Hello Stranger

by Jade West

I’d always been like that. Mum and Dad said I’d been like it since I was barely walking, a little toddler saying owww and rubbing cream on people whenever I thought they’d hurt themselves. I’d wrap my dollies in bandages and cry whenever something bad happened to a character in a story, and I was always on a one-child mission to protect the schoolyard. Always with the desire to help people; to stop their hurting.

she laughed again, and that’s when I knew it for certain. I was in love with her. I was in love with everything about her, even the things I didn’t know.

“Maybe between us we can find a middle ground,” I said with a laugh. “My optimism crashing into your pessimism. Maybe we can find a realistic place, right in the eye of the storm.” He stopped me in my tracks and turned me to face him, and his face was deadly serious when he spoke. “Never lose your eternal optimism for my sake, Chloe. Run away long before you lose yourself to my negativity.”

It was from knowing this was the very best of how I could possibly feel for another human being. Because it was. There was no way my soul could be dancing through the clouds higher than it was that night.

“One tiny second of joy is worth a lifetime without it,” I said. “I want every single second with you I can get. Every single second, of every single day.”