To Love Again

It was a beautiful autumn morning. So beautiful in fact, that one might think it was spring, if not for the bare trees that lined the streets of the city. As the sun's rays peeked through the gaps of the curtains, Amelia finally opened her eyes to the feeling of Sam, her Siberian Husky, licking her face. After her eyes adjusted to the dim interior of her room, she slowly sat up and stretched her arms above her head before swinging her legs over the side. As she sat up, she caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror, with her curly, dark brown hair that was pulled back into a puff. Her caramel-colored skin was covered in a thin sheen of sweat, due to all of her tossing throughout the night. While she sat on the edge of her bed, she reached down to scratch Sam behind her ears. Sam wanted to savor her owner’s affection, so she placed her two front paws on Amelia’s lap and proceeded to excitedly lick her, forcing a giggle from her throat. Peering at the clock on her nightstand, Amelia saw that it read 7:27 AM, and that’s when it dawned on her that today was her day off. This sent a pang of delight through her at the realisation that it would be a relaxing day. Don’t get me wrong, she absolutely loved her job. She had been dreaming of becoming a nurse for as long as she could remember, and when she finally earned her RN license, the whole experience had been almost too surreal for her. She would both arrive at work and leave work with a smile on her face, thanks to the good company of her patients. Likewise, since she spent so much time with each individual patient, she had the power to put a smile on every one of their faces. Even in spite of how bleak or dull their prospects seemed. Although there were a few times she could recall a patient being lost. It was at those times that she would have to remind herself that she couldn't save everyone. Sometimes, all she could do was smile through the pain, in order to give the living the hope of a brighter outlook on their life. After receiving a good dose of love from Sam, she pushed herself up from her seated position and began to walk over to the window and open the curtains. This allowed the sunlight to fully illuminate the room with it’s warming rays. She stood there for a few minutes, soaking up the warmth, as she contemplated what exactly it was that she was going to spend the day doing. She could be an utter couch potato and catch up on her reading, or binge watch some of the many shows that she rarely found the time to watch anymore. Another option would be to do something more productive, like go shopping for the various groceries that she was well aware had been dwindling in numbers in her kitchen pantry. But neither of those options seemed to appeal to her this morning. Well, her only other option was to call up her friends, whom she had been constantly neglecting of late. Maybe they would want to go out somewhere. She wasn’t purposely neglecting them, it’s just that since starting her full-time stint as an RN, she rarely found time to do much of anything. As she continued to weigh her options, she was drawn from her thoughts at the sound of Sam’s whining as she nudged her head against Amelia’s leg. Amelia knew this meant that she was raring to go on their daily, morning jog, and immediately stepped into her closet to dress herself in one of her many workout sets. It consisted of a sports bra, workout leggings, and a matching quarter-zip jacket. After settling into her footwear she exited her closet and walked straight for the front door, Sam following close by on her heels. She then grabbed Sam’s harness and leash from the hooks on the wall near the door. Once she was finished getting Sam fully prepped, she made sure to grab the spare house key, her phone, and her bluetooth earbuds. When she was fully situated, she grasped Sam’s leash and they made their way outside. Stepping outside, she shivered a little at the subtle chill in the air that confirmed that autumn was in fact here. Though she wasn’t worried, because she knew that as soon as she started jogging her body would warm itself up. Walking down the steps from her front porch she took a look around her neighborhood. The city she lived in wasn’t the biggest and on top of that she lived in a mostly suburban part of the city. Things in this area were fairly quiet and that was just how she liked it. The houses that lined her street weren’t all that big either. Her house was probably the third biggest on the entire street and it contained 3 small bedrooms, 2 full bathrooms and a powder room. As she took in the sight of her neighborhood for the millionth time, she made her way down the block before turning left at the corner and walking the rest of the way to the nearby park. She put her earbuds in, playing her usual workout playlist and began to jog with Sam. About an hour later, she was walking back up the stairs on her porch when her next-door neighbor, Frank, called out to her. “It’s unusual to see you coming back from your jog at this time of morning.” Looking at her watch she noticed that it was 8:32. “No work today?” Amelia looked back up at him with a small smile on her face before responding. “Yeah it’s been a while since I’ve had a weekday off, so I figured I should enjoy it as best as possible. And what better way to do that than to stay in bed later than I typically have the opportunity to?” Although she hadn’t made many acquaintances with her neighbors, Frank had instantly taken to her when she moved in. He was an elderly man in his late 60s with graying hair that was once a stunning blonde, and his eyes were a striking green color. He would always say that she reminded him of his late wife, and after getting to know him better she had started to think of him as her grandfather. “Well I can’t argue with that,” he said as he made his way to his car. “Alright, you have a great day Amelia, I’ve got to head out to meet my son. We’re supposed to have breakfast together at some ‘swanky,’ new restaurant that just opened up in the next town over,” saying this he got in his car and drove off as Amelia opened her door and stepped inside, chuckling lightly. If there was one thing Frank would always joke about, it was that his son would only ever treat him to something special when he wanted to show off his financial wealth. Amelia never knew if he was being serious, but she liked to have believed that no child would ever treat a parent like that, especially a dad as sweet as Frank. It would be like a slap in the face, considering everything that their parents had to sacrifice for them. But honestly who was she to talk? She had practically shut her entire family out of her life when everything seemed to come crashing in on her. She walked towards the kitchen to whip up a quick breakfast, and refill Sam’s food and water bowls. In her peripheral vision she noticed a flashing light on her virtual assistant to show that she had some messages in her voicemail. She made sure to hit the play button so that she could listen to the messages as she continued her morning routine. The first two messages were from telemarketers, trying to get her to buy something, so she decided to just ignore them. However, as the third message began to play she recognized her mom’s melodious voice flowing through the house, “Hey, it’s been a long time since you’ve stopped by. I hope you’re well and that things are going smoothly at work. I mean, I know you’re busy and everything, but you can still pick up the phone and call your mother once in a while. We all miss you, but,” there was a brief pause in the message. Amelia stopped what she was doing to give the message her full attention. “We don’t want to force you to talk before you’re good and ready. Just remember that we all love you and want you to be happy. Call me when you can. I love you,” she said the last part in that cheerful voice that she always had when she knew one of her children was hurting. Simply hearing her mother’s voice almost had Amelia in tears. She started to feel like a horrible child for shutting them all out. She knew her family would never judge her, but it was just too difficult to make a logical decision after being hurt so severely. Thinking this, she vowed to visit her parents sometime in the near future. Maybe even as soon as her next day off. “I guess you’ve just forgotten about everyone who cares about you, huh?” Amelia almost screamed when she suddenly heard the furious voice of her best friend Niya echoing through her ears. Looking around her, she searched for the source of the voice, only to realize that her messages were still playing. “I’ve been trying to get through to you for weeks now. What? Did you find some new best friend to replace me or something? I talked to your mom. She said that she hasn’t heard from you in weeks either.” Niya was Amelia’s closest friend and knew all of her secrets. Their mom’s were old high school buddies, but Niya’s mom, Dina, had moved out of state for college. After graduation Dina never looked back, and didn't return until her mother became sickly, which was nearly two decades later. It was around that time that Niya and Amelia were introduced after their mom’s had reconnected and realized that they both had daughters that were 9 years old. At first, Amelia was very shy around Niya, but after starting junior high, they became inseparable, and they’ve been best friends ever since. They’ve held each other together through many bad break ups and fake friendships. It was as if nothing and no one could tear them apart, but now it seemed Amelia was throwing that all away. “Amelia if this is about Adrian, you know you can’t just put your happiness on hold until this all blows over. You gotta just bite the bullet and live your life.” Niya took a deep breath before finishing her rant, “Look, if you just want to forget everyone and everything about your past, I’ll accept that and move on. But if there’s still some chance of you coming back to the land of the living, Ray and I are meeting up tomorrow around 12. We’ll be at that café near Northern Medical, in case you want to join us. Bye.” Rushing over to her phone, she furiously tapped the screen looking for the voicemail message. After a seemingly endless series of taps she found the message from Niya and saw that it had come in yesterday around 3 PM. "Well I guess now is as good a time as any," she thought, recalling her earlier idea to hang out with her friends. She just hoped they wouldn't be too frustrated with her.