Disclaimer: Characters aren't mine, but this story is.
AN's: I took an instant liking to the term "witness by proxy" when I first heard it on an episode of "General Hospital." Over the weekend, while at a teaching seminar the term popped into my head again, and this is where it led me.
Witness by Proxy
I never thought I'd be nothing more than a witness by proxy in your life.
To be a specter on the shadows of your life.
Watching as you moved on without me to help you along the way.
Love was supposed to be ours at some point, even if we denied its presence in out conscious thoughts, our hearts knew.
That's why I'm still bound to you.
Bound to your world.
Bound to watch you walk through life with me.
To watch as you move further away from me.
Move me further into the shadows.
And yet, I can tell that you sense me sometimes.
That you still turn to me, only to stop to shake your head before you turn away again.
Turn away from the past to the life you have made for yourself without me.
The life you have now.
He loves you.
You love him.
The part of me that was his friend remembers that he was is no gomer.
That he carries the baggage of a love not fully actualized; a dream not quite realized.
You are each others second chance, and from the lengthening shadows my love still remains, as a small set of eyes so like yours somehow connect with mine and your life's witness by proxy can't help but smile and blow a kiss, knowing as he kisses your cheek and allows her to grab onto his finger while you give him a smile I wish was still for me alone that this is how it should be.
That I was your path to this life.
But I still wish that our paths hadn't diverged in life.
But then, who knows?
Maybe they'll converge again in death.
Till then I'll continue in my role of witness by proxy to the life that I wish was ours. . .