“Elowen,” I say.
She glances up.
“Yes?”
I study the ridge around us. The house. The lake. The small garden where herbs grow beside rows of vegetables she insists I learn to water properly.
“You built this life,” I say quietly.
Her brow furrows slightly.
“We built it.”
“No.”
I shake my head gently.
“You chose to keep walking when fear would have been easier.”
“You stayed.”
“I stayed because I love you.”
The words are simple. True. Elowen smiles softly.
“You’re getting better at saying that.”
“I am practicing.”
“That’s comforting.”
The wind lifts the laundry again, sending the shirts fluttering lightly against the line. Elowen tilts her head.
“You missed one.”
I follow her gaze. A single cloth has fallen to the ground. I stare at it. Then at the clothespin in my hand.
“This is sabotage.”
“You dropped it.”
“The wind interfered.”
“The wind barely exists.”
“This is clearly a coordinated effort against me.”
Her laughter echoes across the ridge again. I love to make her laugh. And as I bend to retrieve the fallen cloth, something inside me settles with complete certainty. I love my life now. Standing on a sunlit ridge. Arguing about laundry. With the woman I love laughing beside me.
Elowen rests her head lightly against my shoulder.
“You’re smiling,” she says.
“How dare I, huh?”
She nudges my arm. Her fingers lace through mine. The lake below us glitters beneath the rising sun.
I reach up and brush a loose strand of hair from her cheek. The morning wind has pulled it free from the tie at the back of her neck, leaving it drifting across her face.
