A passion so strong, time couldn’t weather away at it. Fortified by a love so pure, nothing could break it. Held by hands so determined, it could never be lost.
I never met another more dedicated to someone than she was to you. She would spend hours on end staring lovingly at your pictures. She’d wait night after night in the dark for you to call. Day dreams of you would plague her at ever waking hour, and when she slept all her fantasies of you would come to life in her mind.
All she ever thought of was you and all the ways she could make you happy. She’d spend her paychecks on you every week. She’d only answer the phone for you. She left behind her friends so you could have her undivided attention. She gave up all her morals and boundaries, just to please you. She gave you everything, never asking for anything in return.
To be in your arms was enough to make her the happiest. Even as time went by and her feelings for you grew, she never asked more of you. She cherished the little time with you that she was blessed with, always grateful for even the tiniest bit of time you gave her.
But it was inevitable. She was so foolish to think she could keep giving herself like that without repercussions. It was a child’s dream that reality would force her to wake from.
I’d always thought of her as strong. She was naive, but with a passion and heart so amazingly strong and dedicated. The way she opened herself up like that, giving everything that mattered never asking or expecting anything back. I was always in awe of her.
Were you so blind you couldn’t see what the rest of the world saw? Or did you? Did you take advantage of her kind heart? Did you use her for your twisted pleasure? You missed something amazing when you walked away. You lost something so precious, and you probably didn’t even realize it.
But we did. We saw what you lost. We saw the light in her eyes die, the warmth in her smile fade. We had to watch her heart harden and close to the world. We witnessed the brightest star in the sky vanish right before our eyes, in the dark abyss of torment and loneliness.
You left her. You turned and walked away, after she’d given you everything. You took it all and left her with nothing but dreams and hopes that would never live to see the light of reality. You killed a spirit so bright and radiant.
You didn’t have to see the affect you had on her. Didn’t have to see her broken and lost.. You were miles away. She was no longer of your concern. After you’d gone, she still held tight her love for you. She believed that one day, her time would come, and you would realize how you felt for her. Despite all the pain and tears, she held on to that belief. I’m not sure which was worse. The heart break of losing you, or the hopeless grip she had on the idea of you coming back for her.
The heart is an ever so mysterious piece of humanity. It makes us our strongest, and at the same time it is our biggest weakness. The fallacies of the heart are man’s greatest flaws, setting him apart from every other living creature.
A year gone by, and little by little, I heard less and less of you, from her. She finally seemed to have moved on and given up the fantasies of you. She still carried your picture with her, though. I caught her staring at it a couple times, but she stopped trying to convince us that you were coming back. She began smiling again. It was almost back to the way it was before you set her life spiraling out of control.
Then on day, it all came to an abrupt end.
I was sitting at home watching TV after work, sipping a soda. Relaxation was the only thing on my mind, when a sudden bang came at my door. The pounding was persistent and unrelenting. I jumped from the couch and flung the door open. There she stood, her eyes blood shot, her hair in disarray. Her shirt was askew and backwards. Her words spilling out in jumbled urgency.
She’d had a dream. You had cried out to her in distress, begging her to save you. It had been so real to her. She insisted you were in trouble. Insisted you needed her. I tried. I tried so hard to tell her it was only a dream. I tried so hard to get it through her head that you’d moved on and forgotten her. But she wouldn’t listen. She believed that you needed her. There was no way I could have stopped her. The fire was back in those beautiful eyes.
I gave her my cell and my car keys. I gave her the biggest hug. I told her to call me when she’d found you. And I watched as she drove away, tears fell down my cheeks.
I’ll never forget the day, or the wild desperate look in her eyes, or the screeching of the tires as she peeled off after you.
* * *
The rain was coming down harder and angrier, blinding her vision. She swerved recklessly about the road. Her eyes set straight ahead. Her lips pursed together in serious determination. All she could hear was him crying out to her, begging her to help him. Maybe a dream, but there was a nagging insistence in the back of her mind, telling her there was more to it.
Her heart raced. She blinked back the tears that flooded her eyes. Her foot pressed further on the gas and the car accelerated.
* * *
I paced back and forth in the living room, nervously wringing my fingers together. I glared intently at the phone, willing it with my mind to ring. The tension building up inside me, I grabbed up the phone and dialed your number. Fuck! Busy. I slammed it back into the cradle. I collapsed back onto the couch and burst into tears.
* * *
The black clouds above had brought rain just as he had predicted. He drove slowly, since visibility was so low. The windshield wipers working their fastest to clear away the constant onslaught of rain drops.
He held his cell to his ear in one hand, driving with the other. His girlfriend was on the other end of the phone, another petty argument. He’d already forgotten what it was about. Her voice droned on, but his mind was elsewhere.
Music played softly in the back ground, but was mostly drowned out by the pounding rain. He tapped his thumb rhythmically against the steering wheel as he proceeded onward.
* * *
The urgency in his voice crying out to her engulfed her mind completely. The tears were pouring down her face, her hands shaking. The arrow on the speedometer slowly crept up, little by little. There was not slowing, no stopping.
The voice in her head was getting louder and louder, washing out the sound of the rain beating against the wind shield, faster and faster.
She shot by another lone car, just as it was about to enter the intersection. Her eyes drifted to glance at the driver. Her eyes widen. Her foot slams the brake.
* * *
The tears just wouldn’t stop. They kept falling like a never ending water fall. I tried your number again. Still busy. I slammed the phone off the wall.
God damn you! If only you weren’t so blind! If only you could have seen what was right in front of you! If only you hadn’t walked away!
I stared out the window, into the bleak night. Lord watch over her. Keep her safe.
I sank back into the couch to wait.
* * *
He hadn’t been paying attention to much. Not the nagging girlfriend or the rain or the street. His eyes were glazed over, staring off into the never ending blackness ahead. Out of the corner of his left eye he caught a sudden blur of color speed by. He turned his head in a bored interest. Barely in time to catch a quick view of the shocked and vaguely familiar looking driver.
A loud screech filled the air as the other car came to a halt. Just as he was about to pass the car a truck came speeding out of no where, no head lights no warning, blowing right through the red light, smashing dead smack into the driver’s side of the car that had come to a stop.
He leapt out of his car, forgetting the phone, never hearing the loud scream that had come from it. He ran right to the car that now sat there smashed to all hell. In a rush of adrenaline he began beating at the passenger window with his bare hands till finally the glass broke beneath the pressure. He could see some slight movement from inside, but the inside was so badly crushed he could barely make out a person.
He crawled in through the passenger window. He heard something muttered from under the crushed driver’s side. Then a limp hand fell to the seat, a cell phone still in the grip.
His eyes widen at the sight of a simple bracelet on the small bloody wrist, and a gasp escapes his lips. “Nooo!” he screams. “Nonononooo!”
* * *
I must have fallen asleep. The sudden ring of the phone startled me. I looked down at the shattered phone, amazed it could still be ringing. I threw myself to the ground, gripped it fiercely. My hand shook with such fear. I closed my eyes tightly. Please lord, please.
I put the phone to my ear, whimpering. “Tell me you’re okay.” I sat there, my eyes shut, fist clenched, sobbing, listening. I heard nothing at first, but a loud pounding from the back ground. “Please,” I begged, “tell me it’s alright! Tell me you’re okay!”
That’s when I heard it. A little sob, a soft whimper.. “I… I found him…..” And that was it. The next thing I heard was the braking of glass and a male voice screaming “No no!” I lied on the ground hugging the phone to my chest, crying for a star that would shine no more, not ever again.
* * *
The ambulance came and took her body away. It took the jaws of life to pry her mangled and broken body from the wreckage.
The other driver walked away with a few bumps and bruises, and a broken rib.
He was in a state of shock and confusion. Why had she been there? What was she doing on that road? That night? Why was she so far from home?
His girlfriend came up behind him and sat by his side. She leaned against him crying softly, a bandage over her forehead. He put one arms around her waist. She winced slightly in pain, softly touching her aching rib cage.
* * *
No one will ever shine so bright. She was something amazing. Something very few will ever truly appreciate. We saw the amazing person she was. We saw the love and dedication she had. Something you had been so blind to.
They say, if she hadn’t been there that night, if she hadn’t stopped like she had, then it would have been you we’d be burying today. Kind of ironic… The girl who loved you more than life itself, died to save you. Died when your girlfriend ran that red light and plowed into her.
I wonder if you know now what you lost. Because I know we’ll never forget.
05-09-03