Do You Remember?

I sat down on the couch facing the window. Looking outside at the trees and seemingly never ending grass in my back yard. My backyard. I laughed silently, not wanting to disturb the stoic atmosphere in the house. It wouldn’t be like this for much longer. Who would’ve ever guess? Me? Of all the people in the world to live this life, it’s me. I turned up to look at the sky. Clear and bright today. My heart was lifted. Today was going to be a good day, I had that feeling in my gut. That good feeling that you want to treasure and never let go. I love that feeling.

Happiness, bliss, that’s what it’s been like for a while now. I’m still not used to it. I’ve always been the kind of girl waiting for the final blow, the quicksand, the storm, but it never came. And it’s all because of him. I felt a large comforting hand place itself on my shoulder. I could almost picture the concerned look on his face even though my back was towards him. The worry line across his forehead. His lips slightly parted. How did I get so lucky?

“What are you thinking about?” He said, quietly. He always understood me. How I never wanted to break the silence. He always knew when something was wrong.

“I’m thinking about us. The past, present, future. Everything and nothing. You, me, our family.” I rambled, then stopped myself and laughed quietly once again. “Are you listening to me? I sound like a cryptic physic or something.”

“Stop doing that.” His voice was much more serious than before.

“Doing what? Sounding cryptic? Sorry, I try not to. But sometimes I just ramble.” A small smile never left my face. I giggled once.

“That’s not what I meant, I meant stop shutting me out, stop being guarded.” He sat behind me wrapping his arms around me, placing one hand on my stomach. I loved him. I loved this.

“Do you remember when we first met?” I said, with a small reminiscent smile.

I had gone to my favorite diner for lunch. I had just gotten back from staying with my dad. They were divorced, my parents. It hadn’t been a pretty divorce either. I felt alone. At the time all I could think about is why people ever even try to fall in love. It never worked. It didn’t with my parents, every time I tried it barely lasted two weeks. At the time I had finally given up, nothing was worth it any more. I looked up to order when I saw the most handsome boy I had ever seen. He looked at me and seemed equally flustered.

“Hi.” I murmured.

“Uh..hi. I’m Shane.” The boy said with a quiet tone.

“Lyla.”

I ordered my food, and each time he walked over things just got quieter. As he walked over to pick up plates and I looked into his eyes. Those eyes. I could feel them inside me. I paid the bill quickly, and stood up, practically running towards the door. Those eyes had unnerved me. The thought of them made me…scared. In a weird way, that I couldn’t explain. I had never felt that way before. As I walked out the door I heard the boy shouting my name. He sounded breathless, just like the way I felt.

“Lyla.” The boy said with his eyes wide. “I’d like to see you again.”

I didn’t want to, but I nodded. And that was all it took. No matter how terrified I was, maybe it was worth the risk. I was terrified of falling in love, but the way he looked at me was something I would never be able to walk away from. Maybe this was what all of those fairytales had been talking about? This was just the beginning of the whirl-wind. The beginning of the tide. The beginning of the rain. The beginning of the storm. And the beginning of the love I would never let go.

Our first date was quaint; cute. He took me down to the ocean. The quiet roaring of the ocean making me feel perfectly at ease. This was what life was supposed to feel like. Not chaotic, or sad, or lonely like the way it had been before. And for that moment all my fears and doubts just faded into the distance. Maybe this time I wouldn’t end up alone. We sat there facing the ocean, our feet in the sand, and talked.

“So, I picked up my things and left. Now I’m waiting tables to help pay for it.” Shane said, with a small gleam of pride in his eye.

“Do you ever regret it?” I asked.

“Never.”

“I don’t think I’d ever be able to do something like that. I like structure, to always know what’s happening next. I can’t be one step behind. I hate being left in the dust.” I said, having the sand run through my fingers.

“I think you could.” He said with confidence. “I just think there’s something deeper down that’s holding you back.”

I turned to look at him in a shocked manner. It was then I realized how much more this was going to be. This wasn’t a fling. This wasn’t going to be another time for me to be left in the dust. I wasn’t going to watch another love fizzle and spurt out the last of its glow. He could see past everything, even if I couldn’t. So I told him. Everything. The fights I had watched. The pain of being torn between the two people I loved most. And he made me feel hope. He put his arm around me for the first time, and we watched the waves going in and out.

Within months we were in love. And more months passed, our love grew. And some more months, we moved in together. Our relationship had blossomed into something that I hadn’t even realized could ever happen. This was the boy I had been waiting for. He understood every little thing about me. He knew when I needed to be left alone. He knew when I needed him to hold my hand. He knew why sometimes I said too little. And he knew why sometimes I said too much. He knew what my fears were, and why it was so hard for me to let someone in. He had more patience for me than anyone else I had ever known. And he made a promise to me that made me finally realize that he was the one.

“Lyla, I love you.” He said, with a fierce look in his eye. “I know you’re scared, and that you’re dying on the inside because you can’t see what’s coming next. I know we’ve got a lot to deal with, I know we have bills to pay. But Lyla, I promise you that I will never leave your side. We may get frustrated with each other sometimes. But I promise that I’ll always be here, I’ll always love you, and that we will not make your parent’s mistakes.”

He had held me so tight after that, and I had hoped he would never let go. A few weeks later I found myself sitting in a boat on the water near our home. The lights of the city were shimmering on the water with a glow so beautiful it put the prettiest star to shame. He looked into my eyes and I felt like he saw everything the same way I did. He understood me. He knelt down, and looked at me with the most caring eyes I had ever seen. Light tears caressed his cheek.

“Lyla, I love you more than I ever thought I could love a person. What we have is something I’ll never take for granted. I’ve fallen so hard for you, my careful, steady, calculated, beautiful, spirited, lovely girl. And I never want to let you go.” He pulled out a box. “Will you marry me?”

“Yes.” I whispered.

I remember that night, we sat by the fire place. Looking into each other’s eyes. Holding onto one another, knowing this could be our forever. How perfect. Time passed in pure blissfulness. Our engagement was rather short. And soon enough I found myself looking into a long mirror, looking at myself. My long veil trailing across the floor, my elegant frame draped in a white gown. This was the day I never thought would have happened. I had looked in the mirror and tried to imagine the young distraught girl who had first met Shane. Now, I was a woman who was in love with a man who had helped her put all of the pieces of her life back together.

I remember the hand squeeze of my teary eyed father as he held me before we walked down the aisle. I felt so much more optimistic, maybe my parents hadn’t been the perfect example, but me and Shane were different. We were special. I remember when the doors opened and my eyes locked with Shane’s. It reminded me of the first time we had ever seen each other. His eyes still sent cool tingles down my spine. I remember looking into those tear filled eyes and feeling more beautiful than I ever had before. I remember that feeling of knowing that this was where I belonged. I remember finally feeling what I had been searching for my whole life, true, unwavering, devoted, love.

“I do.” We whispered to each other.

And I remember months passed and hard times had hit. The problems were mounting, and I felt like there was no where that I could turn. I felt trapped. We couldn’t afford to pay our bills, we had been fighting, and I began to feel like our love was short lived. I remember the look on his face as he screamed at me. My heart beat like I had been running sprints, tears poured from my eyes, how were we going to do this? I could barely think straight. And the worst part was, he didn’t even know.

I remember running outside at 2:30 in the morning feeling lost, desolate, and alone for the first time I had met Shane. I could see all the promises we had made breaking. All that we had built was tumbling down. My hands were shaking. I couldn’t think of anything to do besides cry. I couldn’t do this alone. I remember the feeling of his gentle hand as he turned me around in the middle of the street. This was it. This was the end.

“I’m so sorry Lyla. I love you. Please, forgive me. I didn’t mean any of it. I love you.” Shane said, and wrapped me in his strong arms. I cried into his shoulder as he kissed me all over. The rain began pounding down around us, but neither of us moved.

“Shane, I’m pregnant. What are we going to do? We can barely keep our own heads above the water.”

“I’m not going anywhere, and we’ll get through this together, as a family.” He said to me, placing his hand over my stomach, and kissed my lips. “I’ll never leave you alone.”

From then time passed slowly, my stomach got bigger, and now we’re here, 9 months later. I looked up into my husband’s eyes as he stroked my belly. Happy and complacent. I smiled. Having his arms around me was like a haven, a safe place where there’s no such thing as pain or hurt. We were going to be a family, we were going to be raising this little innocent creature to grow up and fall in love just like us. We had made things work. And I realized that Shane had always been right. There was always something holding me back, but he had fixed all that. Now, I don’t regret anything either.

“Of course I remember. I remember when I looked at you for the first time, our first date, the first time I put my arm around you, the first time I told you I loved you, when I proposed, when you told me you were pregnant. I remember it all, because every moment with you is one worth remembering. And now we get to make more memories as a family.” He looked into my eyes and kissed me once. And I knew everything he said was true.

He is the best thing, that’s ever been mine.