Every ten years
WPOV:
I had tried to prepare my self for today; for the past, almost nine years, I had tried to prepare myself for what I would find today. My heart (figuratively, of course), my soul, and a better part of my brain, had willed me to believe that she would be standing there, on the bluff, waiting with her eyes on the horizon, waiting for me. But there was a very small part of me that kept cautioning me, warning me, reminding me just how long ten years actually was. Warning me, that even my Elizabeth may have mo-, no, that part of me was a lost cause, I couldn't even think it.
But still, here I am, on my ship, hoping beyond hope that she will be there.
It is really by luck that I am able to come here, for the first eight or nine months after I left her crying on the beach, I was completely and utterly useless. I did the bare minimum to survive, not wanting to put Elizabeth or my father, or for that matter my crew, through loosing me, some of them for the second time. After what was probably about nine months, I woke one morning with a new view on life. Something inside of me convinced me that there was something, somewhere ( I will bet my ship that it had something to do with Elizabeth, because I have not been content without her) worth living a good life for.
From where I stand, on the mast of my ship, I can see two figures. I automatically recognize Elizabeth's, but the one beside her is drawing a blank. It is, thank God, too small, much too small to be another man. It is now that I allow myself to remember that last day with Elizabeth, what we did; what we shared, and the slight hope that we may have a child. I put those thoughts away, they are too great, too unlikely to get excited over.
Elizabeth sees me now, and is running down the beach. The other figure follows, for a few small steps, and then stops and sits, as if realizing what Elizabeth and I have been waiting for, for the past decade; the longest of my life. I cast the anchor and rush down the ladder, into the water, and into Elizabeth's waiting arms.
We hold that embrace for what may have been hours, minutes, or maybe only seconds, but I know, that this is the happiest I have been (or should I say, the only time I have been happy), in ten years.