Invisible (part 2)

His face, before it was gone, was all she needed to see to confirm her deepest fears and insecurities about what was happening.  Was he leaving her like she had almost wanted to believe so that he wouldn't disappear or was he gone temporarily for what he set out to do under the King's command.  Deep down she knew it was because he loved her that he left, but now that the separation was happening it was all too easy to feel as though she was once again being abandoned the way her past loves had left her.  The only difference was the last look on his face before he was no longer visible.  

The look that said he loved her more than life itself. 

She saw him and in a single blink he dematerialized before her very eyes.  In a second she realized how awful she must have looked to him by wasting those moments looking at the ground, but the pain of what she knew was about to happen made her do it.  She could not have seen him any more than that last glimpse because she knew she had to reckon with what he been telling her over the past few weeks.  The part of reckoning was a wall she had to break to meet his eyes again.  There was so much resistance that she still couldn't quite understand, and she loathed that it made her lose precious minutes with him, but she was thankful that she got to see the last look of confirmation.  The look on his face was everything she wanted, and she tried hard to memorize it with a sharp mental drawing.  Several drawings were etched in her mind.  She needed his face imprinted in her mind for when things would get difficult.  

That last look was more precious to her than any of their greatest memories together, and she realized that it was even the only part of him that made her believe everything he told her about his departure from sight.  However, she now found herself alone in the small room.  Hands by her sides, dried tears on her cheeks, and a look of dumbfounded weakness spread across her face--she stood there.  He was gone.  Although he had told her about everything, even how to find him, she was still indignant at his disappearance.  

Why does it have to feel like my heart is breaking?  Why is it so painful if he's not really gone from me?  

She felt a sudden weight of sadness embrace her, and more tears burst through and made their trails down the dried ones on her face.  

Pull yourself together, she thought.

As she collected the mobility in her limbs, smoothing down her dress shirt with the gentle palms of her hands, she took in a deep breath and walked toward the door.  She got into her car and sat there as the minutes past by her like pedestrians crossing the street.  One by one every minute made their way passed her, but she remained still.  

She was in her own world, in the one where he was still visible, and she replayed all the times he had spoken about this day.  

The night at the park, as they sat inside the toy car with their knees reaching higher than normal due to their height, he had stared into her eyes with an intense sincerity and playfulness.  Oddly enough he had given her the most serious of talks in that tiny little car at the playground.  She was remembering everything and playing it all back in her mind.  

"You'll find me easily," he had said. 

She laughed half heartedly out of confusion and an awkward dread of what he wanted to talk about.  But she remembered the serious look on his face, and how he said it with so much force. 

"Listen, when I disappear I won't really be gone. I'm changing forms to go into the King's special service, and when I'm done I'll come back for you and bring you with me," he had said.

"Why can't I go with you now?" She had asked, wanting to press him with all her eagerness and power of persuasion, but he had already told her it was not up to him to decide.  

"Listen, you will be able to find me whenever you look for me.  I'll be in all the King's kinsmen, working on the inside, and at any time you can find me when you find a kinsman.  I want you to find me everyday."  Those last words filled her heart with a rush of wind and made her confident about what they shared together.  

The sun was lowering, and she snapped back into the present.  "I want you to find me everyday."  She remembered him say.  And now that the moment of his vanishing had passed she wished she had known more about who the kinsmen were or how she could find them.  The only other memory she had of him speaking about the King's kinsmen were that they would also be looking for her.  She found that strangely sufficient at the time he had said it, but now it was real and the notion made her confused.  At the time it only made sense that they'd be looking for her because he would be in them wanting to draw near to her, but it all sounded so strange now.  Now that she couldn't see him.

She was getting tired, and the sun was now but a thin line on the horizon as she turned on her car and drove home.  It felt easier not to remember him--to stop thinking about it altogether, but the power of his love was unavoidable.  Love and pain went hand in hand, but for now she would get some rest.  

To be continued. 

(Drawing by Sharon)