Edge of the Ravine

47

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chills ran along my spine and I couldn't stop pacing as the train neared the station. I felt claustrophobic every mile closer I came to my enclosure. My teeth sunk into my bottom lip and my heart hammered tirelessly in my chest the moment our destination was announced. Suddenly, my knees became shaky and I sank into my seat and stared out the window.

The journey back to where I had escaped from had been very little like the venture that drove me from its grips. Instead of being blissfully out of it, I'd been hyper aware of every moment that the entrapment grew closer. And despite having the safe anchor of Vlad at a distance—a reason for going back—it still filled me with a quiet dread as the train pulled into the station.

All the sayings about facing your fears making everything smaller... they're true.

When I stopped off the train, no one looked me at me strangely. No one even seemed to recognize me. As I passed through the station and made my way out to the main road, it never occurred to anyone to give me a second glance. I was just another person. Just another face.

Until I began walking to the lawyer's office.

It felt like I'd thought too soon as I made my way across the deserted street and fell into a rhythm as old as time. Somehow it was as if my body knew how to instantly adjust. And though I hadn't walked such a distance in years, my legs eased right back into their old pace to where I was gliding effortlessly through town.mwhich did not go unnoticed or without being talked about.

Only a mile from the train station, I was at the lawyer's office within fifteen minutes.

Mr. Frye was a wizened old man who looked as if he could join Amelia any day. Of course, he was also a wise old man and all of the preparations for Amelia's departure had already been made. There was only one thing he had to detain me for: her will.

My surprise was unequaled when I was informed that she left me everything. Truly, though I was her last living relation, I hadn't thought that she would bestow anything on me. After a separation of nine years—which must have only added to the image of us gratefulness I already suffered from in her eyes—it hardly seemed likely that her last hours would allow for her to be disposed towards generosity to me. Yet, it was all mine from the train tracks to the ravine and every rock and wildflower in between.

I found no comfort in it. No sense of belonging. Not an ounce of rightness. There wasn't even a pinch of gratitude in me for the property. Rather, it felt like the last shackle she could possibly place on me. The lock was in place and the key was a long way off.

When I left Mr. Frye's office, it was in a heavy-minded stupor. I wandered with no real sense of where I was going and no true intentions on going anywhere. Which meant I should hardly have been surprised when I shook off a little of my thoughts and realized that I was standing at the train tracks. Already I had walked so far and thought nothing of it. And though I'd already mentally determined on not returning to that house until the moment I absolutely had to, my body's old habits were impossible to break. There was just enough consciousness for my surprise before I inevitably crossed the metal rails and continued on my journey.

It amazed me to realize that my path was still there.

I didn't sleep that night. How could I? Instead, I wandered in and around the little shack as the night proceeded. For some reason, I didn't touch a thing. It felt wrong to do so. Disrespectful. Amelia had a place for everything and everything was in its place. There was nothing left of me in that place.

Realizing that, I ran all the way to the edge of the ravine. There I dropped to my knees and cried in ecstatic relief. My fears, seemingly so justified by my previous treatment in that house, had fallen back to the earth, no more than dust lingering on my mind. If there had been something left of myself there, I don't know how that would have affected my mind. But the fact that nothing remained... it felt as if I was free. For the first time in my life, I didn't feel the need to hurl myself over the edge just to escape everything. And I could walk away without even wondering what it would be like to fall.