Alice V.L.'s Blog, page 3

A Letter To My Rough Boy

Nothing much was different when I woke up this morning. I peered over at you and smiled when I noticed how your silver streaks were beginning to cover the peppery hair that were getting lost underneath. It made me a little sad to realize how that beautiful head of dark hair was disappearing almost right before my eyes. I noticed how many more lines were showing up around your eyes and how many more furrows had formed around your mouth. I looked at your rough boy lips, and I grinned when I was reminded by how many times they had kissed mine, and how they were the only lips I have wanted to kiss for the past million years. I scrutinized every inch of your face before I looked past the now, and I saw the rough boy I had met so many years ago. The boy with the dark, wild hair and greenish-hazel eyes. The firm, lean and muscular young nineteen-year-old that so effortlessly swept me off my feet from the moment I laid my eyes on him. The rough boy everybody warned me against. The rough boy that they said, would never be good enough for me. The rough boy that would end up breaking my heart. The boy that was too rough for a girl like me. The rough boy that belonged with someone more like him.

I remember that day as though it was just yesterday. It was an autumn day somewhere between me being a girl, and becoming a woman. Through the crowd that had gathered in the city streets, I saw you before I saw anyone else. I caught a glimpse of you getting on your motorcycle and zipping up your rough boy leather jacket. You looked past the guys, and you looked past the girls. Almost as though your eyes knew who’s they wanted to see, they stopped by me and as they fixed a gaze on me, they never left mine. And there we were, two strangers staring at each other with a hundred people around us. A rough boy and a good girl who didn’t know much about life, or love. When your index finger beckoned for me to come closer, I knew at that very moment, I was in trouble. The good girl in me hesitated, but my heart wouldn’t let me disappear into the crowd, and hide from you. I was so powerless to turn and walk away from you, I didn’t want to. You swept me up, told me to hold on tight, and drove off into the night where the city lights turned into magic for me. Little did I know that at that very second, I was riding off into an adventure with a rough boy, that was to last this good girl a lifetime.

But, we had our moments. We had our rough boy thorns among the good girl roses. We had our tempestuous waves, and we had our tempers flare. Actually, it was my temper and always only mine that flared up. We lost ten years, when this good girl broke her rough boy’s heart, but we gained twenty when her rough boy brought her back to where she belonged, with him. We made a home, we raised children, and we carved out beautiful lives. You carved out a magnificent world for me to live in. A place I was safe in, somewhere I was loved and somewhere, I could lay my head down and cry when I needed to, and without shame. You loved me. You caught up each tear that would spill from my eyes, and built me a chamber with them in your heart, where I could store my precious memories in and never apologize for them. You just loved me. Just because you did. Not because I could be anything spectacular or wonderful someday. Not because I was someone important or someone that mattered much. You just loved me. You. Loved. Me. You loved me, and there has never been one day that I doubted that or doubted you. Not once, did I question the love or devotion my rough boy ever had for me.

You stand back and make way for me step forward and shine. You see to it that I have enough space around me to find that which makes my soul happy. You take my hand when I am not really paying attention, and you hold firmly onto it. You stand so closely behind me, just in case I lose my balance and fall. You walk beside me, yet, you are always just a little behind me. Then, almost at the same time, you stand in front of me and you guard me as I make my mistakes. You let me try and you let me fail, and then you pick up the pieces of me and for me. You never scold or berate me, and you have never uttered as much as an I told you so.

So, as I lay staring at you while you sleep for just another five more minutes, I embrace and fall madly in love with each line on your face. I can almost tell a story for every single one of them. Did a line show up the day I drove 400 miles on my own, and you couldn’t reach me on the road? Did another one appear the day a truck hit our son’s car? Was another line because of the day a car hit another son’s motorcycle? Did that long, deep one come from the day our daughter crashed hers? Those frown lines, were they implanted the day our house accidentally burnt down, almost to the ground? I don’t know which line belongs with which story, but what I do know is, a dozen lines are there because you spent so many days and so many nights working tirelessly to give us a home, to put our children through school and to send them all on their way the moment they were ready to leave. I look at your hands, and the traces of all your hard work is there. My rough boy never sits still, just so that his good girl’s hands don’t have to look like that. Are the grooves around your mouth because you kept quiet too many times when you so badly wanted to say something? Did your silver streaks multiply when you sat up so many nights before, waiting for a child to return home safely? Or are some there because you drove around so many nights looking for our young and wild rough boys of our own?

You are a story, my rough boy. Your face, your body and your hair tells of a man that made a queen out of a simple, good country girl. They tell of a man that raised his girls as princesses. They tell of a man that made men out of rough boys. They tell of a man that stood quietly in the background, so that others could stand out and shine. I know that years from now, I will count more lines, more grooves and I will no longer find one single peppered hair on your head, but I will never not see that young nineteen-year-old that swept me up and took me on a journey I never saw coming. An adventure nothing could prepare me for, but one I would never have wanted any other way.

I will love you, years from now, just as I loved you then and just as I love you now. And someday, when we sit on that much-dreamed of porch overlooking our Christmas trees, I hope that you will still bring me a flower from our garden, and sweep this good girl up into your rough boy arms.

 

The Dream-Maker

When she awoke that morning, she gazed at the disheartening reflection that was staring back at her in the mirror. A quick and hurried glimpse in the mirror was nothing new, she had done so on most mornings before. But, what was unlike any other morning, was that she had noticed how the circles around her eyes had become darker, and how the furrowed lines on her face had become clearer. It was almost as though the grey in her hair had streaked through undetected and appeared overnight, somewhere in between dusk and dawn. She noticed how the frown lines on her forehead were suddenly so deeply ingrained, and how the trenches around her mouth were unexpectedly, yet equally visible. As she stood scrutinizing each line, each furrow and each grey hair, she realized that she was no longer sleeping securely in The Dream-Maker’s arms, and that she was no longer awake in someone else’s dream. He had changed her dreams, and he had taken her to places where her fears were waiting to meet her.

Each night and without fail, his shadow of dreams would fall upon her as she lay asleep on her big, empty bed. As soon as she had closed her eyes, he would take her hand and cross the highways of fantasies and fancies with her, where he would carry her off to a magical world of wonder and enchantment. He would fly her high above the clouds and through the starry skies, where they could almost touch the moon. He would steadily hold her hand as they stepped through the passages of time, and crossed all borders of universes and dimensions, just to take her to a magnificent, fairy tale-like world she could never dream up on her own. There, where no-one else was looking, and no-one else lived, she would find him, the one she had been dreaming of, for her entire life. His eyes would be filled with all the love he had for her, and his arms would safely fold around her. He would hold her snugly, almost as though he was reassuring her that he would never leave her. He would press her against him, as if he was promising her heart that his would dream of hers, each night of his life. They would sit side-by-side, and hand-in-hand. When the dream-angels would begin to play their harps, he would take her hand, and they would dance upon each star as she contentedly stroked his hair and inhaled the smell of his cologne, afraid that she might have forgotten it all by the time The Dream-Maker came around and picked her up to carry her back home again.

As she stood staring at the reflection of herself in the mirror, she could barely remember how long it had been since he had sent her that picture-perfect and flawless dream. A dream he had introduced her to, but one she was not yet quite ready to leave. As she staggers from her bed after a tormented night of nightmares morning after morning, she is again reminded of the harsh reality that she was never really equipped to leave her world of make-believe behind. The Dream-Maker had heartlessly changed her dream, and he had left her cruelly threatened by new scenes and new acts that she was never prepared for.

As much as she clings to how things used to be, she is devastated by the fact that she was slowly disappearing from a life he had once carelessly created for her soul to love in. He had turned all that had once made it a welcomed escape for her nights, into a nightmare that he would carelessly drop her off in, whenever she closed her eyes. She had begun losing the memory of him, and she no longer dreamed of being taken back into a world she so desperately wanted to belong in. She lays awake for as long as she can at night, too afraid to fall asleep. She has become deathly terrified of the sound her soul makes when it cries.

The Dream-Maker had exposed her to a dream of untainted and devoted love. He never warned her that it would someday end, before he had transported her right into dreams of an immortal kind of love, where he taught her about an endless flame that burns between two souls only. He assured her of an eternity of bliss she could feel from the innermost core of her. He presented her with glimpses into a life she could slip out to whenever she closed her eyes. He took her into a dream with someone her soul had recognized and deeply needed, yet, he had ripped it away from her without a moment’s consideration. He never once cautioned her that it could alter, and he never once told her how he could maliciously tip the scales in favor of a heartbreak.

Yet, there she stood reflecting on a dream that had ended, while she struggled to embrace the nightmares that had taken its place. Her love was gone. He had disappeared from her nights, and he had vanished from her mornings. The Dream-Maker had rewritten it all, and in the process, he had broken her heart and he had stolen her flame from her. He had carelessly brought those lines to her face, and he had mercilessly plastered those circles around her eyes.

She can no longer find him in the serenity of sleep, and she no longer hopes to find him when she awakes. He changed the design he had once allowed her to live in, and he had left her right in the center of the chaotic nightmares he had condemned her into. Almost as though he was punishing her; as though he was trying to play her heart and mind against one another. Almost as though he had made an enormous mistake when he had chosen her destination all those nights ago. He would not admit to it, but she was sure that he was desperate to cover it all up. It was almost as if he was frantic to set things right, by sending her into nightmares that had begun to slaughter her heart and slay her soul.

She no longer looks forward to closing her eyes at night. She no longer wants to take The Dream-Maker’s hand as he reaches for her night after night. He was never who he claimed to be, and her last stop before morning is no longer all he had once promised her it would be. He had lied to her and he had recklessly deceived her. She was no longer brave enough to follow him into her nightmares. She no longer wanted to fear closing her eyes, and she no longer wanted to fear opening them when the sun peers through and wakes her in her mornings.

She scowled once more at her reflection in the mirror, before she softly whispered to The Dream-Maker,

“If there could never be another dream for us, and if nightmares are all I am ever left with, then please do not let your shadow of dreams fall upon me as I lay asleep on my bed. Leave me to linger in my nothingness.”

Lola’s Secret

 

~ One Promise Too Late ~

She came home today. She couldn’t quite figure out how many sunrises she had missed, or how many sunsets there were since she had been gone. She came home today, just as she promised she would back when she was still a bright-eyed teenager with a million dreams, and a gazillion smiles in her heart. She came back to the village she left her soul in, just like she swore she would come back for someday. Just as soon as she had found her wonderful. She came home today, to the village that had kept her heart safely tucked away in its palms since she left, almost a thousand moons ago. The village that had patiently watched her dream, and carefully guided her on all the roads she walked on, and led her to all the roads she would end up taking someday. The village that had finally raised her. She came home today to the houses she knew so well, the trees she had found shade in on so many scorching days, the school she had found family in, the people she adored and the children who had now all grown up. She came home to a religion her village had passed on to her, from the very moment she was born. She was too young to understand, and not old enough to know that it would someday be the village, she would leave everything behind for … only, it would be one promise too late.

She came home to the mountains that echoed the laughter that used to hang in the air as they climbed to the top, where they would sit together and watch the sun set over their village. It was almost as though a curtain to a stage was being drawn, and they … they audience. She came home to the waves that continued to whisper their names as they crash heartlessly onto the shore, as though to remind her that her soul had remained behind, yet, it continued to linger somewhere in between the stars and the ocean . She came home to the streets that would still lead her to the place where her heart found a home all those moons ago. She came home to the trees that once blew endless messages of love into her ear, as she walked through the lanes.

It was not that long ago that she left her village, and her love behind. It was not that long ago that she swore to him she would return, just as soon as she found her magnificent. She said that she would bring all her wonderful with her and she promised to share it with him someday. She vowed that she would never forget him, or the village that her roots were firmly planted in. She asked him to wait for her, and she begged him to believe in her, and her promise.

She thought that the city streets would be paved in gold and that the morning sun would be so bright. She thought that the city stars at night would perhaps, blind her. She thought that the nights would be shorter, and that her days would be warmer. She thought that she could get lost in the crowds of a thousand strangers on the city streets, as she quietly and inconspicuously, searches for her beautiful.  She thought that she could become fabulous and be amazing before she goes home again, to the village that was keeping her roots watered. She thought that she could grow up and win her worth in the world, before she came home to her forever.

But, how was she to know that her value was never found in her search for wonderful? How was she to know that her splendor would not mean much at all, and that her hunt would all be for nothing? That it would end up being one promise too late? How was she to know that her glory was inside of her, all along? How could she ever have known that when she finally came home, she would come home to a hollowness she never thought she would feel in the village that once filled her with butterflies and bubbles? She came home today, just like she promised she would. She found her wonderful and she became extraordinary for him. She found all she had ever searched for, and all she thought she would ever need, but she came home … one promise too late.

Coming home one promise too late, was never in her plans or her dreams. She never thought that he could leave. She never thought that her village would grow up and change just as they did. She never thought that the faces she once knew so well, would be gone from the only home they had ever known. She never thought that she would be welcomed by a whole lot of nothingness when she came home again. She never thought that their village would become a total stranger to her, with strange new people and strange, new buildings. She never thought that the trees that were once a part of their religion, would be cold-heartedly cut down, and that their mountain would be covered by brand-new houses. She never thought that he would leave. She never thought she would be one promise too late.

As she drove through the streets of the village that was still holding firmly onto her heart and her roots, she realized that she never needed to go in search of any kind of remarkable. She was already extraordinary for him. She never needed to hunt any kind of fabulous, he had already spotted that in her. Just like him, she came from the village with its own fairy-tales and enchantments, and that was all the wonderful they ever needed.

She came home today, to discover that he had found his own kind of exquisite. His very own fairy-tale, and his very precious wonderful. He had been talking to his Angel about new sunrises and brand-new sunsets. They had spoken about a place where he could see the sun come up again, and where the streets were paved in gold and lined with flowery blossoms. He had found his delight in the echoing of the moon, in the whispers of the stars, and in the drops of the rain. He had spoken to his Angel about finding a place where his soul could rest for a while, and where his heart could love forever. He asked about taking one final breath over here, and he whispered about taking another first one, over there. There, where his eyes can once again, see through the foggy mists that were blinding him over here. There, where his heart could be unbroken, and where he no longer had to wait for her to come home. He asked his Angel to close his eyes, but not to let hers cry. He told His Angel that she always had to run, but that he just never really knew why? He said that sometimes, he could feel her fall entirely apart under their stormy skies, but that he just knew, she wouldn’t be home soon. He told his Angel that he could feel there had to be something more out there for him, and that he could sometimes, feel the thunder raging underneath his feet. He told his Angel that he was tired and could no longer fight. He said that he’d hate for her to see him so broken and defeated, and that they both knew it would be one battle he would lose. He asked his Angel, if it could perhaps be his turn to find his very own wonderful, away from their village and away from their world?

His Angel said that it was alright, she would anyway be home, one promise too late.

 

 

 

The House Where Love Once Lived

She began to tremble slightly as she stood in the shade of an almost fifty-year-old oak tree and eyed the old white house on the hill. She felt a gentle breeze submerge her, before a mild shudder ran down her spine, almost as though it was welcoming her back, but at the same time, scolding her for being gone for far too long. She could have sworn that the old oak was much smaller when she used to stand at that very same spot and call out his name, not too long ago. She could clearly remember how they carved their initials in that very same tree, and when she looked closely, she could see traces of what was once written and promised in the bark.

Her eyes followed the trail that leads up the stairs, and onto the porch that wrapped itself around the entire house. He wouldn’t be home, but she had to return one last time. She had to come and ask for her soul back. She was ready to plead, beg and negotiate, so she opened the gate and walked up the path she had walked a million times before. She looked down and wondered if her footprints were perhaps burnt in somewhere underneath her, below a thousand others that walked the same pathway after her. She wondered if the walls would remember her, and if the rose shrubs would perhaps recognize her after all these years? She beamed slightly when she saw the age-old garden swing, one she could barely remember not being there. Were they four, or were they five when they sat there together, for the very first time? Before she sat down, she gently pressed her hands down on the scuffed and worn swing. She couldn’t help by wonder if her hand prints were still hidden beneath his.

The front door was closed, the windows were shut, and the curtains were all drawn. Almost as though it was defending and preserving the memories that were once there for the world to see. Almost as though it was shielding outsiders from the sacredness of a kind of love … that no longer lives there.

Her eyes caught the upstairs window to the bedroom right at the end of the hall. How often had she strolled down that passage and into that bedroom where he would be playing the guitar or waiting for her to do their homework. She wondered if those four walls ever whispered their stories to anyone else? Stories they were dreaming of when they were seven, eleven, fourteen or seventeen. How many secrets had they branded into the walls of that very same bedroom. She looked over at the Fraser Fir she was sure seemed bigger when she was younger. Was that where her love for Christmas trees and their magic began? She frowned just a little when she remembered how his beloved dog was buried right below that beautiful tree, and how they both thought that he would live on in that very same tree, forever.

She noticed the latch of a hallway window still broken. She grinned when she thought back to how it accidentally broke when he snuck out one night; he just had to see her before the morning light. He had to tell her to be still, and that everything will be alright. Before her nightmares closed in on her, he had to wrap his arms around her, and make her feel safe one more time. They must have been nine or ten. She looked out over the town below the big, white house on the hill, and at once recognized the road they had walked each day, hand in hand. She wondered how often he sat there and watched her walk the same streets that lead to the house, where love once lived.

She lowered her head, and replayed memories of what felt like a thousand years and a million heartbeats ago. She thought that if she could be there, where love once lived, she could conquer her brokenness and collect up all the ruins of her broken heart. She thought that if she could feel him once more, there where her love once lived, her crushed pieces would mend, and her heart would feel less numb.

She slowly made her way to the front door, and she wondered how many times she had knocked on that very same door? She was sure that if she listened closely, she might hear the sounds on the other side echo down the hallway, just as she had so many times before. She placed her ear against that heavy, wooden door when she was sure she could hear his laughter on the other side. She closed her eyes when she heard the ghosts of her past still run wild on the other side of those walls. She could not ignore the sounds her haunting memories of unspoiled and untainted love made, or the promises of forever she could still hear from the house where love once lived.

As she made her way down the path and back to the gate, she quickly swabbed at the tears that were threatening to gush from her eyes. It would be her last visit to the house where love once lived. It would be one final struggle to free her heart, still coldly imprisoned between those walls and under that roof. It would be her one last chance to walk away, without leaving her soul behind. There, where it continued to dwell in the house where love once lived.

When she reached the gate, she turned around one last time. She whispered a silent goodbye to what was left of the house where her soul would be trapped in forever. A house that no longer had any stories to tell, except for the collection of souls it refuses to set free. A home that has grown cold, abandoned and silenced. The memories of love, laughter and joy that once roamed freely in every room of this home, was now carved into the foundation and forsaken. Nobody wants the house where love once lived. Nobody wants to be reminded of the sorrow or the anguish that came in as an uninvited guest and left a path of destruction on its way out. As though it stands on sacred ground, the house is left untouched. Nobody dares to walk through that gate anymore. Nobody wants to walk up the trail to the house where love once lived. Nobody wants to forget the anguish of the broken hearts that were left behind, and nobody can fix the fragmented wreck that was once a house where love lived.

The skies turned dark, and the wind howled through the large oak tree as she waved the house goodbye, one last time.

“Keep my heart … my soul still lives there …”

 

WIN LOLA’S 4-LEAF-CLOVER NECKLACE!

The Photograph

She keeps a photograph of him hidden behind another, in an album she buries deep in the back of her closet. What was once just another ordinary photograph, has turned into a token of validation for her, as the years passed her by. It was a reminder of a man and a moment, she should have disregarded, and left tucked away in the past. A simple photograph that wonderfully freezes time for her, and distances the voices around her whenever she looks at it. A photograph she tells no-one of, but holds to value above all the treasures in the world.

She fits in right amongst us, and mostly, she goes unnoticed. There is nothing spectacular, unusual or bizarre about her. She goes about her day to day life as any mother and wife would, she invites her friends over for coffee, or she runs her errands just as any other person would. She kisses her man when he leaves for work each morning, and she waves the children goodbye, as they rush off to school. If you saw her, you would never know about the photograph that she keeps hidden and buried, in her closet. You will never know that every once in a while, when she is alone with her thoughts, when nobody calls for her and nobody needs her, she closes her bedroom door, and carefully takes out the album, where that photograph of him is kept under a shroud of secrecy.

The corners of the photograph are beginning to fray, and the ageing ink is beginning to fade. There is evidence that the photograph was once torn in resentment or fury, or perhaps while overwhelmed by the shatters of a broken heart. If you turn it over, you will notice how it was then desperately glued and taped back together. You are sure that the wrinkles and folds on that photograph, was because it was once crumpled, and impulsively banished into a waste bin. If you look closely, you’ll see stains you’d swear, are from teardrops that once fell onto it.

She slowly and carefully traces his face, as he looks back at her. She gazes into the eyes, that looked back at her a thousand times before. In his eyes, she finds a million stories, and each time she joins him in that photograph, she sees something different. Sometimes, there are stories of pain, suffering and sadness. And at other times, there are stories of uncertainty, confusion, fear, frustration and desperation. But mostly, his eyes let her know of the love there was once for her, and only for her.

When her eyes trail down to his mouth, she achingly touches them, and she smiles sadly, as though she can feel them at her fingertips. She can’t stop her bottom lip from quivering, when she remembers how his lips felt against hers, almost a lifetime ago. She remembers the way they kissed her, and she can once more, hear their messages to her heart.

Her eyes begin to scrutinize every inch of his face, and when they detect that all-too-familiar dimple around his mouth just below his cheek, she beams when she remembers how he once, laughed from the very hub of his stomach. She remembers how it would begin with a smile and a frown all at the same time. And … almost as though a countdown to an explosion begins, he would erupt into a laughter that could silence the entire world, as they search for the happiest and most beautiful sound in the biosphere. She pauses when her eyes rests on his hair. She gazes with sadness at his dark, not quite black hair that is wildly blowing in the wind, and she remembers how he used to run his fingers through them when they argued. She remembers how he used to sit while deep in thought with his elbows rested on his knees, and twirl a lock of his own hair with his index finger.

For a few moments, that photograph of him reminds her of love. An honest, crazy and mad kind of love she thought, she would know forever. That photograph is what tells her where and when she was introduced to a kind of love, she never thought she would find. It was a love that trapped her beneath his eyes, and kept her from seeing others around her. It is a photograph of a man she knows she will miss, for the remainder of her life. A photograph of a place and a time where fairy-tales were real, and butterflies lived inside of her.

When that photograph quietens her heartache yet again, she slides it back behind another one. Her eyes begin to sparkle, and as a lost tear rolls down her cheek, she whispers how her heart misses his. She once again, hides the album in the darkest corner of her closet, before she returns to the chaos of the world around her. There where there are no traces of him or the moment they were once spellbound in. A photograph she clings to, because it shows her the proof that he was once real, even though their moment was fleeting. It gives her the proof she needs, to know that he loved her madly, and that their love was once captured and would remain timeless, and ready for her to evoke, whenever she wanted to.

She Is A Lot Like You

He says that the average girl begins to dream of her wedding by the time she is five years old. When she starts planning it at the age of about seven, she first picks out the colors of her chosen flowers, and she finally agrees on the tiers of her wedding cake. By the time she reaches the age of thirteen, she already knows where her wedding will be, and she knows exactly what time her guests would be arriving. At the age of seventeen, she has already designed, and altered her beautiful white wedding gown a thousand times. She has chosen her Maid of Honor, and she has carefully selected her bridesmaids.

He says that when she reaches the age of about twenty-four, she starts looking around for the man who will take her breath away, and make her feel foolish all at the same time. The man who stands proudly next to her, and whose arms fit perfectly around her. She searches for him in every man she meets, and she listens for silent messages from his heart to hers. She discards flaws that might make her turn away from him; after all, … he need not be faultless, just perfect for her. She looks into the eyes of a man she hopes would someday share her bed, home and life as though he was made just for her.  She gazes penetratingly into them, as she tries to find proof of the children they would have in the not too distant future. He says that he knows this; he sees it in her eyes and he feels it when she is close. He sense how she tries to find recognition in his odor when she breathes him in, deep into her soul.

He says that she will be hunting for a hand that will hold hers closely and possessively, and who will look at her like she is the only girl he has ever seen. She wants him to look at her each time, as though he is seeing her for the very first time. He says that she searches for his honesty in the love she hopes he would have for her, and she tries to find a promise in his touch, one that swears to her that he would never leave her.

He says that he’s not sure what he will be wearing to his wedding. It might be a tux, a suit or white rolled up cotton trousers. He has no idea if he will wear shoes, boots or if he will meet her at the altar, barefoot and with a tie-less, unbuttoned shirt. He has no clue what his wedding would look like; he can’t even imagine who she is; the one that will attach his last name to hers. But, he can imagine how he would stand at the altar, all six feet of him, and wait for her to make her way down the aisle to him. To only him. He says that he already dreams of her broad, yet nervous smile, and he hopes that it would be so great, the world would be able to see it from Mars. He says that he can visualize her delicately walking up to him, as though she is stepping on stars, and that he probably would rush to meet her halfway, in case she changes her mind.

He says that he will say “I do” and take her for his wife, even before the Pastor finishes his sentence, and apologize for his enthusiasm later.  He says that he has been waiting for his future wife to show up, for almost as long as she has been waiting for him.

And … when the world asks him about her, he tells them that her eyes search for him from deep within her. That she loves to laugh, and that the world becomes silent when she does. He says that she perhaps, thinks a little too much about everything, but does not take anything too seriously. He says that she has no idea how beautiful she is, or how her smile feels like home to him. He says that when she whispers his name, the entire planet comes to an abrupt stand-still, as he listens attentively to the only voice he ever wants to hear. He says that she would probably never really make sense to him or to the universe within her, but he is sure that he would love that the most about her.

He says that whenever he is asked about his future wife, he always says that she is a lot like you.

*** COVER REVEAL ***

I am so pleased and terribly excited to reveal Molly’s beautiful book cover!

Seventeen-year-old Molly was relentless when pleaded and begged her father to let her stay behind in the village she grew up in, after James Starkey was tasked with the grim decision of moving his family away from the only home they had ever know, and out to the city.

Molly was terrified of leaving Ryan behind. She could barely shake the overwhelming and tormenting fear that things between them, were about to change forever.

After their first holiday together months later, Molly was devastated to return to her parents, bringing horrendous and shocking tragedy with her.

James was crushed by Ryan and Molly’s carelessness, and in a moment of anger, he demanded that she never see Ryan again. Molly’s hopelessness and rage turned to instant hatred for the father she once adored.

James was beleaguered by feelings of guilt as he watched his daughter pine for the boy she had left behind; the boy he had forced her to say goodbye to, and in the process, he made her question all that she had ever believed in. Would he ever forgive himself for the haunting choices he made on her behalf?

When Molly finally made the journey back to the town she once adored, she was shocked to discover that the man he had become, was nothing like the boy she had once left behind. Even though her heart longed for him, he had become a stranger to her. She was horrified by his unanticipated anger and surprising hatred towards her when he learnt of Molly’s disturbing betrayal.

Will Molly and Ryan’s one night together make way for a whole new world of distressing aftermaths? Will Ryan ultimately forgive her, and can he stop her from making the same mistake again? Will Molly finally find peace in all that once destroyed her, and can she ever forgive James for turning his back on her when she needed him the most?

“Can You Paint Me A Love Story?”

On the corner of a busy and bustling city street, she saw him behind his easel as people hurriedly passed him by, almost as though he was fiercely guarded from the world around him. He smiled slightly as he clutched a paint brush in his hand, and whistled a love song that could not be drowned out by the lively noises of the streets. With each brush stroke, he brought to life the waves of an ocean that were crashing harshly on the sands of a beach. She stood silently as she watched him paint the seas that reflected the rising sun of the morning sky. She gazed longingly at the life he was creating by the mere strokes of his brush, and through the gentle whistles of his love songs.

With a trouncing heart, she walked up to him and through the shudders of her own voice, she asked him if he only painted scenes of the oceans and the skies? He lowered his brush and grinned, before he told her that for a few bucks, he would paint her anything she wanted.

She fell to her knees and grabbed his warm, inspired hands. She stared at them, confident and hopeful that they would create a painting for her too. She asked him if he could paint her a love story? Without pausing to take a breath, she went on to describe how it should look, just like she had planned when she was only a little girl. She told him of a little blue house, a slight way out of town. She asked him to paint a porch with a swing, so that she could watch over her horses and gaze out onto her flower fields. She begged him to paint her on that swing in a white cotton dress, and make it the very first day of spring. She squeezed his hands tighter, and asked him again, to paint her a love story.

He glowered when he noticed the despair in her persuasive eyes. He hurriedly seized a blank canvas, and picked up his paint brush. He asked her where she would like him to place her love in the painting, and when she began to whimper softly, he knew he would have to be placed right beside her, where she needed him to be. She asked him if he could perhaps peek into her heart, and see how it longs for the way it was before; before, when her story was a painting that she had once owned. And then, she implored him to place her love’s arms back around her, just like it once was.

She told him how the bright sunrises contradict the dense mist that weighs down so heavily on her. She said that she needed him to paint the joyful sounds of the birds in the mornings, so that her heart could hear them once more. She gently whispered how she wondered why the world continued to turn, and that without her new painting, she was just not sure she could begin again. She asked him to add fireflies to brighten her darkest nights, and she told him to place the stars like a silvery gown around her.

She said that she wanted to hang it above her big, empty bed where she feared the dark and dreaded the dawn all at the same time. She softly confessed, that she reaches for her love in vain and that she tearfully whispers his name, just as she is about to fall asleep. She reminded the artist not to forget to paint daffodils, so that she can smile instead of cry. She told him to take his time because at that very moment, her heart does not yet have a home, and that it is just a painting, until it becomes her love story.