Through the ages

all characters (c) other then me

/ The guilt weighs heavy on your shoulders./

Through the ages

When you are seventeen you see nothing.

Looking back you can see that you were blind. You can remember bits of their conversations, the words so formal and correct, and you wonder if even then they had an underlying meaning.

But when you are seventeen you are caught up in yourself, trying to make sense of what you are and finding solace in the dark haired goddess that then ruled your world.

Little time is made for what later in life seems so important.

When you are eighteen you see them walking together and you are enchanted with the picture they make.

The smile that lights up your petite friend's face seems as brilliant as the rays of the yellow sun and the glimpse of what you see hidden in his eyes makes you wonder if maybe she could be his salvation.

At twenty you are a man – a hero dressed in blue and red, and yet you can do nothing but hold your friend as she cries the blatant tears of a broken heart.

Helpless is what you feel when you see the man that once you thought of as a brother sink deeper in to the darkness that has always been his.

At twenty-two you have had enough of the muted version of the blonde spitfire from your youth.

So you set them up.

Reluctant matchmaker extraordinaire you plan to meet them both for lunch and from a café across the street you watch as the hesitance give away to hope, hope give away to love.

At twenty-four you have found yourself another dark haired goddess. She calls you farm boy and you manage not to fumble when you ask her to the wedding.

Your friend is radiant in white and once again you begin to hope that maybe salvation might still be found.

You are thirty when hope dies.

You were too late, and later when you cry in the arms of your wife she tells you that even heroes fail sometime.

At her burial you stare at the man in front, the guilt you feel weighs on your shoulder and not even the reassurance feel of the feminine body next to you chases it away.

The man in you cries silent tears for the friend you lost. The hero in you is afraid; afraid that the years that passed will sink into oblivion.

Guilt weighs on your shoulders.

The End.