know? A fool’s intuition? A soulmate’s grace? She’d told him nothing, but those blue eyes knew everything. It was both terrifying and exhilarating to be seen, to be known, without having to sacrifice a breath. That was the moment she knew her world would never be the same. That was the moment she knew she couldn’t stay.
Shuddering in the frigid truck, she decided against leaving the letter. Telling him how she felt was a fool’s game, and although tainted by passion at this moment, she would never stoop to emotion, stoop to the pain that was willing to obliterate her if she stayed anywhere for too long. Especially in the company of the one person she’d quickly realized she could never leave, if she didn’t do it now. Folding the letter up, she placed it on the passenger seat, putting the key in the ignition, and driving away. She’d proved, once again, that she could be stronger than the voices in her head that told her it was okay, she could stay, she was safe now, she was protected, and she was not her past. But at what cost?
Sunny
