//------------------------------//
// June 19 [Sad Sunday] 
// Story: Silver Glow's Journal 
// by Admiral Biscuit 
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June 19

Neither of us wanted to get out of bed, 'cause we both knew that when we did, Aric would have to leave, and we both wanted to make this morning last as long as we could, but it couldn't last forever and I cried a little bit and he did too and then finally sat up and leaned right back down and kissed and wiped my cheeks and told me to be safe and stay in touch and he would come visit me and I should visit him, too, and then we kissed one more time and he went out the front door and I went to the back window in time to see him get in Winston and then I made it to the balcony in time to wave as he drove down the street and then he turned the corner and I wanted to fly after him.

I sat on the papasan for a while and watched a confused black butterfly bump its nose against the window and I watched the leaves of the tree swaying in the wind, and I thought about our trip and how fresh it still was in my mind. I could almost smell the dirt and the smoke from the campfire and the mapley oatmeal and the bad coffee that tasted so good first thing in the morning.

There were some pegasuses who never had a home, but they drifted around the skies over Equestria and I think I know why.

But it was also nice to be home, to be back where things were familiar, and even though it hurt that Aric was gone and so were most of my friends, there were still some left, and I'd make some new ones soon, too. Like the person who lived downstairs, or the people who lived in the house across the driveway, and the ones who lived across the lawn . . . I didn't even know my neighbors yet, and soon it would be time to meet them.

Not yet, though.

I was waiting in case Aric needed me. Maybe to help him load something in Winston or even help fix her or maybe he would stop by on his way out of town to hug and kiss me one more time and what would he think if I wasn't here?

I kind of knew deep down that he wouldn't, though. But I waited just in case.

I sort of thought that I should probably have something to eat, but there wasn't any food in the house and even though he'd said that I could have the leftover food from the trip, he would probably want that, so I hadn't taken any.

I flopped back down on the papasan chair and waited, and I dozed off, and when I woke up again I went out on the balcony and stood on my hind legs with my forelegs on the railing and I could just reach some leaves on the tree and they weren't all that good, but they were better than nothing.

I paced around the living room a little bit and fluffed my wings out and then I thought that I needed to fly, so I put on my gear and got permission and Dori was happy to hear me again and if it hadn't been against the rules I would have told her all about my trip but all I said was that I had gone up north for a week with Aric.

I usually didn't take my portable telephone, but I did this time just in case he called.

I flew over his house on the way out of town, and Winston was still in the driveway but he'd taken the top off and put it on his other truck (which was where he kept it when he wasn't using it on Winston) and the back was mostly full with boxes and his bed and his dresser.

I didn't see him, though, but I waved anyway just in case he could see me and then I started to gain altitude, and I sort of lost myself in the sky for a while, and when I started to really notice things on the ground again, I was over the dirt mines, so I looped around and went back towards downtown, turned around the hotel, and flew straight for the Stetson bell tower.

Normally, there were people all over campus and cars parked everywhere, even where they shouldn’t be, but the parking lots were almost completely empty and there were lots of spaces open along the street, too.

When I went back by Aric's house, Winston was gone.

I sorta moped around the apartment for a bit, then I tried to read some poetry but I found that I couldn't focus on it, and I looked at my Bible but I knew that I wasn't in the mood for that, either, so I stretched out on the futon and took a nap. The pillow still smelled like Aric, and that was comforting.

Waking up was really weird. I'd been dreaming that I was on vacation and I was supposed to take a train and I couldn't be late and then I fell down and broke a bone in my fetlock but I didn't feel it at first, and it was only after someone told me that it looked broken that I couldn't support my weight on it any more.

So I went along on three hooves, until the train that was supposed to take me finally arrived and then I thought that I should get money for the trip, and when I was about to do that, I woke up and the light in the apartment was really confusing and it took me a minute to remember where I was and that it was the middle of the afternoon and not night.

I went outside and flew off the balcony and over Aric's house again but he was still gone and he would be gone for weeks and months and I kind of made a lazy orbit while I thought about what I could do next. I could go to Nina's and get some dinner, but it wouldn't be the same without him, or I could order a pizza but then I'd be eating it all alone and it felt like it was too much effort to get food at all, so I circled back home and went back inside and looked through my books until I found one of Walt Whitman's poems that had a really nice picture of grass on the cover and I started to read it.

Then I thought that Aric might be arriving in Lafayette any time, so I turned on my computer (while I was gone, the internet valves had been set, so I could go to Facebook and anywhere else I wanted to) and checked to see if he'd sent me a message or put up anything new, and there was a picture taken through the windshield of stopped traffic and underneath he said that he was near Waterford and stuck in construction.

That was a few hours old, but from all the cars I could see he would probably be there for a while. So I went back to the papasan and read some poems but they didn't really stick, and then I checked the Facebook again but there was no new news, and finally it was starting to get too dark to read, so I checked one more time and there was nothing new, so I went out to the balcony and let the breeze ruffle my coat and hair, and I flexed both of my forehooves just to make sure that my pastern bones were all okay.

It was pretty quiet, which I liked. The house mostly blocked the sound of traffic on Main Street, and there was hardly any on Grove Street. I could hear some radios and televisions, and the humming of window boxes that were called air conditioners, and some animals too.

It felt like the right amount of noise. Not so much that it was distracting or overwhelming, and not quiet enough that it was lonely.

I stayed out there until it was dark and I could see a few stars through the canopy of the tree in my front yard, then I went inside and closed the balcony door and checked Facebook one more time but there wasn't anything, and then I got on the futon and pulled the blanket up and sniffed at the fading scent on the pillow.