Deep {COMPLETED}

t h i r t y - o n e

Ian Walker

     Somehow, as a freshman in high school, I knew that I would come to love Riley for the rest of my life. That isn't to say I'm going to marry her, but I know that one day even if I'm not with her, I will still have always loved her.

     My favorite view has become the view of her profile in my passenger seat as I drive and the wind blows her hair around. Actually I had quite a few favorite views, the one of her in a mob of people, flashing lights all around her. And I just as much loved the view of her tired face in the morning sunlight in bed next to me. My favorite view was any view with her in it.

     I glanced at her, she knew I was looking and pretended like she didn't.

     "So where are we going?" I asked for the umpteenth time. I tried to focus on the road ahead of me but how could I when she was sitting right next to me.

     "Just drive." She said with a devilish smile plastered across her face. A distant memory of us undressing, and running into the lake in the rain ran across my mind and I smiled. I wondered if she remembered, and if she had loved me then.

     Finally, she instructed me to pull over. I put some quarters in the parking meter. It was dusk now, the sky was darkening quickly. We walked around the block, up to a large industrial dome-like building. She led me through double doors, and the inside of the building had an interior mimicking a museum. I looked around, she looked hypnotized.

     "What is this?" I whispered to her, it was dead silent inside. She beamed, tilting her head back to look up, I followed her gaze. Above us was a large, telescope looking machine, that magnified the sky.

     "A planetarium, where they show stars and stuff. I came here once when I was a little girl." She said to me, she seemed distant, like she was lost in a memory. We walked up to a toll booth looking cubicle, inside was a bored looking teenager, who gave a not so enthusiastic welcome and collected four dollars from each of us, we got wristbands that said,

WADEPOLE PLANETARIUM

     Riley took my hand, I was comforted by that, because she felt far away, but her grasp reassured me. We milled around, looking at posters and diagrams, but I knew she was itching to go up a level and look through the giant telescope. The museum was almost completely silent, there was one other person there, an old man wearing a faded blue polo and khakis, walking around with a cane, making no noise except for when he stopped to cough.

    There was a small doorway that opened up into a dark room with a few benches and a projector screen. Riley led me in and we sat down. A short film began in front of us, she looked mesmerized by it. It must have been from the 1970's because it was grainy and incredibly cheesy, and there were spots on the film that you could see someone has cut out of the tape. I leaned over to Riley, breaking the spell.

     "Riley." She looked at me, her face was so close to mine.

      "Hm?" She asked.

     "Can I tell you something?" I asked cautiously, she cocked her head to one side, and looked forward, watching the screen. I looked forward too. "I love you." I said. She laughed quietly.

     "I know." She said. "I love you." I nodded, both of us still not looking at each other.

     "Right..." I let it be silent for a moment, our words hanging in the air. What did that mean? That we loved each other? What a simple exchange of words and feelings, yet, it wasn't simple at all. It had taken everything for Riley to finally love me, and I had been waiting for it for years. The film ended, we silently got up and walked towards the stairs. She took my hand, and led me toward the telescope. We each looked through it, Riley looking longer. When she pulled away she turned to me.

     "I used to believe that I didn't deserve you and that the universe would find it's own way to make order. Well, I've come to find that there is no order to the universe, and that even if I don't deserve you, I have you, and that's enough for the both of us." She said all this calmly, like it was something she had been thinking on, waiting for the right moment to tell me.

     I looked up at the stars once more, thinking about that first night on the rooftop, when I fell in love with her, and how I never looked back from that moment on.

     "It's beautiful." I breathed, referring to both the stars and everything about Riley, everything about us. I backed away from the telescope, she was looking up, staring into space, something that she had always longed to understand. She was finally getting her answers, or at least becoming content with the lack of answers provided. I think she was finally understanding that the universe didn't have a reason for everything, sometimes things just happen. Sometimes people just find each other and have to come up with their own reasons for why it works. I didn't bother asking myself why Riley and I worked, we just did. I thought all this as I said to her, "I'll love you forever."