Prehistoric Love

“What?!”

“Calm down! I took a course in college on quick sand.” I explained

A few more seconds went by, “You did what? Why would you do that?”

“I needed an extra credit. Look, just find a better way to get over here and bring a vine to pull me out.”

I slowly began to raise my legs and lower body up, taking time to make sure I didn’t sink further.

Once I was laying flat on my back I staid still, waiting for Nate to get here.

“Cass! Where are you?”

Without moving I called back to him, “Over here!”

He walked over to the edge, holding a long vine in his hands, “What are you doing?”

“I’m staying as still as possible while having as much mass as I can to lay flat on the surface.”

Another silence, then, “Why?”

“God Nate, use your head. What do you do in a pool when you want to float instead of sink?”

“Ah, you lay on your back?”

“Correct, so what should you do when you don’t want to sink in quick sand?”

Another silence, which is really irritating, “You should… float on your back?”

I sighed, “Yes, Dr. Hawke, and isn’t that what I’m doing?”

“Ooohhh,” he drawled out, “that makes sense.”

“Yes, now toss the damn vine!” I screamed

He fumbled before tossing the vine close enough to where I could grab it.

God, for a man as smart as Nate is, he can be so slow.

I grabbed the vine and we slowly worked together to pull me to the edge. Nate tossed the vine and reached down, lifting me up and out of the quick sand. Still carrying me Nate moved away from the sand, not putting me down until he was certain we were on solid ground.

Once I was on my own feet I began to rub the mud still sticking to me, glad that the rain was at least helping to clean me.

“Are you okay?” Nate asked

“Yeah,” I looked up to him “thanks for your help.”

He smiled and wiped some mud off my cheek, “Just think of it as you owing me one.”

~*~

Another hour later and it was still raining, and we’re still walking.

But now we’re walking in the dark.

“Are you sure we’re going the right way?” I asked Nate as he walked in front of me.

He sighed and stopped, turning to look at me, “No, not really, but between the dark and the rain I can’t see the cave even if I climb a tree.”

Biting my lip I nod, “Alright, do you think we should keep walking, or stop for a while?”

He sighed again, “We should probably rest. Who knows how much longer we have to walk?”

We walked to a large tree with enough leaves for us to sit under it and stay out of most of the rain.

We didn’t talk.

It seems like we’ve had a bunch of awkward silent moments since our first meeting in the truck.

I sat on a large root with my back against the tree, holding my knees to my chest. A few feet over Nate sat in a similar position, but with on leg stretched out and an arm hanging loosely over his bent knee.

For a long while the only sound was the rain hitting the earth.

“Why’d you leave?”

I closed my eyes when he asked the one question I wanted to avoid, “Can’t we just let it go?”

“No,” his voice was firm, “I deserve to know why you just left me standing there.”

I didn’t speak for a while, finally saying softly, “It’ll only hurt you more.”

He spoke just as softly, “Nothing could make the pain I feel worse.”

I felt tears well up in my eyes at the agony in his voice.

It brought back such painful memories.

I looked at the reflection in front of me, the woman so beautiful in her long white dress.

“Oh, Cass, you’re gorgeous.”

I look to my left to see my best friend, Ann, with tears in her eyes.

“Don’t cry, Ann, you’ll ruin your make up.”

She laughed, “Sorry, I can’t help it. I’m just so happy for you.”

Smiling I look back at my reflection, “I’m happy for me too.”

We talked and prepped, me for my big day and Ann for her role as Maid of Honor.

When a knock sounded at the door Ann stood and allowed Nate’s mother, Shasta, to enter the room.

The older woman smiled at Ann, “Do you mind giving me and the bride a moment alone?”

In a shaky voice I began to speak, “I loved you so much. I wanted to be your wife, have your children, and grow old with you.”

“Then why’d you leave?”

“I had no choice, Nathan.” I practically whispered

“Of course you had a choice!” he exploded, “You had the choice when I asked you to marry me, you had the choice every time we made preparations. God, Cass, you had the choice to tell me that morning! Instead you just left, without telling me why.”

I squeezed my eyes shut against the tears.

After Ann left the room, the Native American woman circled around me, inspecting every flaw she saw.

And I’ve always felt she thought I was one big flaw.

“The dress is gorgeous, but I think it would look better on a woman with a darker complexion and darker hair.”

She stopped in front of me, “And your eyes are too green for my mother’s tribal necklace. It clashes with the turquoise. I will never understand why she allowed you to wear it.”

My hand reached up to grasp the beautiful piece of handmade jewelry, “She thought it would be a nice contribution to something blue and something old.”

“Well,” Shasta sighed, “She must be going senile.”

“Cass, I need to know.”

I took a deep breath, “Before the ceremony your mother came up to visit me.”

I felt more then saw his frown, “Why would that be important?”

“Because she wanted to give me some advice.”

More like an ultimatum.

I frowned, “Why are you telling me this now? There’s only a few more minutes until the ceremony begins and I need to finish getting ready.”

“Because, I want you to leave.”

“What?” I asked, perplexed.

“I want you to step out of that dress and walk away.”

I narrowed my eyes, “I don’t know what you’re talking about, but I’m going to be nice since you’ll soon be my mother-in-law. I want you to leave this room so that I can finish getting ready and marry Nate.”

She nodded, “I’m sure that’s what you think you want to do, but do you really want to ruin Nathan’s life? Do you really want him to live the rest of his life without seeing his family?” she glared at me, “because that’s what will happen if you marry my son.”

My eyes widened in shock, “You’d disown your own son because I married him?”

“Yes,” she said confidently, “You’re not worthy enough to be with him. It would be better if you had even a little bit of Native American blood in you, but your ancestors are from some third-world country in the Middle-East.”

I gaped in shock, “You’re discriminating against me because of a culture I don’t partake in? I was born and raised in the United States of America!”

“I’m sure you were, but Nathan needs to find himself a nice Native American girl, one who won’t ruin his royal blood line.”

“What did she say?” Nate asked.

“She talked about the difference between our heritages.”

He nodded, “Mom has always been big on blood line, but I still don’t understand why that’s important.”

“Think, Nathan. Where do my ancestors come from? What’s my heritage and culture in her eyes?”

He was silent for a while, “But she wouldn’t…”

“Oh, yes,” I finished when he trailed off, “she would.”

I glared at her, “I love him and I’m not just going to give that up because you fear your grandchildren will be ruined.”

“No, I’m sure you wouldn’t think about the consequences of that, but I suppose that’s because you’ve been poor all your life.”

“My financial status is just fine.”

She nodded, “I’m sure it is… now. My family has money and you’ve weaseled your way into my family for three years now.”

I began to see red, “You can’t be accusing me of stealing money from you!”

“No, dear, I never accuse. I’m simply stating that if you marry into my family part of that money will be yours, and I can’t let my ancestor’s hard work go to an unworthy girl.”

“Fine,” I spat, “I’ll sign a prenuptial.”

“That’s not good enough. If you marry my son I will be forced to disown him, effectively taking his heritage and money away, not to mention his family. Nathan has always had his family and money to back him up, how well do you think he’d make it without that support?”

I was shocked, “What kind of mother does that to her own son?”

“A mother who is only looking out for the well being of her entire family,” she burst

“So looking out for Nate means you have to push him out of your life?”

“If it comes to that, yes. He needs to learn that the only future for him is with a nice, worthy native girl. Not some poor scum from the Middle-East.”

Tears fell from my eyes, her sharp words causing me pain, “But I love him, I can’t just leave him.”

She nodded, “I know you love him, who couldn’t?” she wiped a tear from my cheek, “but you’re not right for him, you’ll only bring him down. Let him go. Show him how much you love him by letting him continue to have his family in his life. Let him live.”

“So you left because she didn’t like your blood line? You must not have loved me as much as I once thought you did.” Nate said with venom.

“That’s not why I left.” I defended

“No? Then why? Because you couldn’t handle my heritage? How hypocri-“

“She was going to disown you!” I screamed, interrupting what he was saying.

“What?” he gasped in shock.

Quieter I explained, “If I married you she was going to disown you and never let you see your family or money again.”

He sat in shocked silence for a while, “You still shouldn’t have left,” he attacked, “I wouldn’t have cared, all I wanted to do was love you.”

Tears feel down my face, “You don’t understand. You’ve never had to worry about funding a dig, or making sure you had food. You’ve always had money and your family there for you. If she took that away because of me then I would be the reason why your life was ruined.”

“Cass…” he said quietly, moving closer to me.

“I didn’t want to leave,” I cried, “I loved you so much, but I couldn’t live with myself if you had to go through the trouble I did growing up.”

He sat next to me, wrapping his arms around my shaking body and holding me close, “Why didn’t you tell me my mom had talked to you? That she was practically harassing you?”

“When, Nate? Before or after she disowned you?” I asked into his shirt.

He held me tighter, rubbing my back, “It wouldn’t have mattered. I loved you, Cass. Nothing but that would have mattered.”

I cried a little harder when he used past tense to describe his feelings.

Because I still love him, I never stopped loving him.

After a while my tears stopped falling and I calmed down enough to finish my story.

I sniffled, “I left because I couldn’t stand to see you live without the family that means so much to you. The money wasn’t that big of a deal, I knew you’d be world famous, but it was the thought of you losing your family that hurt me the most. So I ran. I ran because I loved you enough to know that you needed your family.”

He laid his head on mine, “You were my family, Cass, you and any children we may have had.”

We feel into another silence, holding onto each other as we fell asleep to the rain’s music.