She looked out over the dunes for his return, a sign, anything.

Would he come? Why haven’t heard? Why is he so distant?

This is the part she hates, the intensity of the feelings, love, hope,

doubt, distance, despair, delight, resolve, and resignation.

It had always been this way. Was it her obsession? Was he really that

different? Was he really so sweet, and caring, and tender, and distant, and

difficult?

Does it have to be thus?

She kept looking, kept hoping, every day, whenever she could, she’d

look out and hope, watch the sun fade and steal her heart, pulling it down

beyond the horizon, inevitably, undeniably. Broken, she would return inside

and pretend her life to continue.

In the morning sunrise would return her hope, renew her spirit, buoy her

heart…..and the pattern would repeat, day in and day out.

The day came when she no longer went to the deck. She

knew now that his absence wasn’t a delay, a deferral, it was a decision.

She would never look out again.

She became better at pretending to be happy,

took solace in things that had become familiar but never fulfilling, there

but not their’s, comfortable but not comforting.

Alive, but not living.

He steered the ship through the storm, made little progress. He had

turned back over and over only to return to this ship and try again. He was

unprepared, unequipped, and unsure of the way.

Sure of his purpose.

There was something that compelled him. Something that drove him on

this time in spite of the storm, In spite of all the objections to his

leaving the safe harbor.

The waves chilled him, blinded him, concealed his progress. But he was

moving forward, he was approaching the coast. He was approaching that which

had held him together for years.

The storm receded, the sun appeared and then set. She would be watching,

or would she? It had been so long, so much time lost, so many times he’d

disappointed her by returning to the safe harbor.

He could see now, the sea was calming, the wind relenting, the mists of the

rains fading. He could see.

He looked at the shore, felt the guilt rise, felt the shame of his cowardly

delay consume him.

How could he have expected her to wait? After all he’d done and failed to

do, how dare he think himself worth it.

He returned to the tiller, began a gentle turn away from the coast. The

tears blinded him, he couldn’t imagine life alone.

And then he heard the voice, he tried to see but only saw motion. She was

there, she had always been there, it was his doubt that blinded him.

But it was her gentle, loving, honest heart that led her back to the

shore. Not another chance, but compelled to continue the journey with him

as they were meant, first separately, and then together, to complete.

It wasn’t where, how, or when they came together, it was always that they

would come together.

The journey continues.