A/N: Origin stories aren't usually my thing… but sometimes it's fun to do something out of the ordinary! What is my thing however is writing in first person (surprise! this is easier than third person) so this was the perfect moment to throw in some first person chapters. All chapters are from Elizabeth's point of view unless otherwise noted. Enjoy!
That was my forever. It seems so strange to talk about forever in the past tense as I actively live in it… but it's the most factual statement for the situation at hand. Everything that's around me was my forever… but now my forever is different.
My first forever was him. I'll never forget the way he looked on our wedding day. He had this timeless, tall, dark, and handsome quality to him. I look back fondly at those times and realize he has barely aged. In that moment, he was the one who looked like he was ready for forever… and at the time he was, but I understand that he wasn't ready for my other forevers and they weren't his.
Then my forever was my time in the CIA. Moments in foreign countries, turning my life upside down, finding clues among utter chaos… I was ready for that forever. To be honest, I still want that version of forever in many ways. It's not that I don't feel like my work now isn't important, that I don't benefit people in some ways, but something about the chaos was comforting. It was a certain, unique peace that I could live in forever.
They'll always be my forever but they were the part of my forever that I didn't plan on, that I didn't plan for. It was never that they weren't wanted, I still want them to depend on me every second of every day, but when my forever with him started… I didn't see them in my forever.
I couldn't imagine my forever without them now. I wasn't ready to be a mother when Ali came along… but I don't know if that's something I would have ever been ready for. The universe had other plans and for those other plans I am so grateful.
I thought I was ready for Jason a few years later… but I was wrong. I was so wrong. They taught me how to love with the most tender, burning passion. I wondered how I could ever love someone or something as much as I loved Ali and then Jason continued to teach me that I didn't know everything about my forevers… but I knew they would always be it.
They challenge me. They continue to teach me things I never thought I could know. I think they still love me most times and I know this phase will end and their love will be evident. My love for them never varies, it's the most consistent thing I have ever know… it's the only forever I know will never end.
I know forevers can end. I learned that the hard way. You think your parents are forever… you never really imagine a life without them, and then one day there it is - that thing you always knew was possible but you didn't think you'd ever actually know. That was just the first forever I saw come to an end.
I didn't see my time in the CIA come to an end… but it did. It was filled with a different forever but it was still a forever that ended. One that I miss almost as much as I miss the first forever that I lost.
The next loss was easier than I ever anticipated. I wasn't necessarily happy about it, I didn't want it at the time… but I needed it. My forever needed it. We were great… in the present and in the past but as forever became closer and closer, we grew further and further apart.
I used to think divorce was a sign of weakness… I didn't think about the fact that the most adult thing you can do is admit your faults and admit to the things you aren't good at and can't improve on and we weren't good at being married to each other and we couldn't improve on that. We're great as co-parents, he's still one of my best friends, and we approached getting to this point in the most painless way imaginable, but he wasn't my forever.
When I reflect on that particular forever, I realize a lot of reasons why we were never meant to be each others forever. I felt the need to explore, to spread my wings… the craziest thing he had ever done was attend UVA instead of Clemson. He loved stability and in many ways convinced me that I needed more stability than I actually did. He was my stability and that was all the stability I needed, but he needed me to need more. He dreamed of turning his family business into an empire, and he isn't unsuccessful in those attempts, but I needed more than being a CEOs wife.
For a very long time, I couldn't imagine needing anything more than him… but then I had a taste of it. I had kids, I had incredible opportunities, I had dreams cross my mind that had never been near it before… I had a desire that can't really be explained… but I had a need to be more than he wanted.
That wasn't necessarily a bad thing. Our expectations of each other were simply different and we didn't realize it until later on. There was nothing wrong with that and we were exactly what the other needed for many years, but we weren't what we needed forever, and that's ok.
Eight months of dating someone doesn't exactly feel like it's a forever thing, but he is starting to feel like my forever. Henry McCord has had his fair share of former forevers too… maybe that's why there's this soul connection there.
Henry McCord has been through the end of forevers that I can only begin to imagine. He lost his wife in childbirth with their daughter and went from happily married, in the best time of his life, to a widowed father at the same time that his daughter came into the world. It's hard to go through a divorce but at least you know it's coming… it's not really sudden, at least ours wasn't. Henry's was sudden.
As you grow old it eventually hits you that there will be times when you do something for the last time and you don't know it, that's how most of Henry's endings have been. He didn't realize it at the time but the death of his wife also meant the death of his military career. He could have been a single father in the military but it was also a huge risk. What would happen to Stephanie if something happened to him? Those are the things that come first when forevers change.
I hope I'm not another one of his suddenly ended forevers. I don't even really know if the idea of me being forever for him crosses his mind… but it crosses mine. Each passing moment with him shows me that he could really be part of my forever.
This potential forever wasn't like the other forevers. His office isn't far from mine and we saw each other in various buildings on campus for about a month before he finally asked for my email. It seemed strange that he asked for my email… we have a staff directory that would easily give him my phone number and email but I went with it.
I'm glad I did. I wasn't sure what to expect when I saw an email from him but it made sense as soon as he said he felt better with writing words than saying them sometimes… I can be that way as well. I agreed to coffee, and it was the best coffee I had ever had.
Then it was on to drinks. This little place by campus has a great Wine Wednesday and I could have sat there and drank bottle after bottle with him, taking in every detail of his story.
He met his wife as an undergrad before enlisting in the military. He had been in ROTC but knew things would change drastically after he finished his undergrad years.
He was a marine pilot and the detail in which he could describe his assignments and experiences made you feel like you lived them too. He and his wife settled in New Jersey near her family and he eventually gained his PhD in Theology just before Stevie, his daughter, was born.
A theologian… not my type, admittedly.
When his wife, Michaela, passed away, he stayed near her family and welcomed the help raising Stevie. He even told me about how they had decided on the name Daniella but Michaela always loved Stephanie.
After Stevie was born, he named her Stephanie as a final gift to Michaela. He expressed many times that she was okay with her daughter not having any sort of family name but feelings change when something so drastic happens and Stephanie Michaela seemed to fit her much better than Daniella Rose. It's her little way of always having her mother with her.
Stevie had recently began college at Lovell University and the wanderlust and empty nesting got the best of Henry and prompted his move to UVA. He was ready for something different and I can't blame him, I can feel the same wanderlust in myself sometimes.
I hope that those aren't all the forevers that I'll never know. My present is going to have a tremendous impact and what my forever will be and who will be in it. Yesterday, Conrad asked me to serve as his Secretary of State.
Today, I sealed my forever date in the history books and I accepted. I will now and forever be Elizabeth Adams Callaway, Secretary of State.
