Vindicated

Disclaimer: Coffee preferences aside, I own nothing

Chapter two of three

Reflections and Dreams

Like love and faith, the truth is never vain…

I'm late. And it's killing me. I take the path with quickening strides great full my memory holds this course true because the sun and all its light have officially left the city and even though the moon is taking a stand in the night it's losing quickly to the powers that be and their cloak of rolling darkness. The wind picks up again and this time it's all business. I watch the leaves in the trees, their pale veined underbellies thrown up in the breeze. I've been told it's a sure sign of rain.

I've played the scene I'm about to encounter over in my mind so many times, it's funny I never once wondered after the weather.

So now that the sky above is preparing for what I think will be a quick yet violent battle, I add it into the equation and it does not set the story astray in the least. And I will admit, only to myself of course, that I may have let my fantasies have the better of me. I mean a year is a very long time to wonder and hope and daydream. It's pretty much the most of what kept my head above water, or sand rather, these last few months.

The closer this day came to the forefront of my life the more I hoped things would go my way. There would be no greater moment in my future than to see my own emotions reflected back at me in the depths of those blue eyes.

'A reevaluation' and 'new understanding' of all my past declarations are the terms that would be used. No tear drenched reflection on the past and its mistakes. It might be a fantasy but she is who she is.

Incomplete without her science and the logic it follows, like water and its mindless path down hill, it just knows no other way.

I'm pretty sure I've come to terms with the fact that there will be no such utterance in the moments that follow. And I can all but guaranty there will be no commencement tonight, no sudden drop into the unknown that has filled all of the spaces my heart can spare. But it's the heart of a lion, or so I've been told, and it's too strong and filled with love and a heavy dose of pride, to give up hope now.

If patience truly is a virtue, I'm as virtuous as they come.

The air is so thick, so wet and heavy I can't be sure if it has in fact begun to rain. As I round a corner and it fills my vision I turn to the Reflecting Pool for conformation. There are a few scattered ripples along its glassy surface giving the echoing tree tops a soft and dreamy feel but it's only the wind whipped cotton candy petals that disturb the picturesque pond.

Perhaps Lady Luck does in fact exist.

And then the lighting strikes making contact somewhere in the not to distant distance and the thunder roars immediately after.

My quickening stride becomes a steady jog.

If there was ever a foreshadowing to heel to, along the horizon of my life, I would think this would be it. Rolling thunder and air so thick you could drown, set directly in the path of a reunion that's sure to cause more heartache than joy.

I don't know what this last year was supposed to prove or how it came to be. I almost feel as if I went to bed one night with no intentions of ever leaving and I woke the next morning with a full fledged understanding and desire to leave as quickly as possible. I know I left because she was determined to go, to prove she is who she was before we were ever us. But I also know I did it for myself, for my country and my peace of mind. For the faith of my son and the lives I know my skills did save.

I did not leave to see if I returned to more than what I left.

And I'd be damned if I was to stay, to work on my own with only her memory and the haunting of her absence. I'd be a man with no mission, a tide always turning and striving for purpose and like every wave that crashes upon every shore, I'd surface with nothing but the slowly sifting sand between my desperate fingers.

Sure I could blame the boy wonder for all of this. Because when you think about it, the duckling just couldn't keep his mouth shut. And now the truth has an inky permanence to it, printed a thousand times over with no disclaimers of changed names or protection for us, the innocent. I always kind of felt like Sweets wanted us together. Not just for the reasons and evaluations listed like evidence or symptoms in that damn book, but more like a forgotten middle child who's become desperate for his parent's affection. A constant, broadening need to have his opinion viewed and respected.

The repetition of a single action with the expectation of a different outcome; It's nice to be the one to throw those words in someone else's face, however childish that might sound.

Far be it from me to label the boy mentally unsound, but his perpetual insistence when it comes to the matters of my heart have given me moments of questioning his ability to compartmentalize.

But then again what does that make me?

I've come upon our coffee cart, the face beside its counter barely registers, but the soft feminine voice stops me.

"Hazelnut roast, cream no sugar."

Our eyes meet again and I see the woman who was hiding inside the teenager I remember.

"Good memory." I state as my eyes go wide with surprise, after all it's been a while.

"Cream, two sugars, second one of the days is always a decaf."

She throws her thumb over her shoulder to indicate a bench some fifty feet behind her, set in a halo of iridescent, golden light that only highlights the ribbon like mist thickening the air.

And there in the middle of that misty glow sits the reason for my existence.

"I didn't recognize her without you." She tells me by way of an explanation.

My only reply is a burst of sincerity added to the automatic smile she's pulled from my face. My eyes don't even meet hers as my body starts to move. They're fixated on the bench and lovely pile of bones upon it, her head thrown back, no doubt to watch the heavens brew above. I can't help myself, can't grab hold of the calm exterior I'd resurrected from its storage with this exact moment in mind, so I fall victim as I always have, and rush to where I know I belong. Where I know I'm home.

A/N: For the stories sake I've considered Sweets' book reevaluated and published. A very big thank you to everyone who's added this to their story alert/favorite stories! I'm new to this and it's amazing what those alert emails can do to improve even a Monday!