Who Am I?

Chapter Two: Goodness:

\"David,\" she murmered softly, snuggling into his large, heavy chest, breathing in his cologne.
\"Samantha,\" he murmured lovingly, his fingers running through her hair.
\"Does this pain ever end?\" She finally said, so quietly he almost couldn\'t hear her.
His eyes clouded over. \"I don\'t think so,\" he said honestly.
Tears fell down her face like drops of crystal clear mineral water. But he knew that they were more like drops from the ocean because he could taste their saltiness as he kissed each and every single tear away from her face. He looked into her eyes, and she looked into his, and it was like looking into a mirror. His eyes were hazel and hers were a deep black, but the same depth of pain and despair darkened their faces. Yet, if nothing else, they had one another. She forced herself to tear her eyes away from his as she shifted and moved her head back down onto his chest, snuggling deep into his embrace. They slept together like that.
The next morning, a timid, shaky voice called outside their apartment door. \"Hurry,\" she said hurriedly. \"Open the door before someone sees me, please,\" she begged.
Samantha groaned. David moved, but his body protested. Every muscle aching from the strange position he slept in the night before. Samantha giggled. \"We\'re like some old couple that can\'t walk or move around,\" she jested though both of them saw some truth to it.
He smiled a little and nodded his head in agreement.
\"You guys,\" the voice said, much more frantic and shaky now than before.
Samantha jumped up and opened the door. \"Come on in Annie. Sorry about that. We slept on the couch last night and so it was hard to get moving again when we heard you at the door just now.\"
Annie nodded as Samantha closed the door. \"But I could hear someone coming down the hall,\" she hissed, a tremor moving through her body. \"If they had gotten through at some point. Well who knows what would have happened,\" she confided.
Samantha and David exchanged a look that didn\'t pass by Annie. Annie was tall, 5\'7\" to be exact. She had light blue hair that was as straight as the back of a hard chair and that stopped just above her shoulders. She also had thin lips and the most hauntingly desperate golden eyes.
\"Hey,\" Samantha exclaimed, back to being cheery self again and breaking through the awkward silence. \"Let\'s look at wedding pictures!\"
\"Whose?\" Annie asked, her voice rising a bit though still ever so shaky like a lily pad in the water that is barely touched by a light passing breeze.
Samantha laughed, clutching her belly from the deepness of the laugh. \"Ours silly. David\'s and mine. Who else do you know that\'s married?\"
\"Well, you could have meant a celebrity couple or something. I heard Dana Westbury and Clive Owens got married recently,\" she said.
\"Pah, celebrity weddings,\" said David, dismissing the idea as abusrd and preposterous.
\"Yeah, who needs them? We\'ve got a marriage that will actually last,\" Samantha said, winking at Annie.
Annie giggled shakily and sat down cautiously on the couch. \"Well,\" she started to say. Samantha nodded at her in encouragement. \"Let\'s see them,\" she finished bravely.
It was a long time before they were through with the album. Samantha had long stories for each picture, and while this seemed to bore David after awhile, Annie was curious to hear all the stories in full and even interjected her own comments and questions throughout each story. This caused it to drag out even longer for David who ended up leaving towards the end to stand outside on the balcony by himself.
\"Is he ok?\" Annie asked hesitantly while they were putting the album away.
A strange look came over Samantha. \"Yes,\" she said mechanically. \"He\'ll be fine,\" she assured Annie. But she sounded like a robot.
\"What\'s wrong?\" Annie asked.
\"Oh, he just got bored.\"
\"He seems down.\"
Samantha sighed softly. \"We both are,\" she admitted.
\"Why?\" Annie asked cautiously.
\"Truthfully? Neither of us has any idea why. We both have had great lives. Good parents, good childhoods, good friends, and we found each other and so we should be living happily ever after.\"
\"But something is missing?\" Annie ventured.
\"I\'m not sure,\" Samantha admitted. \"Maybe that\'s it. We just don\'t know,\" she said truthfully.
Annie looked at her in concern. \"Is there anything I can do?\"
Samantha smiled bravely. \"No, Annie. We just want to see you get better. Get out sometimes. Interact with people.\"
\"I interact with you,\" Annie said, a bit defensively.
\"Yes, but, you need to interact with other people to get on in life,\" Samantha pushed a bit.
\"I get on fine,\" Annie said simply.
\"You think that because it\'s the way you\'ve lived all your life. You don\'t know anything any better. But it can be better so much better Annie. I promise. There\'s a whole world out there for you to explore and discover. But you have to give it some semblance of a chance.\"
\"Listen, it was hard enough to meet and talk to you two. If you can\'t see that...\"
Samantha interrupted. \"I see that, and I\'m so proud of you. At some point though, you have to take the next step.\"
\"I don\'t think I can.\"
\"You can,\" Samantha assured her with confidence swelling in her voice. \"I know you can.\"
\"You\'re pushing too hard.\"
\"Sorry,\" Samantha said, finally backing down. But both her and Annie knew that this one time backing down did not mean she was going to let it go.
They went out to join him at the balcony. \"It\'s a nice day,\" Samantha ventured carefully.
\"It was, but look,\" he said pointing at the darkened sky. \"Look at all those clouds.\"
\"There\'s not too many. Maybe it will just be a short drizzle.\"
\"Appearances can be deceiving Samantha. It could be a downpour for hours on end.\"
\"But it will end,\" Samantha said.
He looked away from her. \"Yes, it will end.\"
She smiled a little and asked him gently to look at her.
He looked at her and the depth of pain in his eyes brought tears to her eyes and a gasp to her heart. \"Until it starts again,\" he added. \"There are breaks of course, but it\'s never really over.\"
She looked down at the ground, her eyes darkening to match his.
Annie looked at both of them in concern. Then she heard some other people on the sidewalk below. \"I gotta go. Bye guys,\" she said quickly, leaving as rapidly and hurriedly as she had come.
\"She is concerned about you you know,\" Samantha said after a brief pause.
\"She needs to worry more about herself. She is in and out like that. A rabbit on the run.\"
Samantha nodded her head. \"That\'s sort of what I was trying to tell her. She\'ll be ok though. I think. Don\'t you think?\"
He looked at Samantha, and the words no could not leave his lips. Her eyes were full of such hope, and he couldn\'t squash the glimmer in them. \"I don\'t know,\" he said evasively.
She nodded her head ever so slightly and looked down again. The thunder rolled, and her eyes got big. \"Let\'s go inside,\" she begged.
He nodded. \"Of course. I know how these storms scare you.\" He linked his arm around hers and guided her inside. She clutched at him like a frightened little girl clings to her father for protection and comfort.
That night the storm was still raging on. He got up slowly, untangling himself from her body. He walked outside on the balcony as the cold wetness clung to him like a dry sheet on clothes in a dryer. He sighed. \"Like the storm that rages in my heart.\" He could hear her stirring. The other day at the grocery store there had been a girl. Now she had known real pain he knew. Not the kind of sadness he felt, but true heartwrenching life experiencing pain. The kind that went to the reaches of your soul. The feelings of a deep despair that ran deeper than any river in the South ever could. He knew then that there was good in this world. It was strange, but her pain showed him that there was goodness. It was odd and a paradox and thus very hard to explain. But he had seen what had happened when Samantha and he had reached out to her. Saw the look of relief and comfort in her eyes. And he looked at Samantha now, sleeping on the couch peacefully, her dark hair falling over her porcelean face. He knew then that there was good in this world. There was bad, but there was also some kind of undeniable good.
Samantha\'s eyes began to slowly open as she felt a hot white light burning inside her eyelids. She looked up. He was surrounded by it. Her instinct was to run to him, to scream his name. But she didn\'t move. She wasn\'t paralyzed. She wasn\'t in shock. Yet for some reason, she didn\'t move. She just stared as he faded away. And then she ran. And then she screamed. \"DAVID,\" she screamed in anguish because some part of her knew he wasn\'t coming back.
He stepped through a mirror and on the other side, he saw her. \"Samantha,\" he said softly.
\"No,\" the girl said softly, stepping up to him, a white cat with a moon shaped crescent on its forehead on one side of her and a black cat with a moon shaped crescent on its forehead on her other side.
*Of course not,* he thought to himself. Samantha has short black hair and deep black eyes and this girl has baby blue eyes with golden as the sun hair. Still, he couldn\'t shake the feeling that he was looking right at Samantha.

To Be Continued...