Chapter Twelve: The Colorado Goodbye

I sit in the darkness of the summer night on my brick steps. And tuck my knees up to my chin.

And I wait.

Nick is leaving tomorrow for a week-long motorcycle trip to Colorado to visit his best friend who moved away last year. The summer night is as calm and content as child’s sigh as I shift my weight around on the hard surface in anticipation of our goodbye. My daughters are in the house sleeping and Nick is wrapping up his shift at ten so he can embark on his journey with the sunrise.

He’s sneaking in a quick goodbye to me before he goes.

As a dutiful Catholic, I’ve bought him a St. Christopher’s medal. Even though he’s gone on several trips like this, that motorcycle shenanigans still worries me.

I figure a little saintly intervention can’t hurt.

Just a few minutes after ten his truck is pulling up to my house and I stand up and smile widely. His dark form is soon sauntering to my steps and wrapping me in his arms.

“Hey,” he whispers and kisses me.

“Hey back,” I say.

We’ve only been dating two weeks and now he’s going to be gone for one. If I were to stand on the outside of my life and observe this timeline were it anyone else’s, I would surely gaffaw and do my best impression of barfing with the ridiculousness of thinking anyone could say or feel the words, “I will miss you,” after such a short time together.

It makes no sense to me. Yet it seems like the most logical emotion I have ever had.

But it is not me who articulates the insanity. Nick’s eyes lock with mine as he smiles and says, “Crazy as this sounds, you have no idea how much I am going to miss you.”

I bite my bottom lip and dive into the lunacy with him, throwing my arms around his neck and laughing as I reflect the words back like a giant mirror.

“I am going to miss you too,” I wholeheartedly admit and then add for emphasis, “So much!”

He clasps me harder and I tell him, “I have something for you before you go.”

Peeling myself from beneath his embrace I reach into my sweatshirt pocket and take out the medal, “To keep you safe,” I say with a smile.

And there in the darkness, with only the light from my blackberry, we sit down next to each other on my front steps and I read the prayer to him.

Grant me, O Lord, a steady hand and watchful eye. That no one shall be hurt as I pass by. You gave life, I pray no act of mine may take away or mar that gift of thine. Shelter those, dear Lord, who bear my company, from the evils of fire and all calamity. Teach me, to care for others need; Nor miss through love of undue speed The beauty of the world; that thus I may with joy and courtesy go on my way. St. Christopher, holy patron of travelers, protect me and lead me safely to my destiny. Amen.

I finish the prayer and he hugs me, thanking me so sweetly as he fastens the medal around his neck, “I promise to wear it the entire time. But more than that, I promise to come back to you. Safe.”

I remind him then of the story he told me about his grandparents and how they’d been separated for three years during World War II. I playfully assert that we can certainly last a week if they made it through that.

“Ah, yes, yes they did,” Nick purrs in my ear, hugs me harder and projects, “But if I ever had to go to war, let me tell you something.” I lift my gaze to his as he emphatically professes, “I’d move to Canada before I’d ever leave you.”

And at that moment.

In the darkness.

I feel so wanted. So protected. So simultaneously crazy and sane. And deep down inside of me, in this place where my soul has harbored this faint flicker of a dream for as long as I can remember, I start to feel as if maybe that misty hope is moving from wistful reverie to un-yielding certainty.

And I allow the thought to slip into my consciousness.

As I fall into the one place I’d always believed was real but never known.

In love.