Prologue
August 20, 2010
“Cameron, where are you going?” she asked as he quietly made his way out the room. He stopped at the sound of her voice, making him hesitate for a quick second. Her eyes were already finding an answer in his sweet tortured face, an answer he wouldn’t admit to, for her own good.
“I’m going for a ride,” he answered after some thought.
She knew the only thing she could do was smile and let him go, she still holds on to hope.
His eyes that once looked cold and emotionless to people’s feelings, now show more of a gentle expression, even though there’s still regret hiding deep behind the softer light that has taken over them. The pain he still holds inside. The regret that has been tormenting him throughout the years. It’s time to free him from pain.
Today, at the Park of Hopes, where beautiful white oak trees with orange, red, and yellow leaves decorate the once green grass in the fall, there’s a calm lake in the middle of the park, where ducks spend all summer waiting for people to show up and feed them all day. And like every year, there’s a little reunion. Family, friends, and even the ones that once were enemies sit on top of the hill, where the water reflects the fiery sunsets, leaving behind a sense of loneliness as the light slowly vanishes where the sun meets the high mountains of Montgomery Village. Everyone comes here to celebrate life.
My life.
For almost three years, I’ve been walking the world, gaining the strength I needed to come and visit this place. The place that brings most of the painful and sweet memories of my whole life. A life I only got to live for sixteen years. Every year I tried to gain all the strength possible and the courage, courage to walk in front of all the people that kept me in their hearts for so long. I could never do it. Today, for some reason, I feel that I will do it. Finally, I’ve gained the necessary strength to finally set them free, set him free, and finally free myself from this trapped space between all of us.
Finally, I can see my mother smile happily. My father shows a gentler expression. I see how my sister has grown from a misunderstood teenager, to be a person that cares for others. My friends, they haven’t changed much; I would never want them to. That would make me really sad. And him, to see those eyes that still intimidate me, but make me melt as his guard fades. Those eyes that for once made me question God why he let this happen to me. Why me?
But with the years, I got my answer. Now I have a question for him.
“Hey, Cameron, were you happy? Back then did I fulfill my purpose in life?” I asked, but I was sure he couldn’t hear my voice. Not anymore.
