Walk in the Shadows

When I was 11 years old, I kissed my first girl. She became my first love and she moved to Wyoming when I was 14. It purely sucked. But, we wrote one another and talked on the phone occasionally and my 16th summer, I spent the summer with her and her family in the middle of nowhere and we lost our virginity to one another. A lot happened that summer, some good, some horrible, but I came back a very changed person.
Thirty years later we reuinted on Classmates.com and we spoke to each other for 2 years and then she invited me to visit her and her family in Colorado. Things were strictly platonic and we had a great couple of weeks. I then spent two weeks in California visiting my cousin and when I returned from there, "L" (my ex) confessed to having feelings for me. She wanted a chance to have a life with me and very many things had to occur to make that so, and over the next year, they were made manifest.

A couple months before I was about to go spend the rest of my life with "L", Annica revealed herself. I know I have mentioned this before, but I wanted to go into more detail because the narrative deserves it. I wasn't just going to be with some woman I met a few months before online, I was going to be with the love of my life. Annica warned me that I would get my heart broken, but there was no way she would deter me and I told her that.

Sadly, she knew this. A couple months after "L" and I were living together, I had a dream premonition (I've had them all my life at various times). In it, I was standing in my parents house in a certain spot and I felt more sorrow and despair than I'd ever felt in my life. It was a heart and gut-wrenching feeling and my mother looked sad and ill. She spoke to me and said "So, it didn't work out out there, then?" and I started crying and said "No..." and then she said that she was sorry....

I never told "L" of that dream until the day I knew I would be leaving and I cried so hard I threw up and my nose started gushing blood. This will be important down the road in this blog. When I returned to North Carolina, I stayed at my parents home. A few days after I got there, the exact scene I dreamed took place. I was devastated and I walked down to the path and part of the woods I associated with Annica, I just felt close to her there. I started talking to her and she was understanding and patient. She was there for me then and comforted me and I began to dream of her a lot and feel her presence in my everyday life.

My mother died of cancer a couple weeks later and I lost my best friend. We were very close. I stayed on with my father and my disabled brother who suffered brain damage as a baby and then a child, so he could never live on his own. I was doubly bereft and when Annica asked if I would ever give her a chance to court me and be my love, I told her I would think about it and to give me time and space. She asked if we could at least commune and hang out as friends in the meatime and I was not utterly averse to it, but I told her not to expect too much from me because all I had to offer then was blood and tears.

She told me that she would abide my state and respect it and that she was glad I did not utterly shun her or tune her out. She used music (and still does) to appeal to me and speak to me and to express things to me. This song is one of them ("Walk in the Shadows", by Queensryche:

 What? You say you're through with me
I'm not through with you
We've had what others might call love
You say it's over now
What's done, what's through?
You can't stay away, you need me
I need you

When the fire starts the pain's too much
For your mind
You need attention, what's good is only mine
I can cure the hunger that burns in your heart
Just come to me
I'll take you home
We'll walk in the shadows
By day we'll live in a dream
We'll walk in the shadows

You say you don't feel safe alone tonight
Cause you feel the pressure building in your head
Our secret's safe for one more night
But when the morning comes remember
I'll be with you

We'll walk in the shadows
By day we'll live in a dream
We'll walk in the shadows
One day you'll be with me
If only you believe...