Time's Tragedies- The Books Of Beginning [2]

90. Forever Faithful

The night was hot and sticky, in the way that made the very air feel heavy. It was, Kate thought, one of August's last hurrah's before September blew in, bringing a new school year and the temperate nature of fall. With September also came Lili's birthday, and that made Kate smile. She was so, so grateful that she would be here for her daughter's 16th. (She tried not to think about what it would be like if she wasn't.)

"Couldn't sleep either?" The familiar voice of Kate's husband pulled her from her thoughts. He took a seat beside her on their front porch, the moonlight making his eyes gleam in the dark.

"Nope," Kate admitted with a lopsided half smile. "The sleep cycle I spent years developing is all jacked up again. Hopefully it'll snap back like it did after the kids started sleeping through the night and all. Hopefully."

"Yeah," Rafe chuckled mirthlessly. "I get it. I'm still getting back to actually sleeping too. It was... sleeping in our bed without you beside me... it felt so wrong. I just kept tossing and turning. Needless to say, I've been running on caffeine and spite for a while now."

"That sounds like me all throughout college," Kate said with a smile. She took Rafe's hand though, and squeezed it sympathetically to let him know that she was here now, here and never leaving, not if she could help it.

Rafe bumped her shoulder affectionately. "You'd think they'd want their psychology majors to actually engage in all those healthy behavior they teach about."

"You'd also think they'd want business majors to practice healthy spending habits instead of spending their lifetime paying back student loans, but that's not happening anytime soon," Kate retorted.

Rafe's amused laugh was the only human sound to mingle with the croaking of frogs and the hum of insects. It occurred to Kate then that they were probably the only ones out in the neighborhood - a reasonable guess, considering it was 2:30 in the earliest hours of morning. When it was just the two of them surrounded by the quiet and the wild like this, it was almost like they were the only two people on Earth.

"I've missed you so fucking much," Rafe admitted, resting his head lightly against Kate's shoulder, her hand running across his back in slow, soothing circles. They were able to do that, to slip into intimacy as easy as breathing, no matter how long they had been apart.

"I know," Kate said softly, "I felt the same way. I wish things hadn't gone the way they did, I wish I could have been here-"

"It wasn't your fault."

"I know that. It was just hard, the way everything went down."

Rafe sighed, "yeah. You got that right."

Kate's fingers slipped under his t-shirt and scratched lightly at his back, her nails lightly tracing shapes and letters along his skin. The motion was repetitive and comforting, like a lullaby. "I know it wasn't easy. Having to handle everything alone, I mean."

"Of course not," Rafe said, "but it's okay. I dealt with the things that needed to be dealt with, maybe not always in the best way, but, well, I tried my best. I accept that. I just..."

"You just what?"

"I worry about the kids," Rafe admitted. "I worry about how they'll heal from this. I worry that I could have done better for them. That they wouldn't be hurting so much if I had done things differently."

Kate pursed her lips. "That's natural, I think. And I know how you feels. I know that we both wish that I had been here for it all, even though I physically couldn't be. But we work with the situation we were handed, and that's what you did. You protected them, you loved them, you heard them when they needed to be heard and comforted them when they needed to be comforted. You looked after their physical and mental well being. You stayed present and strong when they needed you to be. There's nothing more that you could have done."