by innocently. The thing that hit home the most was that she was living on the corner of two streets that lead to two dead ends. In front of the house was the only side street on this road, and between the two, there weren’t fifteen houses total. And given that it was one thirty in the afternoon and most people were at work, there was little hope that it wasn’t Dakota driving toward her. In fact, she was pretty sure that it was his car humming loudly down the winding streets.
Cally was looking to the connecting road, waiting for his sky-blue Camaro to break the tree line. She knew the road wasn’t that long, and there wasn’t a single curve in it, but it seemed like forever before she saw the telling evidence that was emerging from the trees blocking her view. Her eyes followed his path as he turned left in front of the house. He drove to the end of the cul-de-sac, turned around before parking in front of the house as the fear and reality of what she was about to do truly set in; and for some reason, she could no longer breathe.
Everything was coming to this exact moment, and she was now looking straight at the three choices in front of her. She could breakup with him and tear his heart out, stay with him and face the wrath of her friends, or fall over dead from the speeds her heart was beating at. At that moment, Cally was leaning toward the latter, because death would be so much easier than either of the other two options she was facing at this point.
At the moment his car stopped, she felt her heart fall into the pit of her stomach. No one ever told her that it would be this hard to breakup with someone. She knew she had to do this—everyone had said that she had to do this—but no one could ever prepare her for this moment, and no one ever said it was going to be easy. Then again, no one ever warned her that it was going to be the most difficult decision she would ever have to make in her life either.
Cally watched as his car door opened, everything inside of her turned to ice as her breath caught painfully in her chest, and her heart seemed to turn to an icy fire that wanted to eat her from the inside out. She wished that someone would have told her how bad fear could get, but she doubted anyone had ever been this afraid before. Why didn’t anyone ever warn her of what was coming? Why didn’t they write a manual on all the things that could possibly happen when you were about to tear a man’s heart out? Why?
Movies and books had nothing on real life! When she saw Dakota step out of his car, everything seemed to blur around him. The once crisp trees and grass and houses were just a blur of colors that mashed together, and the only vivid thing she could see was him. He seemed to radiate with a strange hypnotic energy as he walked toward her. It was like she could see his joy emanating from him as he slowly walked around the back of the car.
The way he moved and the golden energy around him made her heart stop its intensive racing as her erratic heart came to a complete and utter stop inside of her chest. No matter how hard she tried to look away, she couldn’t. Cally had never seen someone’s soul the way she was looking at his right now. It was the most magnificent thing anyone could have ever seen and probably would be the most magnificent thing she would ever see in her life.
Cally was so enveloped by what she was seeing that she had almost completely dismissed Dakota as being a real person and not just the amazing ring of multicolored halos surrounding him, until he stopped in front of her, and she started to realize that he was down on one knee. She almost missed his words completely, because his eyes said so much more than anything he could have said out loud. Their souls seemed to be speaking their own language, something she wasn’t sure of, and yet, she understood the words perfectly. It seemed like the world around them was speaking in ways that she had never known existed, because she was learning to listen to more than just the verbal words that he was saying; and yet, those words were saying something she felt like she had to acknowledge for some reason.
“…I know, it will be hard at first and we won’t have enough to have a fancy wedding, but I love you and don’t want to live without you. Cally, will you marry me?”
She still didn’t know where that black box came from or what he had said before that, but now she just wanted to die because she was now facing a fourth road that she could take; yet, she was seriously considering taking the “death” option if it would only come and wrap it’s claws around her now.
Cally didn’t know where the strange warm aqua light came from, and she really didn’t care as it started to envelop her in its warm embrace and as long as she wasn’t there facing the most difficult decision of her life. Her world and life began flashing before her eyes, like a movie showing her the past and future all jumbled together. She couldn’t believe that she was seeing so many different things swirling around her as time passed and changed, showing her what could be and what would be if she stepped down each path. Yet, she knew that they couldn’t all be real, and at the same time, her heart whispered that they were all real and true options for her mixed-up life.
Her crossroads had finally come to a point, and now she had only one thing left to do. Cally had to make that one single-most difficult decision of her life; the one that would determine which of the many scenes she had seen would be her one true life’s path. The world around her seemed to hinge on this one single solitary decision.
She opened her eyes far too fast, breaking the overwhelming clips of what could be, only to see the old wooden steps beneath her feet stopping the swirling movement that the rest of her body felt from being tugged back from a world of spinning images. Her eyes slowly drifted back to where he was kneeling, and another wave of fear washed over her. She had a choice in this, didn’t she? She didn’t have to do what she knew she should do, did she? Why did life have to be so unfair? So complicated? Why couldn’t someone tell her what the right choice was in this? Why did she have to make this decision all on her own?
Cally looked up at the warmth and joy she saw in front of her, the guaranteed happiness and love that was kneeling there, smiling as bright as the sun. The choice, the road she was facing, looked easy and simple, but in her heart, she knew that it was far from the easiest path. Her life was never easy or simple; it was always far too complicated, and she never seemed to do what she should. Why was this happening to her? Why was she in this position? Why did she have to do this? Why was she being forced to make this choice now? It wasn’t fair. None of it was fair!
Rough Beginnings
Cally wasn’t sure how long she sat there or how much time had passed or even where the words came from. It felt like she was sitting in the backseat, letting someone else control her body as the world seemed to play out before her like a movie, because the words that came out were not the ones that she had ever seen herself saying, or even the ones that she knew she should say. No, these words were the ones that would change everything; they were the words that were going to lead her on a road that she never saw as a possibility.
“Only if you show me why I should marry you.”
She watched as her arms wrapped around him, and for the first time, she kissed him. Cally could feel the fire running through her with the desire that he always seemed to envelope her in that washed over her in a fast and furious wave. She didn’t think she had much of a choice, and at this point, the only thing she wanted was Dakota there to protect her and make all of the confusion go away. She wasn’t one to give up easily, but what was she going to do? There was a hot, sexy, hypnotizing guy that wanted her as much as she wanted him. Yeah, this wasn’t that damn hard to figure out, and yet, it was the most terrifying thing she could imagine.
Cally took a step back and tried focusing on something else, anything else. Yeah, wouldn’t you know the first clear thing she saw was his freakin’ car and the memories of all the time they had spent in that car, talking and riding around aimlessly? It seemed that she wasn’t going to win this, no matter what she did or where she tried to focus her mind.
He pulled her in closer until their bodies touched in so many places that her mind started to spin out of control again. She had never been this close to a guy before, and something about it was mesmerizing and shocking. It seemed that she was going to lose this fight, no matter what she did, so instead of fighting it like she knew she should, she just closed her eyes and enjoyed it while there was still time to enjoy it. Because when this was over, she was going to have to tell