From this side of the Border...

She sat by the table... The room was dark. She took the sheet of paper and placed it next to the ink on the small wooden table. She picked up the match sticks, unsure of why she was doing this...again. 

She lit the candle and looked around to see if any1 was near. The house seemed quiet, still, almost as if she were alone. But she wasn't, she never was. He was always around her, her husband. He was asleep, so were the children.
If any one found out, it wouldn't go down well. 

She shook her head, steering her thoughts clear of every1 else.

She smiled at the paper... it was her favourite kind. Rough, beige, hand made with a hint of rose scent. She remembered how he'd liked the paper...

She thought for a moment... how would she begin? There were no words or thoughts in her head, just feelings. A mix of a zillion emotions that she wasn't sure of. But she knew that once she began to write, it would all come to her.

She dipped the pen into ink and began...

WITH LOVE... From this side of the Border. 

My Love,

I've missed you. It's been a while since I saw your face. I've been dreaming, not one pleasant dream in the past month... you haven't come to visit me in a while. 

Could you? I feel like you're fading, I'm beginning to forget what your smile looks like... I don't want to forget. You are like sand, held tight in my palm. I'm losing you. Am I not?

I haven't spoken to any1, I don't want to share you. I can't bring myself to talk about you. 

Strange isn't it. You are all I think of and I can't bring myself to utter a word about it. They say it's not right, that we are two worlds apart. They say it's just an unfulfilled want from years ago, that it will pass...

I smile at them...Two worlds apart? We speak the same language, it has a different name on either side. But it really is the same, the words and the feelings driving those words. 

Will you speak to me again...just once?  

 

I haven't been able to sleep much of late. I wonder if we were to have made a different decision would you be by my side right at this moment? Would we have lost every1 else who mattered to us? 

Would we have been happy with that decision and it's outcome? Because God knows I'm not content with this one. 

I wonder if you think about me as I do you. I wonder if you ever asked for me or about me. I wonder if you know I am a married woman now, that I have two wonderful children. Both girls...they're beautiful. 

Strange where I ended up, I'm in the exact place I never thought I'd be, married with children and a stay at at home mother. It's not half as bad... I would have liked to be bigger though, I would have liked to make my mark in the world, as you have. 

I think about you often, wonder if you would get along with my girls... I imagine how they would take to you... I wonder if you look at them and be happy for me.

You are good father after all... you always were. That is one of the qualities I loved best about you even then.  

There is much that had been unsaid.

I'm not sure what brings me the courage to write this to you. I am not bitter anymore for I know what we had was real. I know if I ever happen to see you again I will smile at you, maybe even ask about her. I would talk to you, tell you about my journey since I last saw you.

But of all the things I would like to say, this is of utmost importance...

I am sorry. 

I let it all go and never let you know. You had a life, settled and fragile and I had no place in it, we both knew that it would go nowhere. I truly believed we would fight for our love, but was it worth breaking the hearts of everyone else in our lives? I never had an answer to that... I may have chosen the easier way out...but it never really was easy.

I cried myself to sleep for months... Sometimes when the urge was to strong i'd travel. Leave everything behind and leave for a new, unfamiliar place. One without memories of you. 

I want you to know I will always hold a special place for you. Nobody can take that place, nobody ever has. 

I've missed you, for every waking day. I've loved you....

I'll be seeing you. 

Someday.

Yours. 

With Love...from this side of the border.

She blew out the candle. Gently folded the paper...This time she didn't look around to see if any1 had woken.  She held the paper close to her heart and for a moment wondered what it would be like if he did read this letter.

She walked over to the closet and placed the letter with the others...again. 

She locked the cupboard and went back to bed, hoping to see him, hoping he would come to her...

First Love

She fell in love at 17.

Innocence and the want to be perfect in his eyes were the center of who she was, of what defined her.

He was 22, charming and full of spirit. He had too much spirit, there was never any place for a boy like that in her circumstances. He would never fit in her busy schedule. She had the world at her feet and his feet never touched anything softer than metal.

Two worlds apart. They made a clichéd script for a happily ever after...but they never did end up together.

They fought every single day, for four years. Their want for each other too strong, impatient and aggressive. They seldom agreed on any matter. But they had one thing in common... they were both crazy about each other.

It was her first love and it had lasted four sweet years.

She looked back now and saw how happy she had been.

He rode her off into the sunset, dirt in her eyes and bare feet hanging out of a car window... she read to him, wrote for him and taught him the ways of society.

They got away from the ordinary, the mundane and all the people who would never understand. They had a world of their own... a little place she felt safe. A place that brought her to life...

A place where she could scream, shout, yell, be everything that society told her not be... 'ladylike' he had mocked her once. She'd slapped him so hard her hand hurt, she never told him but she went home and cried that day.

Oh how she'd loved him. She hated him and wanted him all at the same time.

They fought through every up and down, every obstacle. He went away for months on end...she would wait for one letter or one call...

She loved him more than any1 would know.

She'd loved him unconditionally...

Innocent love never happens twice. She'd been ruined the first time around.

Four sweet years...

The best love she would ever know.

They didn't end up together...

She fell in love at 21....