Page 10 - The Houseguest

“To me, the sea is a healing place.
It makes what’s shattered whole. Somewhere within these crashing waves is the restoration of my soul.”
With patience, I would learn the stories behind the words. What was shattered? Why did her soul need restoration? Questions to be answered at another time, in another place. The desire to know her better, to learn about what made her into the person she was felt like an insatiable thirst I had to quench. Days turned into weeks and into months. My life suddenly had meaning. My purpose for existence was defined without uncertainty. Every aspect of our lives had become interwoven, the twists and turns of her life overlapping mine like braided twine whose thin strings become stronger when joined together. She was no longer making what would be “her” memories, nor was I making mine. We were creating “our” memories. Two years had passed before the night I asked Karina to spend the rest of her life as my wife. I’d invited her for a moonlit walk along the shoreline. We walked hand-in-hand as my feet, and then my knee displaced the sand underneath. As I knelt in front of her, I could see that the breeze had swept her hair in front of her face, a replay in my mind of the first time she looked up at me and said, “I’m Karina.”
There was no hesitation on her part to answer, nor mine to ask. We knew our union was inevitable and there was no considering any alternative. The wedding was in early summer and of course she insisted on a ceremony by the ocean. A barefoot bride approached me
10
The Houseguest by Linda Ellis www.LindaEllis.life