It was a cold Thursday morning. Angela jumped out of bed when the alarm went off. Her husband, David, had been gone for three days. He had joined the army. His enlistment threatened Angela's carefully constructed defenses. Sometimes she looked at him and wondered if she loved him because he was so much like Marcus. It was never her intention to find someone like him, it had just happened. David and Marcus had the same physique though David was neither as tall nor dark. Angela could never beat him in chess. Her husband was intelligent and witty. His younger life had been marked by the day his mother abandoned him with his father without explanation. Angela loved David, in her own way. He would never hurt her and she would always be faithful to him. Their baby girl was asleep in her crib, she was eight months old. Angela went to the bathroom and splashed cold water on her face. She'd had that dream again. It had been nearly fifteen years since she met Marcus for the first time, but she was still dreaming about him. In her dream they were never together; he was simply present. Each time she had the dream Angela awoke with a deep sense of loneliness. They were both happily married and had children of their own but even that couldn't erase the past for her. She glanced down at her wrist. She still had a small scar. It was perhaps the only testament other than her heart to what happened that day so long ago. As she looked at her sleeping baby she thought of that other baby girl. The one that would be thirteen now. The same age she was when it all began.
"What a different world that would be." She thought. She often felt that the one life had to be sacrificed in order for Marcus and her to live. That never made it any easier. Life was precious. Angela glanced at the clock. She needed to get ready for work. Maybe that afternoon when she got off she could catch Marcus on the computer for a minute. She didn't even need to talk to him; just seeing that he was online gave her comfort to know that he was still out there. Existing. She couldn't live in a world where he didn't exist. Even if she never saw him again.