Notes: Footprints belongs to Ed Robertson.
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I followed footprints in the snow
Never knowing if I was right behind you
Looking down no one would know
I wasn�t walking hand in hand beside you
For your footprints lead the way
To a hearth where hearts we made surround you
You�re awash in all its glow
I�m still standing in the snow
I stood and watched the lights go out
While the snowflakes settled all around me
Though it filled my heart with doubt
Couldn�t move and this is where you found me
As our footprints disappeared
Snow erasing how I came to be here
I�ve got nowhere else to go
Now you�re standing in the snow�
You might have left me in the cold
A fitting ending for the fool that I was
But you�d be cuddled up alone
And I�d still be standing in the snow
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He shouldn�t have come.
The snow floated down in drifts, blanketing the pavement before him, and when he turned back he could see the tracks the cab had left on the road. Darkness had fallen somewhere between the airport and here, and he could see glinting through the trees the cheerful sparkle of Christmas lights on the neighboring houses. The frozen air was still, and he could hear the distant laughter and yells of children somewhere down the street.
It was all very comforting, in a domestic and homey way, and he wondered, not for the first time, what he had missed out on. His shoes crunched dully through the snow as he made his way down the driveway, and he glanced back briefly to see the single solitary set of prints he had left behind him.
Somewhere along the way, he had gotten used to walking alone.
There had been a time when they walked in step together, not only figuratively, but literally. Their witty conversations, the comfortable back and forth, it had all happened on the go, as she matched her steps to his. He found himself missing that, these days, the easy presence of someone who could read him so effortlessly, and could keep up with the rhythm of his life in a way that no one else could. He missed her.
It had been a mistake, coming here.
He was close enough now to see her, through the picture window, and he was struck by the lines that had appeared on her face through the passage of years. She didn�t look older, really, just more mature. She had lost some of that wide-eyed innocence that had fascinated him about her all those years ago, and it saddened him. But there was a peace in her face now, a quiet contentment that had been missing then. He had never been able to make her look like that.
He envied the man who had.
The flickering light from the fireplace played across her face as she reached out to brush back a lock of hair from the eyes of the little blond boy in front of her. They were her eyes. The girl behind him had them too, but her hair was red, undoubtedly inherited from her father. The tears that stung his eyes took him by surprise, and he blinked them back abruptly, thankful for the darkness that cloaked him.
It was a Christmas card scene, the kind of moment that he had assumed never really happened outside of the movies. But there it was. And there she was, at home in her new existence, happy at last. And here he was, standing alone in the snow.
He had never imagined that it would be this hard. Years had passed, after she left, years in which it was just too painful for him to call, to hear her voice all those many miles away. And then one day out of the blue she had called him, and they had talked, and it had been as if not a day had passed. Years had gone on like that, with phone calls, and emails, and the occasional card. It had hurt when she had told him she was getting married, but life had gone on, as had their correspondence, and as the years sailed by, he had thought he was finally beginning to be ok with everything.
And then she had asked him to come visit for the holidays. She wanted her family to meet him, this man who they had heard so much about, who had been at the center of her existence in the administration of the man her son was named for. She wanted him to meet her children, and he knew that she was not trying to be cruel, was not trying to remind him that they could have been his. So he had agreed, and he had imagined that it wouldn�t be so hard.
But now he was here, and the snow was drifting down around him, and he was suddenly struck by a nameless fear. It was the fear that had gripped him all those years ago when she had turned and walked out of his life. He had let her go then, knowing that she needed time to find herself, to find her existence without him. But he had been so sure, in that buried part of himself that he never spoke of, that she would come back someday. Standing here now, outside her house that she shared with another man, watching her laughing with her children who were not his, that fear gripped him with a force that shocked him.
She looked up then, and she saw him there outside the window, standing in the shadows thrown by the porch light. A smile broke across her face, and she leaned down to whisper something in her daughter�s ear. The girl turned to peer out the window, then grabbed her brother�s hand and dashed off to some other part of the house. Their mother stood there for a minute with a tiny smile tugging at her lips, and her eyes dancing in the firelight, and then she came to the door. He caught his breath as she stepped outside, wrapped up in a red coat, and he hesitated awkwardly at the end of her driveway. So many years, so many memories and unsaid words hung between them, and as her eyes found his, he discovered that none of that really mattered.
She flung herself down the steps and into his arms, and then there was nothing but the silk of her hair against his cheek, and the familiar scent of her, and the gently falling flakes that dusted their hair as they stood motionless in the driveway, clinging to each other as if only seconds had passed since she had walked out of that hotel room and left him behind.
She pulled away eventually, and held him at arms length to look at him. Her eyes darkened as she took in the toll the years had taken on him, and he knew she was trying to keep her voice light as she accused him of not taking care of himself. He smiled a little, and reminded her that it had been her job to do that. He had better things to do.
��like run the country,� they finished together, and she laughed. He didn�t. He watched her instead, and when she looked at him with that questioning look in her eyes, he found that he didn�t have an answer for her. Instead, he took her hand, and they walked together a ways down the driveway as he tried to gather his thoughts into something approaching a logical conversation.
He stopped eventually, and she stopped with him, and they stood there, watching the snow falling around her house, and the children playing inside the window. �I can�t stay,� he finally told her, and when she looked at him he could see the resigned understanding in her eyes. �I thought�� he shook his head. �I thought I could do this, and it wouldn�t be so�� he trailed off. �You should go back in to your family. Apologize to them for me, ok? I just�I can�t.�
She turned away to look back at the house, and when she turned back, there were tears sparkling in her eyes. �It wasn�t fair,� she said, and he didn�t understand. �It wasn�t fair of me, to ask you to come,� she explained. �I just�I missed you. I wanted�I don�t know what I wanted. I wanted to see you, and I wanted you to meet them, and�I�m sorry.�
He shook his head. �Don�t be. It�s not�� he was cut off by a harsh laugh from her that echoed in the still night.
�Not my fault?� she finished. �Well that�s debatable, isn�t it? I left you, in case you�ve forgotten.�
�I haven�t,� he said quietly, and he could see how much that stung her. He sighed. This was too hard. There was too much there, now that they were face to face, now that he could look into those eyes, that he could avoid over the phone, over email. The bitterness only existed because he had never stopped loving her, because he had never truly forgiven her for leaving. But seeing her now, here, in this place that was so utterly her, so completely where she needed to be, he was ashamed of his anger, and yes, of his love. This woman belonged to someone else now, to another life, and he had no claim on her.
He released her hand and reached up to brush away the tears that had started rolling down her face. �I wanted to come,� he told her, and the bare honesty of the statement struck him, so he continued. �I wanted to see you too. But I can�t�� he waved his hand at the house. �There�s just too much�that could have been.� She nodded, he could see in her eyes that their regret was the same. She wordlessly wrapped her arms around him again, and he buried his face in the rough wool of her coat and the soft down of her hair, memorizing her for the last time.
He pulled back finally, and reflexively reached out a hand to brush the snow off her hair. She smiled at him, that slow sad smile that he remembered so well, and she reached out a finger to halt the trail of a single tear down his cheek. �I never stopped, you know,� he whispered before he could catch himself, and she drew back her hand sharply as if he had burned her. He had a moment of panic, wondering if she didn�t understand, or if she knew he had been talking about loving her, and didn�t care. But then her eyes softened, and he knew she understood, and she cared�she cared more than she wanted to, more than she should.
So he understood when she turned and walked away, and he didn�t cry as she made her way back up the steps to her house. She turned back at the doorway, and she spoke so softly that if there had been any wind it would have caught her words and sent them tumbling off unheard into the night. But the wind had died, and the snow was falling silently, and so he heard her whisper �I never did either,� before she opened the door and went back to her home and her family.
He stood there for a few moments, and he watched the snow fall and fill in their footprints on the driveway, erasing all evidence of her, until he was standing alone in a blank sheet of white. Only then did he turn to walk towards the road, leaving behind a single line of footprints that led away from the house, away from her.
Away from what could have been.