Chapter one (there never was a chapter two)..

(April 2006)

She had always found it hard to believe all of the far-fetched stories that people told about how, against all odds, they had found the person who they were certain was their one true soul mate. There were so many reasons in her mind as to why the whole notion of ‘soul mates’ was completely ridiculous that she laughed at all of the hopelessly romantic fools who genuinely seemed to think such nonsense were possible. She pitied those who seemed to have signed-up to the idiotic theory that true love comes along just once in a lifetime and that, when we find it, it is at our own peril that we ever let it go. To believe in the theory that there is just one person in this whole world who was somehow ‘made for us’ would also mean believing in destiny – and she was far too logical and obsessively in control of every element of her life to ever allow herself to think that any of it was outside her free will.

How strange, therefore, that at the age of 41, she should find herself sitting alone in a dark hotel room in the early hours of a chilly, April morning, her heart breaking and her whole body aching from the pain that had hit her like a brick wall as the reality of what had happened slowly dawned on her. The reality was that not only had she without question found her soul mate but that she had also lost him. The reality was that she had spent all of her life believing that he didn’t exist only to discover that he had existed deep inside her own memory for almost 30 years. The reality wasn’t that she had never been lucky enough to find him, but simply that she had not been wise enough to be able to realise that she should never have let him go all of those years before. And here she was, 28 years older but no wiser…he was gone again and this time there would be no fairytale reunion almost 3 decades later. This time there would be no second chances. They had had their second chance but had thrown it away just as recklessly and carelessly as they had their first chance.

She was somebody who had never believed in destiny, fate or the concept that true love is unstoppable, unavoidable and will always find you, in spite of how much you may try to fight it, deny it or run away from it. How could it be true then that at that moment she felt as though every bone and muscle in her body was aching for the man who was, without a shadow of a doubt, the man who she had been born to love? Suddenly that realisation hit her and she started to visibly shake from top to toe. The numbness that had crept slowly into her body and had taken over her mind, soul and spirit over the previous two traumatic months vanished straight away and was instantly replaced by what can only be described as total pain and utter despair.

They had, between them, made many choices over the previous year but in her confusion and grief she couldn’t for the life of her think which one of those choices it had been that had backed them into this inescapable, dark and suffocating hole. This time there was no escape tunnel. There was no third chance and there was no prospect of ever seeing him again. She tried so hard to force these cruel truths out of her mind as she desperately attempted to focus instead on the plane that she was to catch in just a few hours time. This short flight would be her temporary escape from a world that he was a part of and from the damage that she had both caused and suffered. But it had not been planned as a solitary escape from him – it had been meant to be an escape for the two of them from the increasing pressures that their ever-growing need to be together was placing on them. It was meant to be their time. A time during which they could stop looking over their shoulders, relax and simply enjoy each other without the shadow of the ‘goodbye’ which hung over them every time that they managed to steal an always too brief hour or two together. These thoughts only distressed her more and just added to the helpless and hopeless screaming she could hear echoing around in her head.

Eventually, she closed her eyes and, although sleep was still a long way off, a strange, comforting calmness finally began to descend on her as her mind began to desperately and randomly search for happier moments that it could focus on instead. Her whole body ached for peace, for some respite from the desolation and devastation, be it only for a few short hours. Gradually, through the darkness and turmoil that she saw behind her exhausted eyes as she lay there, she began to be able to picture an image of a bright, sunny day that she recognised from 9 months before – it was a glorious, July afternoon. There was not a single cloud in the clear, blue sky and chillingly, as she viewed that scene as a distant onlooker, she realised that she was about to witness the point of no return moment that had so completely change her life forever. The moment when she had been struck by the kind of bolt of lightning that the hopelessly romantic fools who she had previously laughed at believe herald the moment when you first set eyes on your soul mate. The moment when you instinctively sense that from then onwards a life without that person will be incomplete, empty and, ultimately, just too heartbreaking to even contemplate.

Copyright 2006
Diane Malinowski