Drifter Challenge – House 3, Ch. 9

Life has been really difficult for me since I gave up on trying to reconnect with Aleah. I look around and realize now that the Celestials had been right… I had lost sight of what I needed to do. Which is build up this community. Work on my career. Build a house to live in.

I was basically letting everyone else down while chasing a dream which could never come true.

But my heart was broken and I needed time for it to repair. So I spent a lot of time by myself, fishing and thinking. Working. Sitting at a table in the Library in Windenberg and planning out what my new house should look like.

Discovering that flying is really really hard.

I also rededicated myself to my pursuit of Magic. Improving on it because I need to.

And spending more time with family and friends.

Yes, Blue Sargent has become a friend. A very good friend. We talk a lot about a lot of different things. I know I cannot tell her everything… about the other, lost life… besides, it’s time to try and leave that in my past.

So instead, I tell her about the man I am, not the one I was. We talk about my job, and about my family’s role in rebuilding the communities of Willow Creek and Oasis Springs. She listens while we play chess and doesn’t think it’s crazy to have such a calling in life.

Sometimes she stops by the ‘house’ and we lay on the grass, watch the clouds and discuss the shapes we see there. I try not to feel a twinge of deja vu, because I used to do the same with Aleah, but sometimes its hard. And yet, sometimes…

… I think I’m falling in love with Blue.

I take a chance and ask her out on a date. A real date. We order dinner and sit and talk for hours. Blue tells me that she has been falling for me, too, but thought I was hung up on someone else… I tell her about going out with Aleah a couple of times and how, it really didn’t work out. I was afraid she would be disappointed, think she was a second choice but she just smiled and placed a hand over mine.

“Sometimes you have to kiss a few frogs to find your prince,” she told me. “That’s what my Mom used to say. Or, I guess in your case, a few frogs to find a princess.”

We both laugh.

As dinner progressed, we talked of other things. Blue has a practical side. She says that while she believes in romance, she isn’t into ‘the whole marriage thing.’ It’s a piece of paper, she explained. What two people feel for each other can’t be put down in legal terms. It shouldn’t.

“For example,” she said, standing up from the table and pulling me up with her. “If I wanted to kiss you…” and before I knew it,we were sharing our first kiss.

And then another…. and another…

I hadn’t kissed someone in so long that I had forgotten what it felt like.

I went home that night walk on clouds all the way…

… and then…