October 31, 2020 - Nolan Acreage, Near Nevada, Iowa

A familiar, large, warm hand settled on her stomach, pulling her against a strong and familiar body. A strong, chest toned by hard work and a soft stomach formed by leisure. His voice was a soft rumble against her back, “Good morning.”

Eyes still closed, she nestled herself back against him, warmth and comfort washing over her. His breath was warm on the back of her neck. There was a thought trying to intrude in her mind as he hugged her close to him. Nearly every morning of their marriage they had taken those few minutes as they awakened for their own. Even when life was chaotic, they always had those few moments, his arms wrapped around her, her fingers tangling with his.

She tried to drown the thoughts intruding upon this moment, reaching for those blessed few minutes of sanctuary and peace at the start of another day. She did not want to open her eyes. Did not want to begin the day without the warmth at her back. Painful, hot tears pricked at her eyes. She tried to throw herself back into the dream, as she did every morning.

She focused on the weight of his arm around her waist even as it vanished. The warmth and comfort left her as though a cold wind had blown it away. Her throat felt tight and her breath caught on a sob. She was alone in a way she hadn’t been in nearly thirty years.

She stayed in bed longer than she should have, trying to recapture the dream. She wished that she could live in that dream and forget reality. She let the tears fall, hugging herself against the pain. She hadn’t even been able to properly lay him to rest. So much had happened. She wiped her eyes and finally forced herself out of bed.

It was almost like a ritual, standing on the eastern side of her wrap around porch, the morning’s first cup of coffee in one hand. Gwendolyn looked out over the sprawling expanse of grass and gravel in the dooryard of her farmhouse. Thirty years ago, newly wed and filled with the vibrant energy of young love, she had stood on this very porch. Then, as so many times since, he had stood behind her, her back pressed against the warm length of him, one of his arms wrapped around her waist holding her close.

Her amber colored eyes, filling with moisture, slipped closed. Tears gathered on her long dark lashes. She could almost feel the warmth of him behind her again, his large hand spread across her stomach, his chin resting on her head as they watched the sun rise over their lands. The lack of him was like a hole in her very soul that couldn’t be filled. A yawning pit that threatened to swallow her whole if she wasn’t careful.

The physical presence of him was only one part of the hole in her world. She missed the stalwart strength of him, the sense that whatever happened they were in this together and together they could handle anything. Her breathing hitched as she set down her mug of coffee on the wide railing they had painted so many times over the years. She could almost hear the warm, deep rumble of his voice against her back, breath tickling the hair on her head, as they spoke about their dreams so many years ago. They had so many plans, dreams, and hopes that had never come to fruition. They had so much they still wanted to do. So many things that would never be finished.

She closed her eyes tighter, breathing deeply and reaching for strength. “Jaime,” Her voice was like a sigh. “It wasn’t enough. It wouldn’t have ever been enough.” She felt broken, shattered on the inside and filled with sharp edges that scrapped against one another. Almost forty years they had shared, raising Jes, building a life together that was gone in a moment. One quick moment. Nothing they could do to prevent it. Nothing to bring him back.

Jes awakened slowly, laying on her back for a long moment and staring at the same ceiling that she had watched for so many years. Dawn was creeping in through her east facing window, crawling across the floor and threatening to shine in her face. No alarm had rung, there weren’t alarms anymore. Just the sun and so many years of routine to awaken you. She could already smell coffee.

She stretched relieved that the action finally didn’t pull as badly at her scars. The wounds were mostly healed now, but Jes hadn’t been able to bring herself to stop wearing the bandages. The strange fractal patterned scars covered almost the entirety of the right side of her body. Her right eye was no longer the familiar honeyed brown that had stared back at her from the mirror most of her life, instead iris and pupil both were a dark purple color run through with a few golden fractals that resembled the shape of the scars on her body.

At first, she had worried that she would be blind in that eye, but as the eye had healed, going from that angry red to this strange purple, she had regained her vision. For the most part. Occasionally she would see blue-white lines that tangled and twisted over one another, but as soon as she shifted her focus to look at them, they would disappear. She climbed out of bed, rubbing the sleep from her eyes and getting dressed. She took the bandages off in front of the mirror in her room, studying her healed body. There really was no excuse to keep the bandages on, other than her own insecurity.

Gwendolyn was in the kitchen, dry eyed, cooking on the antique wood stove that had stood in the kitchen for more years than she had. Until recently, it had been more decoration than useful, but Jamie had always insisted on maintaining it. She was thankful for that now, it had been humorous back then. She would tease him about never using the thing, and here she was cooking with it. It had taken no small amount of effort to learn to bake inside the wood-warmed oven, but Gwendolyn didn’t have much else to do.

Shortly after she came inside, Jes had come down and taken Rowdy outside with her to do the morning chores while Gwendolyn cooked breakfast. By the time everything was ready, the boys should have been back from their morning patrols. Jes came in, kicking the dirt off her boots outside before shucking them and stepping into the fragrant house.

“Morning, Ma!” She called out from the living room.

“Breakfast is ready, kiddo.”

”Where are the boys?” Jes asked the obvious question as she stepped into the dining room.

Gwendolyn looked up, opening her mouth to answer, but she lost her words as she saw Jes’ face. Amber-brown eyes that had once been almost like looking into a mirror, had changed in only a couple of weeks. The left eye, still amber brown and oh-so-familiar met hers with a hint of anxiety swirling in the depths. The other eye was a rich violet, deep and almost dark. There were brilliant gold lines, in a strange pattern, that made the solid colored iris and pupil look like that fancy asian pottery that was knitted back together with gold when it had been broken.

Jes’ face was more slender than it had been when she first came home, sharp cheekbones carving away at the gentle curves of her cheeks. The shape was so very familiar and at the same time, it was like looking at a whole new person. The right side of Jes’ face was broken by sharply defined purple scars, nearly the same color as her right eye, that wove across her skin in a strange fractal-like pattern.

She was not smiling.

Gwendolyn stepped up to her daughter, reaching out to touch the scarred side of that beloved face. It was the first time she had really seen it since the bandages went on. Before it had been a mess. “I’m so glad you’re okay.” She said as her hand cupped her daughter’s cheek. “I was so afraid you wouldn’t live.”

A tremulous smile flickered over Jes’ face. “Me too, Ma.” She admitted. “I wasn’t sure I wanted to at first. It hurt.”

“I know, sweetie.” She pulled Jes into a warm embrace.

“Is it bad?”

Shaking her head, Gwendolyn then pressed her cheek against Jes’ scarred one. “I think it’s almost beautiful. I’ve never seen anything like it.”

Jes chuckled and squeezed her mother tightly. “I love you, Ma.”

“I love you too, dear.” One last squeeze and Gwendolyn let her go. “Go wash up and I’ll go see if the boys are heading in.”

With no sign of Hadrian or Rock, neither Gwendolyn nor Jes had much of an appetite. They wrapped the leftovers in foil and went out onto the porch to sit on the swing, watching and waiting. Their little corner of Iowa had become dangerous almost overnight, but until this morning, despite everything, Gwendolyn had felt mostly safe on her farm. She was familiar with every inch of the property, had ridden every trail. They had scaled back their own operations as they aged, leasing much of the lands to the neighbors as they entered retirement. Jamie had always hoped that Jes would one day come back, but Gwendolyn was more realistic. She knew that Jes wasn’t a farmer at heart. She may love the land, love her home, but the work wasn’t for her. She had been building something of her own out east, something she could be proud of.

Maybe one day she would have come back, to live on the farm when they were gone, but that day had seemed so far in the future that Gwendolyn had always waved it away.

Somedays didn’t seem so certain anymore.