It’s technically the time in between night and sunrise. Time is a weird soup.
For all the humans who want to run away but choose to stay and lean in it–their faith, their strengths and values, their people.
Grabbing her jacket from the chair, she slipped her arms into the patched light denim and pushed open the sliding back glass door, glancing back at the sleeping form in the bed.
He didn’t stir.
She stepped outside onto the square wooden deck and stared at the dark hills beyond the fencing. She had come to love this place. They both had. She’d never known either one of them to fall in love with a place so quickly. Seemingly in an instant.
She tilted her head back. The sky was in the in-between space—changing from night to morning.
She felt like she was in an in-between space herself. Unlike the night knowing it was to become day, she was unsure what she was wanting to change into. Her own personal stars were still shining like pinpricks in her own personal darkness, but where was her sun?
Earlier that day, after they’d wound through the scenic drive and then made there way back to their cabin on the long dirt road, he’d asked her: “But are you running away.”
Tears had pricked her eyes, but she hadn’t answered. Instead, she’d looked out the window.
It hadn’t felt like running away when they’d planned the trip. And it was a trip, after all. There was an end date.
So why am I up at sunrise o’clock and feeling…untethered?
She sat at the wooden table outside their room and fiddled with the yellow beaded bracelet she’d picked up yesterday at the National Park they’d visited.
She took a deep breath and inhaled the chill of the morning twilight sky.
The gravel crunched behind her and he laid a hand on her shoulder.
“You’re up early,” she said as he kissed her on the forehead.
“So are you,” he said, sitting in the other chair.
She just nodded and took the hand he stretched across the table towards her.
“I don’t want to…run away.” The words came out cracked and she didn’t sound as confident as she’d wanted to. Tears welled up in her eyes again.
He squeezed her hand, holding her gaze. “I know.” He looked out across the hills, now starting to show their color as the twilight started to give way to the sun peeking over the horizon. “It’s beautiful, but we don’t need to decide anything yet. Let’s just enjoy our time here, together.”
“I love you,” she said. This was said with all the surety in the world.
“I love you, too.” His smile turned into a grin. “Well, should we start the day’s adventures off with coffee?”
Loosely inspired by WILD’s song “Lean Into It”
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Writing Process Notes
12/29/23 // 12:10pm-12:57pm. copy and paste from Word to here, formatting, picture, etc. posted to socials too.
Mrs. Writer 
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