Prologue
As I sit on the edge of the beach with the waves, the sand, and the setting sun thoughts of that year surround my body as a surge of emotions takes me back to that once familiar place, the very first time I fell in love with him. Looking back at my life before fate entered, I can now see just how arrogant and stupid I was before that one evening. Now I have no idea what I feel.
Fate’s calling

“Hey Braden, when are you going to come out of your room? The party starts in twenty minutes.” Jared, my annoying roommate pestered on the phone, “come on out” he whined, “we’re going to be late, you know that this is the biggest party of the year. Everyone’s going to be there.”
Sighing, I responded that I was halfway down the hall. In reality, I had no desire to even step into that party. To tell you the truth, I was sick of the whole college drama which includes only two components: binge drinking, and waking up with a hangover. Instead I was ready to move on to more serious items in my life which is basically my future work. I mean, if I was going to be Mr. King, lawyer extraordinaire I had to spend more time studying then doing childish things. Muttering to myself I put on my coat and left the dorm.
Outside it was pretty cold for an early October evening. Shivering I jogged up the street towards Midnight Coffee. Right as I took the turn I found myself on the ground dazed and confused.
“Need some help?” A voice asked as I tried to find my bearings in the world again. When my vision felt right again I looked at where the voice was coming from and I found her. She was about 5 foot 6, had brown hair, and hazel eyes. The thing is the first thing I noticed about her was her smile. Her smile made me feel right in this world, like I belonged right here on this cold, dreary October night.
“I’m Tessa, are you sure you’re all right?” she asked again with a look of worriment and amusement at the same time.
“Yeah, what happened?” I groggily asked.
“Oh you were jogging, and then slipped on a rock in the middle of the street. It was pretty epic; I haven’t laughed like that in ages.”
“Your welcome” I replied noticing her genuine personality. “So yeah, my name’s Braden. Want to go get a cup of coffee?” I feebly asked as I sat on the curb looking at her.
“Yeah, that sounds like a great idea. Looks like you might need some after that fall.” As she helped me up I noticed just how different she was from the other girls that I was used to dating. This was the moment that fate was calling.
A Perfect Life?
Sitting on the beach reliving the memories are too hard for me. I shut off all the feelings and try hard to forget about the past, but I can’t. After we got married, we were on our way to a perfect life together. With two smart, beautiful boys, Derek, and Logan, we couldn’t be more ecstatic about starting our future family until the fight.


Lost
“I hate this case file.” I muttered to myself in the kitchen fuming over the fact that Lawrence was away again from the office with no contact information. I grabbed a Miller from the fridge when Tessa walked in.
“What the hell are you drinking?” She said, as she made her way up to me. “You know that I don’t want you drinking when the boys are still up.” She said as she tried to control her voice from getting louder.
“You know what; I’ll do whatever I want. It’s my house and my life you got it?” I replied, getting even more frustrated that Tessa was edging her way into my bad side. As the seconds passed, something in Tessa changed. Her once genuine personality closed up as she tried to regain her composure.
“Leave. I want you out of the house right now. I can’t deal with this.” With that Tessa stormed out of the kitchen while I left the house. I knew that what I said probably hurt Tessa, but at that moment I had to get rid of my life, for even an hour. I turned the engine on in my car took a swig of beer, and then took off. Passing the bar I quickly decided to take a u-turn when I saw a bright light in front of me.
Homecoming
I start to walk slowly back up the beach wiping the tears out of my eyes hating the fact that he is gone. His funeral was today. It was a really simple affair with basically only his few close friends, family, and coworkers except that we felt a missing piece that he ripped out of us.
I stopped and turned back to the ocean looking at the waves rolling in and rolling back out to sea.
“Why now? Why now when the boys need you the most? I don’t understand.” Taking one more look towards the ocean I felt his warmth gently moving through my body. I knew that he was there with me in all the moments of life that we had spent together. This wasn’t really the end of him. This was only his homecoming beckoning him to live with me always inside of my heart. With this in mind, I look up at the night stars shining brightly above me and whispered to him. “I love you and will always love you.”