Title: A Momentary Escape
Disclaimers: All standard disclaimers apply – the characters do not belong to me and no money has been made. Please don't sue.
Notes: Started this as a Cheyenne story but it really didn't sound like her… and, honestly, I don't particularly like that character anyway. I had quite a bit of trouble writing anything beyond 3 paragraphs…So I revamped it. Amazingly, it was then pretty easy to write – I finished it in one night at work! Just as a warning: not only is this unbeta'd (it has been spelling-and-grammar checked, though), this is my first Reba fanfic!
Summary: Reba escapes, just for a moment.
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Reba Hart gingerly sat down on the chipped stone bench in the park that was between her work and the home she shared with her daughters, son, son-in-law and granddaughter. She stopped there two, three times a week, each time overcoming her maternal guilt and trepidation to have some small time of her own.
Time when she wasn't a single woman, divorced after 20-odd years; a mother struggling to guide married teenagers under her own roof and at the same time raise her two youngest; an impromptu babysitter for the grandchild she adored but didn't want to raise herself.
Time when she didn't have to juggle her fears of being alone and her hopes for her children, guilty at the divorce yet thinking it the right thing, having to face the fact that her children would now come from a broken home. She didn't have to worry about money, a roof over all their heads, or food on the table.
Time when she didn't have to worry or be strong and could just be… herself.
So she came here, to the park where parties and fairs were thrown, venturing away from the well-used areas to this almost forgotten courtyard, the concrete cracked with age and overgrown grass crowding the edges. Never before had she seen anyone else here beyond an old man sitting at one of the stone tables, a worn chessboard in front of him as he played against an invisible opponent. This was her own little corner of the world.
Sometimes she brought her writing notebooks, something a secret kept from everyone in her family. Pages filled with poems, songs, quirky stories she wanted to remember, and quotes that touched her heart… They all found haven there, away from prying eyes where she could write down her hopes and dreams on paper. Sometimes it was a photograph album, snapshots of moments so that she could look back and remember only the good times with her family.
Sometimes, maudlin, she looks at the happy family photographs and wonders just where they all went wrong. Had there been a signpost screaming 'Danger!' to them, a fork in the road they had ignored as they raced on their way through life?
Other times, she'll read back over years of her hopes and dreams… and watch as her dreams for herself were replaced with hopes and dreams for her family and children. Then she would wonder just when she lost herself, the fiery take-charge, take-no-prisoners redhead that had grown up on a farm in Oklahoma. When had she become so wrapped up in the Hart family, in her roles of wife and mother, mediator and disciplinarian that she lost herself as Reba?
Inevitably, she would wonder if she had kept a hold of that, of who she was… would things have turned out differently?
Those thoughts she shook off quickly, not wanting to stain this place and the serenity it had come to mean to her.
Serenity?
She laughed a bitter sound that carried on the breeze and caused the man to look over at her with his bushy gray eyebrows drawing together in consternation.
Sanity.
She knew beyond a doubt that if she hadn't found this place, hadn't started the habit of coming here and sitting and thinking… she would have lost her sanity long ago.
Between the overwhelming guilt, the feelings of betrayal, the constant interruptions and demands, and the new woman in her husband's – ex-husband's – life wanting to be best friends… She needed the escape.
So she walked through the park every few days, each step taking her further and further away from the chattering people and children playing games, the sounds of cars and suburban Houston life. Whether the sun was brightly shining overhead or there were gray clouds hanging ominously, she came here. Sometimes it was a mere drizzle, others a total downpour. The weather didn't matter. What mattered was the very fact she was there, someplace that was hers and hers alone.
Occasionally she would go further down the path, bypassing this courtyard as she sought somewhere more secluded, but she usually found herself here. It reminded her in some ways of her home growing up. There were far more trees here, but it had the untamed feel that some parts of her childhood home had. She could smell the grass growing freely instead of in manicured beds interspersed between concrete walkways.
There was even a rickety wooden pavilion half-hidden by the plants that, if she tilted her head, squinted her eyes, and looked at it through rose-tinted glasses of remembered childhood, looked just like the barn on her parents' property. She could almost hear her brothers and sisters calling from inside it, voices clear as a bell through the distance of time.
A part of her wished that it actually were that old barn there. Then she would be able to once more steal away into the hayloft and surround herself by the strong scents of nature and the warmth of the animals below as she read, wrote, and dreamed. Throughout her childhood and well into adulthood, that loft had represented a safe haven to a girl who had hid her vulnerable side from prying eyes.
The girl in her wanted to go back there.
The woman in her wondered whether she had perhaps hidden that vulnerable side just a little too well. If she'd allowed parts to seep through… would she be here, alone, like she was right now? No, she couldn't think like that, that she could have changed what had happened. She'd still be here, but without the mask that she wore so well to outsiders.
They'd know what she felt, her emotions and fears. They'd know about dashed dreams and the hopelessness that invaded her dreams at night.
They'd know too much… and she wouldn't be able to protect herself from the pity she would see in their eyes, the half-hearted efforts to connect and the insincere smiles pressed on her.
She wouldn't like that at all.
She was who she was, who she had always been. That was enough. And if, sometimes, she had to steal away from her life to sit alone and think, to salve emotional and psychological wounds against the salt of everyday life…
She would, to keep her sanity and to learn more about the woman she'd forgotten she was.
She shook her head, looking up at the darkening sky. It was getting late. Her family would be worried about her and wondering just when she would be getting their dinner ready. She stood, wincing as she stretched and then bent down to pat the chipped stone bench that had been a constant in her life for months. The touch was a goodbye, a promise, and a benediction.
She was leaving, but she'd be back.
The next time her life crowded around her, wrapping her so tightly that she couldn't draw a breath without choking… she'd think of this place and the bonds would loosen just a bit.
And when everything was clamoring, not a single minute of peace found anywhere… she'd escape here again, just for a moment.
She had no choice. This place, this time alone, was more than a momentary escape. It was the very reins on her dreams, her sanity, and her mind.
She couldn't afford to let them snap.
The End
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