Dedicated to Valerie.
Always a friend, and forever in my heart.
It's funny how one single moment can define you entire life and color all that is to come. What's ever funnier is that I am constantly redefining what that one single moment was.
At first I thought this moment had passed when mother died. There had been so many stark realizations to face back then. My parent's marriage had not been perfect. Mother had not been blissfully happy. Daddy had cheated.
This was all reevaluated when I met Jesse. I decided that this would be my defining moment. He was so lost, so scared - though he would never admit it. Most importantly though, Jesse needed me. It was wonderful to be needed. Until that point of my life I had always been the one with needs, but Jesse changed all that.
Ah, but all those moments seemed to pale in comparison to the next one. The "moment" I realized I was blind. Surely this was it. So many things now had to be rediscovered, relearned. What is seen by the eyes? What, more importantly, is seen by the heart? But, my eyes healed. That moment too soon passed.
My next "moment" still shakes me to very core. I killed someone. I took their life to safe my own. I feel like I should have so many things to say about that experience, and yet somehow, words still escape me.
My life since then has been filled with so many defining moments. So many�and yet they call all my summed up into one single word - DANNY.
Daniel Santos.
My husband.
The moment we first met, and I felt myself drawn to him in ways that then I could not explain.
The moment we first kissed, so frightening and wonderful at the same time. Frightening because he made me feel things that Jesse had, and wonderful for the same reasons.
The moment that Danny spared my life, risking everything he had known in his life for a girl he barely knew.
The moment we kissed on our wedding day, a kiss that had transformed a farce of a wedding into something real. WE were real - together.
The moment that I realized I loved him, and the horrible knowledge that I might have destroyed the dream of that love.
The moment that Danny I saw Danny lying on that hospital bed, so pale and still; knowing that if he died the best parts of me would die as well.
But, none of these are it. None of these events in my life were my "moment." I just had it. I should know.
Danny lay in his room, and the beat of my heart had finally slowed because I knew he was going to recover.
I was crying in relief when a young nurse approached me in the empty corridor.
"Mrs. Santos?"
That sounded wonderful to my ears.
"Yes," I replied.
"I was told to bring you Mr. Santos' things�what he had on him in the crash."
I took the large envelope from her, and she quietly proceeded down the hall.
There was not much in it, just two items.
One was his wallet, the other was my "Moment".
Danny had been wearing a thin, gold chain at the time of the crash, nothing of import in itself.
On that chain hung a small gold band�my gold band. It was the one that I had returned to Danny just a few days before.
It was what had been engraved inside the delicate band that meant everything to me; two simple worlds that captured everything from our past and promised everything for the future.
Forever Michelle.
I knew it then. I knew that everything would work out, and that I would do everything in my power to fulfill that promise.
It had all been defined.
That night, when Danny was resting peacefully, I made my way home. On the way there, I stopped at a small jewelers.
When I left, I was wearing a new necklace with two wedding bands hanging from its simple chain.
Forever Michelle, one said.
Always Danny, the other answered.
Together they would stay until the moment I could return Danny's ring to him. Somehow I knew that moment too would be special.
"Danny," I said softly to myself.
"Always and forever."