Daily Flash Fiction Challenge

She was walking ahead. Not just a couple of steps, but distant. Maybe fifteen paces. And she walked with determination, jabbing the long stick she carried into the ground or swatting at a low hanging branch. When her pace would slow, he would catch up to her. They would walk, side by side, in long silent moments. When he would speak to her, she would emit more of a sound than a response and quicken her pace, putting as much space between them on the trail as she could without actually storming off and leaving him.

He remembered the first time they’d come here. Younger, newer, and basking in the warm sun of possibility. Then, he had loved the silence between them. Those first quiet moments, sitting on the boulder that overlooked the canyon, the distant towns and cities, the far-off mountains, and the only view he’d seen was her. She had sat, her arms wrapped around her calves, her chin resting on her knees, staring off into the vastness.

“We should come back here,” she had said. “Every year.” She’d turned to look at him, her perfect face a mask of serenity. “Every year for the rest of our lives.”

Today, the overcast sky lent a grayness and dampness to the wood, and as they approached the boulder, these many years and many trips later, the expanse of the valley below them seemed to be empty of the promise it had once held. She stopped and looked off to the distant horizon. Catching up, he stood beside her. Her eyes shifted down.

She had something she needed to say.

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