Breaking Sky

She was rushing today. Her heart pounding with anticipation. For it was Friday, and this was the day she would receiver her weekly letter from Bob. He was so far away, fighting a fight worth everything. She felt too many would not fight it, and that left people like Bob.

She was gathering her purse...her keys...where were her keys?

Rushing through the house her thoughts again turned to the moment he told her he was going. The moment she knew her fears of him leaving were coming true and she wasn't going to stop him. She didn't even make an effort to stop him. She knew he wanted to do it. That he would to stand for what was right...to be noble. Because that is who he is. They promised to write every week. He wouldn't miss one. And he hadn't.

She found her keys in her purse after all.

Rushing out the door, she had her baby on her hip and towed her 3 year old son behind her. Other thoughts ran through her mind, groceries that were needed...she had to stop at the bank...but her mind quickly turned again to the post office. First and foremost.

The sky was growing dark above them as she buckled her children in the car. Though she hardly noticed. Her mind was already going over the way it would feel to hold the crisp paper in her hands and her eyes stroking over the familiar curves of his handwriting. Somehow the curves had become their intimacy. The way to be close to him from so far away.

Finally, after struggling to get her car through the traffic...that annoying vehicle that was going the speed limit! She was at the post office. Leaving the car running with her children inside, she rushed to the PO Box and quickly opened it to find her letter.

It was empty.

As she returned to her vehicle, she tried to put it out of her mind. The clouds were gathering and the sky was darker than before. She looked up to it for a moment. It was hanging low. Waiting to break.

She drove to the grocery store. Her kids were such angels there. She watched while other small kids screamed about what they wanted but couldn't have while her little boy sat patiently in the cart playing with his little jet airplane and snacking once in a while on a cracker. How blessed she was. She couldn't imagine life any differently. But the missing letter still weighed in the back of her mind.

She went through the bank drive-through and then home. Life had slowed. She was just doing what she had to. She unloaded the children and headed to the door.

Then she saw it.

A notice. Red. Stuck to her front door and waving in the wind.

And as her heart broke, the thunder broke too. Finally the heavy clouds, like her heart, broke and it cried. It cried right along with her.