“You can’t leave me here,” I wanted to say, “You can’t just up and leave me stranded here in the chaos of college,” I wanted to beg him to plead him to take me with him. What I wanted was for him to stay here with me forever and to never leave.

My mind was racing a million thoughts a minute, in panic mode. He was leaving in a week and I wouldn’t get to see him for another two years. His smile, his laugh, his over protectiveness, all of it gone.

Sitting down on the edge of my bed I remembered him telling me that he was leaving after getting back from Basic for the Calvary. We hadn’t spent more than a few days together and I could tell there was something wrong.


“What’s wrong, Dante?” I finally got up the nerve ask while we sat on the pier, feet dangling into the murky lake water.

“Del., I’m sorry,” I heard his voice crack, his eyes were glassy, and he hesitated before continuing as if it pained him, “I am being sent to Korea for two years.”

My own throat tightened and my own eyes became glassy, my vision blurry, as realization hit. I wouldn’t see him for two years, wouldn’t hug him, wouldn’t feel the sensation of his skin against that of my own for two years. I could lose him forever in the world of the American Army.

Tears poured down my cheeks like escaped prisoners, smearing my makeup. Dante’s iron arms surrounded me pulling me to him, my mind crumbling.

“I swear I will call as often as I can and I will write and send pictures…,” his voice a mesh of love and panic and sorrow.

“I will do whatever I have to, to keep you,” I mumbled into his shirt, “And don’t you let no Korean chick cling all over you.”

“I love you,” I could hear the smile in his voice as he squeezed me closer to him.


Now I sat on the edge of my bed tears escaping my eyes and forming miniature waterfalls. Thinking of him, wanting him, calling for him in my mind. Wishing that he had never walked into my heart, but knowing that if he hadn’t I would be the same quiet girl everyone looked to for answers on tests instead of taking risks every now and than and standing out against the world.