Chapter 1: The state of things.
The music was loud. She hated it there. There were only one set of eyes Eleanor cared for, and those eyes had forgotten about her. Park. The person who changed her. He was there, in front of her. But he was not Park. Not the same Park. Not her Park. A stranger almost. He looked at her with pity sometimes. The way you look at an old toy you haven't played with in a while. Obsolete. He didn't know. He was clueless, but that is how Eleanor felt every time Park looked at her. Obsolete. Part of the past. A past the waves of time had washed away.
How long had it been? Four years. Four complete years. Enough for both of them to sort out that maybe would never be enough to satisfy either of the two, and that maybe, and just maybe, the first serious relationship you have is not necessarily the one that will stick. Eleanor drank the beer in her hand from the red solo cup. The music was too loud for her taste. If only Park knew he was the reason she was there. The only reason she stayed there, at 1 am, talking with strangers she didn't care for, and sometimes pretending to have fun. But he didn't, and that's how it should stay.
Sophomore year college. Eleanor had worked her way up to the top of the class, and received a scholarship she could not refuse. They were both on scholarship. She had followed Park to that school; back when she thought Park was all she ever wanted. Now. Well, now she was finding she also wanted stability. She also wanted safety. She wanted to have all the things her mother didn't provide her with, and she could only hope those things included Park. But as she stared at the goof on the other side of the room, talking with another girl, she couldn't help but wonder if love would ever be enough. What was love after all? What was marriage? It was the promise of strapping your life to the life of someone else till death did you apart, and that scared her. Park was familiar to her. But part of her wanted to run from everything familiar. She could not help but fear he could become what her mother had married. And absent man who cared only for his own well-being. For his own ego. She wanted to escape the past, not marry it, and as Park made eye-contact with her for a few seconds from across the room Eleanor waved absently and turned around.
She walked away from that room, and into the porch, where she stared at the night sky. She could not care less for the drunker peers around her. They knew her personality already. The smart, capable, confident woman they should know better than to mess with. She stared at the night sky, and wondered if love would ever be enough to satisfy her, and if love could ever really last.