I know why you tarried.
It would be enough to think on this day, if perhaps you didn't have to also consider facts. Such facts would have to include that waiting, for some time under the broken awning in such a downpour had ruined all your makeup. I know how long you waited for him too. I know. I have been there. Don't forget, I was once your age, love. And as your sister, I have seen you go through the puppy love of school days, and the emphatic heartache of crushes you would have on your teachers. Remember that one English professor? What was his name? Ah, yes; Mr. Bothell. I laugh when I recall how my own friends and I would lie awake late at night, attending one girlish slumber party or another; dreaming, fantasizing on all we wish this full grown man might do to us young twits. We would argue over who was going to woo him this or that year, and of course, who among us would land him as a prize for marriage. Silly, we were then. As I know you were in your highschool years, my dear. But this is different, you could tell me. Not necessary to hear it from your own lips, though. For I know your woman's heart on such matters of love. And this IS different. He, that is, your love, seems to have fogotten you this time. He was such a handsome young man. So full of promise, and so eager to see you smile. I feel he must have loved you more than his very life. What a prize you yourself have found in him. So much more so than any such reward for childish dreaming among your peers. He was kind to you always, that I could tell. And would forever wish to see you nothing less than in heaven in his arms. For this, I am pleased to realize you have known such great happiness, and found such synergy in your young life. And yet, for this I must feel sadness, as it is as if he has left you now. But, you must reason, my beloved sister, you know as well as I he never left you but for a moment's time. He was brave to go off to fight when he did. He was gallant in his efforts to join the rebellion. Never but when he would look at you, did I see but then,that fierce passion of commitment in his bright eyes. Oh, he truly loved life, Sis. It was for that reason, I know, that he joined the soldiers of our brave army; passion to fight for life. He fought for your life as well as for mine, and that, of course, of his unborn babe you carry now. He loved you both, you must know. I know you are hurt. I know you feel lost. But, as I wring the rainwater from your gorgeous brown curls, I tell you, he never left. And the pain; such pain seems unbearable now. To realize he is gone from us all forever, to never see the likeness of his eyes in that of his newborn child's. Nor to feel the touch of the little one in his own arms. I know the pain aches deep inside your heart. To stand in the downpour of God's own tears for your loss....it will not bring him back. It will not wash away the pain. But a little girl is before me now. And I know the pain is as real as your mind's world is fanciful. I know you fill your head now with thoughts on teaparties, and dolls. Your own child will be along within the month. The new babe will need you to be strong, as your husband was always. You must return to us, my love. You must remember the living now. He will not be back. But we are here. Wash off the dread cold of today, but remember you are forever loved. And for this, I know why tarried in the rain.
