Dancing on heartbreak

Dancing on Heartbreak - 1

*** If you see any typos or errors in grammar, feel free to correct. I would be eternally grateful to you ;) ***

The wait is over.

He's finally coming home. The airplane prepares for landing at a steady cadence, reminding me of what seems like a lifetime ago when I saw a plane just like it disappear in to the night sky. The plane descends ever so slowly, my heart beats ever so fast. Why does it have to take so long? I've been waiting for this moment for weeks. I should have waited longer, though. Much longer. But sometimes tragedy hits and gives disaster a silver lining.

I'm huddled deep in my coat and push away morbid thoughts of a catastrophe. I don't want to think back to that phone call that always seems to come after midnight. I don't want to be reminded of the words that ripped my reality apart. I can't think about it, because then I'm drowning in sadness and that wouldn't be fair. Because I'm happy too.

Somewhere behind me the first cheery notes of Jingle Bells float through the air. I turn around and see a guy in uniform grabbing his phone from his coat pocket, the mechanical bells replaced by his voice. He asks how long the wait is. The answer seems to please him, because he thanks the person on the other side and lets his phone slip into his pocket again.

"About thirty minutes or so," he tells us.

"Us" consists of a group of five totally different people. Or, maybe not so different after all, because we all live with the fear, know the insecurity and the longing for a loved one. But also, we feel the grief and the relief. The guilt.

"How long has it been?" The question comes from the woman next to me. She's in her fifties, if I'm guessing correctly. She motions toward the plane that landed a few minutes ago and is now taxiing toward.

I hesitate, just for a second. "Six weeks," I confess. It's nothing. Gone in the blink of an eye. The last weeks are what you dread, not the first few. Never the first.

"O, my dear..." She focuses on her hands, on the red leather gloves she's wearing. Sadness coats her features. 'I'm so sorry.'

I smile and quickly shake my head. "No, it's not..."

A careful smile returns, relief lighting up her hazel eyes. "So... it's fine?"

"It's... fine," I answer in a partial lie.

The small jet stops. I look up and of course there's nothing to see behind the tiny windows. "And how long has it been for you?"

A tiny crack appears in her sunny disposition. "Seven months," she says, swallowing the rest of her words.

Again, I nod my head, hearing what she isn't saying. The fear, the long nights praying for the phone not to ring, for the doorbell to keep silent, praying to every god above and bargaining for a few more days of safekeeping. Just a few more.

"But this was the final one. This Christmas it's going to be the two of us. Just like all the other Christmases that come after."

"I thought I was spending the holidays by myself," I confess. "And although there's nothing to celebrate this year, I'm still grateful."

"Yes." She understands. Of course, she does.

This year there's nothing to be joyful about... Just like the year I first met Sam, five years ago on this day.