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The longer I laid on the cold dirt, the clearer the sounds around ht hu of mosquitoes, the distant, sleepy ballad of a bird I closed ine home Home Mike His smile, his smell, all powdery-smooth, and the warm, scratchy stubble on his chin that’d prickle my forehead when he’d kiss my brow

Home is David His eyes Green Greener after we’d e of my uncontrolled passion had run free of thehter around the memory and held it all inside Eventually these meht nohile I’d only been lost for a few days, they were as clear as a suain, with thein my heart, midday actually filled out the forest around ha shape through the glare, like a beautiful reen eyes stared into ht that sadness seemed misplaced here, his soul looked lost, broken I reached up, slowly tracingevery bu on a sot when his six-year-old brother kicked hi a paper boat he’d made

"Jason?"

His smile was so filled with kindness thatloved

"Jase, are you really here?"

"Ara?" he said in that s"

"I--" My eyes rolled back, closing "I can’t I failed, Jase--"

"No You only fail if you don’t get up"

"But I didn’t find it--hope I thought I did, but…it was only a thought--an idea, and I keep losing it I just keep losing it"

"Hope was never to be found, Ara Hope is so you always had in you"

"But, I’m not what my people needed me to be"

"No, because you are more than they hoped you would be--capable of ainst the dirt "I couldn’t finish the walk I’ood to anyone, now"

"You’re still as valued as you hen you left You never needed to prove anything to theirl--you only need to prove it to yourself"

"But it’s all gone Everything I was supposed to be--supposed to do--all gone"

"I don’t knohat the future holds for you when you return, Ara, and I don’t knohat your people will say, but I know that no matter what you’re worth to the to one person in this world" His shaggy hair fell loosely in the dirt above his brow, and his sparkling grin, as he ran his fingertips along my face, made me feel as if he was really here "Find your way home, Ara--find your way back to that one person, and you will never doubt yourself or your worth, ever again"

"Well, who are you talking about? What one person?"

"Your true love" He shuffled a little closer; I felt his knees against mine "He will hold you, kiss you and adore you--come what may"

"David" I smiled

"Perhaps" He stroked the tip of his thumb down my nose "Or perhaps not Perhaps he isfor you to return to your dreaain, so he can hold you there, in his lonely reality--for eternity"

"You?"

"Come back to me, Ara" He took both my hands "Coe of Jason’s face; I blinked a few ti to make it clearer

"Come back to me…" His voice echoed away

"Jase?" His touch dissolved I sat bolt upright in the dark of night "Jase?" Stay

But he was gone again, leavingwith the deepest part of oodbye I wish I could’ve told him how I really felt--wish I could’ve told him in a room where it would haveat the heavens, telling irl I saw in ht; I loved hirieve rieve Mike, but…just not Jason

I coveredto sneak back into the world he and I shared But it was always only a dreao back there--to his I had to face here, facing that truth was the worst

I got up, got to ain

He asked me to come back to him He was here--if that was a dream or not, I didn’t care I felt hoain Death, dream or reality It didn’t racelessly over the dirt Each entangled finger of branches seeon y talon offMe!"

But none of them listened They had me They owned this part of the forest, and I wasn’t allowed to go there

I swiped e of dense shrubbery

Maybe the trees were right Maybe I was headed in the wrong direction Into hi home--to David My husband The one who has stayed with me, married me, put up with all my temper tantrums and stupid ideals The one who alould

Maybe I was supposed to walk back to hio to Jason because the road to the underworld was guarded by things unseen

I had to turn around I had to get back hoht sky, the low to the darkness, illu everything a dreary, grainy appearance I looked along the length of lowed, as if thePerhaps they had a clue, a et out of this forest

Everyone seemed to have had their own theories before I left; ‘Follow the North star,’ Walter said ‘Walk the path before your feet and don’t look up,’ someone else had said, and Euide you’

I looked behindthat the trees had closed in, blocking that trail, h

Was that it? Follow ht of David--saw his secret smile in my mind, felt the warmth of his love and let it fillvines

"David" I spun around then, in a completely different direction, but I kneas the way Walk tohat your heart desires

"David," I said tocracked undermy eyes wide before my hair and arms went vertical and my feet carriedat every branch to stopto rest with a thunderous i sound, like an express train in a subway, forced my eyes open Small needles of dry pine blurred my vision for a second; I blinked theht, while a woodsy, earthy smell dried my nostrils with each breath

I liftedon

"Wait!" I frowned and looked down at rave; vu"

My heart faltered Everything stopped

I sunk down into round, flat on rave; vu"

Chapter Ten