Full Circle

He had asked me to remarry him, now that time had passed, and I felt inside that I was ready again.

He’d grown his hair out long like he used to, and once more dyed it black. He looked elegant and well put together as it trailed in inviting sway down past his shoulders.

He masked the limp well, and walked straighter now – even without a cane. His eyes were clear with sense of purpose, and I could feel his energy stronger in its core.

Confused about life’s purpose and how mine seemed to have circled back along its path, I’d said Yes, drawn to the warm remembrance of what we’d once come so close to sharing. I was tempted to cross the gap that had always been between us, and to find out if our love could at last claim happiness.

He had plans now, and had decided he was moving to Colorado. There were options there, he said – better than those on the West Coast. He wanted me to move there with him. It could be our chance to “start over.”

So all of our friends and family had been invited and were gathering in a nearby event room to properly bear witness. They were a cherished collection from our society that in our previous life together had been scattered and poorly tended.

My parents were there, as well as dearest, unofficialized godmother and godfathers to our now grown children. I’d never revealed to these parent figures who’d always been our friends and “watched over” / kept tabs on us how much they’d always meant to me.

There were other people there, as well: smatterings of youthful temptation that in the past might have distracted my once-husband away from me, and caused me insecurity.

I was alone for the moment in a side room, having dressed myself in a dark evening gown, and was now putting on lush, colorful shades of dark and light eye shadow containing hints of iridescence. At first, I layered heavily to gain intriguing effect, then cleaned the process to a result more subtle.

Nervous and in a daze, I worked on this while gazing into the mirror. Anxiety was churning slowly in my stomach, and if I wasn’t careful, it could ignite into a full-blown attack.

I was thinking about how long my quest to find “the right partner” had been taking. Ten years, now – and not much to show for it. Maybe it was better this way, although something felt untraceably off about it. Was it the promise I’d made to myself that I’d be breaking by going forward with my once-husband?

Where was my past fiance? I wondered. If asked and truly answered, how would he respond to my decision? I had loved him deeply because his heart had seemed pure, and like me, he had often adorned his sleeve with it.

But, he was nowhere to be seen, of course – although I had written and asked him about it…or at least in my mind I had. In reality, I hadn’t gotten the courage to go through with it, since he had officially “rejected” me.

Everyone was assembled, ready, and beginning to get restless, as the pandemic was still recent and gatherings experienced were a novelty and not yet trusted.

My once-husband about-to-be-renewed walked in, as usual, casting aside conventions. He must have been the one I had learned this from, although I had applied the skill to my own directions.

How much in life had we learned from each other, while determinedly fashioning it to our individual preferences?

Our love had always been a bit like bending light: you could not easily see our congruency – just some opposite effects resulting, refracting as if we were polar opposites destined to attract, but we’d get closer, our poles switched and we would repel each other.

I guess that his was the tail that had near-always flipped whenever I would reach to be closer with him. It was some sort of defense mechanism from trauma in his childhood, projected at me as if I were considered a threat because I offered and craved intimacy.

It was amazing and strangely unsettling to no longer feel his automatic pushing away from me. I was unsure that I could trust this sense of him having evolved and settled into his maturity.

“Having second thoughts?” was the jist of his inquiry, as it was a natural consequence of our damaged past’s history.

“Actually, I am worried. What’s to prevent our reunion from going the way it did before?” I asked him a bit nervously.

“I know better how to handle the Russians, now. I’m not afraid to, anymore.” This meant he was feeling confident enough to stand solid against the most tenacious self doubts.

We laughed at his joke together, and I felt some tension ease inside, wooing me to relax into acceptance, rather than being stuck at my instinct’s indecisiveness, I began turning left to walk into his arms while we headed to the door.

Just then, in slow motion, a hatch lifted from the floor to the right side of and then behind me as I turned to go. As it was thrown wide open, my ex-fiance began struggling to pull his body through the narrow hole.

He tried repeatedly in vain to call my name, becoming more desperate as no sound escaped his lips – not even his gasping breath could be heard, as he fought to reach me.

My ex-fiance’s eyes widened with panic as I arrived at the door, and he fumbled wildly, grasping for something in his jacket pocket. It was a gun – and his arms trembled, shaking with adrenaline, as he lifted it, pointed it at me, and tried to control his aim.

The gun went off, giving an ear blast-cracking sound as its bullet launched and wooshed through air, reaching me as I turned, startled, to meet that sound’s direction. The bullet hit me, piercing and passing through my body, just under my left collarbone.

As the searing pain erupted into my system and I was falling backward from the bullet’s powerful impact, I began losing consciousness and caught just a glimpse of my once-beloved’s stricken face, realizing he had meant to fire past me to get my attention.

How ironic! I thought hazedly as the light was fading. When we had first met, I had accidentally shot him – and then been there for him while he’d gone through months of agonized healing.

Now, I was experiencing the pain he had gone through, before he had found forgiveness and grown to love me.

What a twist to the end of an emotionally intense dream!