Finding Solace

Sitting in a small, dark room by the window, the young girl looked out onto the streets. She didn't see much, a few cars and the street lights...but there wasn't a soul out on the street. It was like the whole world was locked away behind their solid oak doors, safely ensconced in their secure, pretty homes.

She couldn't stop the chuckle that escaped her throat at the idea of being safe in your own home. She'd never known that feeling herself. Her own home, growing up, was a virtual warzone between her alcoholic, abusive step-father and her indifferent mother.

She had survived that house, had made it through her childhood and teen years alive, though not unscathed. The scars remained, both physical and emotional, but she tried not to think about them too much. She had seen the coffins of her 'parents' lowered into the ground, plain pine boxes buried in a potter's field for unclaimed souls. They weren't worthy of anything more from her.

She never claimed the bodies when they'd been found dead in their run-down one family home. She wasn't about to waste any of her hard-earned money to bury the monsters that had worked so hard to try to cut her down. As the final grains of dirt landed on the mounds where they were buried, she turned and walked away from the site, leaving behind the anger and the pain and the stigma of being their child. She made a new life for herself and she never again thought of them.

Until tonight, when she was sitting there, looking out on the empty dark street and wondered, where the other people were. On any other night, the street would be teeming with people at this hour on a Saturday night...but tonight it was empty. She turned from the window and looked around the room, her eyes landing on the mound on her bed. Gently rising and falling with the slow even breaths of her lover. She let her gaze linger for a moment, marveling at how lucky she'd been to find someone who never asked about her past, someone who accepted her as she was now and never dug any deeper. She smiled, for the first time in a long time, and she turned back to the window one last time. She took a deep breath as her gaze swept over the street again. Still empty.

Then she stood up, closed the curtains to block out the empty, quiet world and made her way over to the bed. She paused a moment by the bed, once again tracing the lines and curves of her lover's body before she lifted the sheet and slid in behind the warm body in her bed. She shifted closer and wrapped her arms around the soft, sweet-smelling body of her lover of 6 months. She snuggled even closer and placed a light kiss on an exposed shoulder. The body beneath her stirred and rolled over to face her. Expressive green eyes opened and smiled up at her. "You okay baby?" The voice was soft and clouded by the sleep that still clung to it.

She smiled down at her lover and placed a light kiss on her lips, "Yeah, I'm fine now." And she was, now that she was back in the arms of the woman who loved her, she could breathe again and she found herself feeling at peace, happy and ready to take that next step towards the future that her 5 year old self never thought was possible...but now it was and all she could do, was lay there, her arms wrapped around the angel who had saved her, and smile at her good fortune.

The End.