What I miss is the sound of the rain on a tin roof. Thundering, it drowns out every other noise. I can close my eyes and see the 4-wheeler rumbling away, that small bundle of stubborn energy and spunk holding on tight. No one’s called me “Hannah” for 12 weeks now and I can’t remember the last time the power went out. I can still feel his red overalls, tattered and worn, beneath my fingertips. Rats don’t scurry in my ceiling at nighttime.
How do you leave a life behind you, and remain the same?
It’s funny the things that bring it all back to you. And it only takes a moment-- a song, a line in a book, a sighting on the street, a photograph on your phone, a passing comment in conversation. Sometimes it’s nothing but the stillness. For here in the silent darkness, the whisper of memory surrounds you.
It leaves you aching.
I told him there would always be longing. I know longing the way one knows the feel of their skin and the sound of their breathing-- fully and intimately. Every moment is laced with it.
I know she mends—the girl with the broken heart. But I don’t know how. I know she always longs. Unlike the vapor and the raindrops, I know her aching never fully vanishes. Her life consists of a little bit of empty no matter where her feet wander. Because she’s tasted something more, something better, something far beyond.
Sometimes I want to forget. Memories burned in my mind puncture like a needle to the flesh—fragile and messy, painful. Yet how will we know the joy if we do not also know the ache? I remind myself of that on the nights where their faces haunt and that life of adventure feels so distant and fleeting.
I hear Him beckon, here in this aching stillness. Like the pulsing in my veins and the breath in my lungs, there is this constant calling…
There’s so much more love, so much more.
