TITLE: The Park Bench
AUTHOR: Myriss
EMAIL ADDRESS: myriss1013@yahoo.com
DISTRIBUTION: Ephemeral Okay. I will forward to Gossamer myself.
Okay for others but please let me know. And keep my name and header
attached.
RATINGS WARNING: G
CLASSIFICATION: VR
KEYWORDS: MSR. (Welcome to the land of the thousand ships!)
SPOILERS: Nothing really.
THE DISCLAIMER: Any character you recognized from the t.v. series
belongs to 1013 and Fox. I am just borrowing them.

SUMMARY: A man sits on a bark bench, watching and thinking.

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

Sometimes love goes no matter how hard you tried to hang onto it. In
the end, you end up hanging on too tight and suffocating it. It took
him a long time to realize what he had done---even with the arguing,
the raised voices, the slamming of doors. It took him even longer to
finally admit it. In the end, it was too late to salvage the
relationship. She had packed up her things and left, leaving nothing
but the ghost of her presence behind.

So here he was now, creeping along on the wrong side of forty and very
much alone. She had been at his side for so many years that her
absence terrified him. He wasn't quite sure if he could go on living
without her.

The last time a woman had broken his heart, he had buried himself into
his work, but this respite was not available to him. His work had
been her work, too. The void that she once occupied haunted him there.
So he fled the office. He fled the empty apartment full of memories.
He wandered to the nearby park and sat on the park bench, watching and
thinking, wondering what went wrong.

When a couple passed by him walking hand-in-hand, a stab of pain went
through his heart. Once upon a time, he had been one of them---loved
and in love. Not now....

What was love? He thought he had shared it with her but he supposed
he could have been badly mistaken. Love could not possibly hurt this
much.

Hell, he wasn't sure he believed in love anymore.

Hanging out of the park was a way to soothe the pain. Time spent
there was time spent away from brooding at home, but it took him a
while to get over his dark apathy to finally noticed them. The elderly
couple.

He wasn't quite sure why they fascinated him so much. They looked like
any other old couple walking the park. The husband was tall and
stooped. The wife small and wizened. They came swathed in layers of
coats, hats, and gloves to keep off the autumn chill. When they
walked, their arms were linked closely together. The husband leaned
protectively over his wife. They walked the slow shuffle that the
very old seem to have.

They would stop to rest at a nearby park bench. There, the wife would
pulled out a paper bag filled with sandwiches and drinks. They would
eat and talk, their faces close together. Every once in a while, he
could hear them laugh. Afterwards, the husband would tenderly wipe
his wife clean with a napkin. Then she would gather up the remains of
their meal, stowing away their trash in the paper bag. The old man
would stand up and stretch---then reach down and help his wife to her
feet. And they would be on their way again.

They came so regularly, they became a marker in his day. A curious
respite from his brooding. So when they didn't appear at all for a
few weeks, he began to wonder if something had happened to them. They
were very old after all. But he did not have to worry long. They
appeared the very next day...coming slowly up the path like they
usually do.

But this day was different. It was warmer than it had been and the
park was crowded with visitors taking advantage of the sunny day.
Their usual bench was full so they slowly plodded to where he sat and
stopped.

"May we?" the old man asked, gesturing to the bench.

Surprised, he managed to say, "Oh, sure." And scooted over to give
them enough room to sit down.

The old man carefully helped his wife to sit down on the bench, before
he followed, his joints cracking audibly. The old man sighed. "I am
getting too old---"

"Oh please," his wife said good-naturedly. She smiled at her husband
then turned to him and said, "We've seen you here often."

He smiled shakily back at her. "Well---yeah." He rubbed the back of
his neck, feeling a bit awkward.

The old woman smiled. He could see that under the cobweb of fine
lines that she once had been a very beautiful woman.

"We've been out of town," she announced. "We went to see our
great-grand baby." She pulled out pictures. "Do you want to see?"

He didn't really, but he didn't want to appear rude. "Sure," he said.

The old woman's smile dazzled him. He was suddenly happy with his
decision. There also came the blinding insight that this old woman had
probably broken more than a few hearts in her time.

"This is Tristian," she said. "Ten pounds and eight ounces. A big
baby---like his Grandfather--our son." She sighed and shook her head.
"My, it took him a while to settle down. Our son. Too busy traveling
all over the world, you know---Nepal, India, China, the Middle East,
Europe. Then he joined the Peace Corps and went to Africa. That's
where he meet Mai. Mai's his wife. She was also a member of the
Peace Corps and a teacher. She's part Taiwanese. Tristian is the son
of our granddaughter Lily. "

"I can see the Asian heritage in the baby's eyes," he told her.

"Oh yes." She smiled lovingly at the picture. "He has beautiful
eyes." She pulled out a bag of sandwiches. "Would you like a
sandwich?"

"Oh, no thank you, ma'am."

"Are you sure? There's plenty."

"I'm fine. Thanks," he assured her.

The old couple began to eat. After a while, the wife said to him, "So
are you married?"

"Me?" he stammered. He shook his head. "Oh no. Uhm---came close,
though--" he broke off. The ache inside came rolling back like a
tidal wave. He felt he was about to drown in his despair.

Oh God!---he missed her!

"I guess she decided she would be better off without me. Not that I
blame her," he added brokenly.

The old woman reached over and patted his hand. "We've been together
for over fifty years," she said. She and her husband exchanged tender
looks. "And I can tell you we had our share of ups and downs, dear.
If it was meant to be, it will come out all right in the end."

He watched them begin their usual routine to leave. The wife
gathering up their trash and putting it into the paper bag. Her
husband's bones creaking as he helped his wife stand up.

The old woman turned to him and smiled. "Thank you for letting us sit
with you. We will see you tomorrow." Then she tugged gently on her
husband's arm. "C'mon, Mulder, let's go home."

He watched as they began to walk down the park path. Abruptly, they
stopped. Like two halves of a whole---yin and yang---they stood
there. Their heads bent close together as they talked quietly.
Suddenly the old man gently cupped his wife's face in one hand. The
other he used to brush back a stray lock of white hair. Then he
reached down and kissed his wife gently on the lips. He saw the old
man mouthed, "Love you" to his wife. Another kiss---this time on the
forehead---and then they were once again on their way, hand in hand.

As they had disappeared into the horizon, something deep inside of him
squeezed tight, then expanded, bursting out. On this warm autumn
day---in the crowded park---a man began to weep.

So this was love....

He believed.


The End


*AUTHOR'S NOTE -

Sorry! I couldn't put 3rd POV up at the top. It would have spoiled
the surprise! But I hoped that I put enough in there for you to get
just a itty bitty little suspicious about who the old couple really
were. For those who were totally surprised, I hope it was a pleasant
surprise. I hoped I managed to pull it off.

This story would fit very nicely into the Thin Slices universe---very
far, far into the future.

Thanks for reading! And thanks to those who have been so very
encouraging! Constructive feedbeed is always welcome! myriss1013@yahoo.com

---Myriss (04.18.01)