THE STORMS WITHIN

The journey back home...

Forever comes when one accepts the truth that their life, and most importantly their love, is much more gratifying if it is shared with the soulmate they are meant to find. When one accepts the gifts that Fate is eager to bestow upon them. Forever may come bearing gifts so unexpected and so indescribable that one would have never dared to believe that life could be so amazingly beautiful and fulfilling. To believe one could possibly be worthy of those gifts. And even more important, learn that all life would ask in return is acceptance of those gifts and the marvelous things that would come along with them.

A lonely boat swayed gently on the waves of a calm Aegean Sea. The stars that filled the night sky played joyously with their reflections in the placid waters. In that boat, two souls in love with each other, Can and his beloved Sanem, were on their way back from the Galapagos Islands. Feeling the strain of a long day's journey, Sanem slept peacefully, dreaming of what had just passed, when she had finally finished her second novel. It was inspired by Can and his road back to her heart, and now they were more in love than ever before. They had spent the most beautiful days of their lives together in the Galapagos. She smiled in her dream, because her heart and soul were content. She knew everything would be okay because she had Can by her side. Holding her hand. Never letting go. They chose to walk the road of love, and she was grateful that Fate had brought them together. They had shared so many ups and downs, but the love they shared now was proving stronger than any of life's misfortunes. They were together, and together they would remain. Sanem was finally confident in that fact.

Sitting on the edge of the bed, Can watched Sanem's serene face as she lay sleeping. He could not bring himself to turn his gaze away from her. His eyes shone with a deep feeling of happiness and contentment. With the passing of each day and night, his heart filled with more love for her, his beloved Sanem. He thought of the day they met. He thought of that day very often. She had changed his world, changed his heart, changed him. He never realized how much he had closed himself off from the happiness life had to offer until the day Sanem walked into his heart in such a quiet but powerful way. He could have said she barged into his life with a loud and quick mouth and a personality larger than life. But it was in the gentleness of her love that Can both lost and found himself. She never pushed herself onto him. Quite the opposite. She innocently waited on the sidelines for his love. He still had a hard time believing that she could ever have felt she was not good enough for him. Not good enough for the broken and stoic man he was when they met.

In the light of the candle burning on the table beside the bed, illuminating her beautiful face, Can looked at Sanem and felt his heart swell and fill with love. Deep down inside, he finally understood that during the year he was away from Sanem, he had come to realize the value of their love and the deafening void he felt without her next to him. He could hardly believe that eleven months, two weeks, and four days had passed since the day she became his wife. Since the day they sailed away toward the Galapagos Islands. Those days, and the love they shared during their journey, were enough to fill his soul for the rest of his life. She was his wife now. She was Sanem Aydin Divit, an author, a businesswoman with a knack for perfumes, and soon to be the mother of their unborn child. That thought still scared him as much as it filled him with love, wonder, and gratitude.

He had always feared being left behind, being told he did not matter. Somewhere deep down, he had always felt he was not good enough for his own mother. That scar had never fully healed until he met Sanem. And now? Now he would become a parent himself soon. He remembered the dream he had of having children with Sanem. How content he had felt in that dream. How happy and grateful to know that even for a moment, she had accepted him back into her life at a time he was too scared to tell her how much he still loved her. It was a dream that had become his silent hope ever since, that someday it might come true and now it would.