What Felt Like a Lifetime

She was driving for, what felt like, days. Everything was taking so long and she was nearing her breaking point. She didn’t understand how people could find patience instead of panic in certain situations.

I guess some people just have that meditation stuff down.

While they could practice patience and calm while meditating seemed like an absolute joke to her right now. So, she continued to drive. 

Over an hour and she finally reached her destination, she probably parked in two places, but in this moment she couldn’t care. She locked her car and bolted for the building. As she ran, she thought about the last time she’d run this hard and was fairly positive it was back college when she trained in track. 

Good to know I’ve still got it.

Who knew you could give such a snarky sarcastic statement in your own mind to yourself. Maybe she’d just discovered a new talent. 

Once finally getting into the building she stood, frozen. It was huge and she didn’t know where she was supposed to go. After her third loop of the open space someone approached, asked her name and ushered her in the right direction, they jogged together and she really fought the urge to scream at the helpful person to go faster.

They did, FINALLY, get there however. She quickly thanked her helper and rushed up and plunked her butt down, front row, closest to the doors, rested her arms on her legs and just stared, since that’s all she could do now. Which was the worst situation she had ever been in. She had no comparison to anything else she had ever experienced. 

She wanted to do more.

She had to do more! 

But this was it, this was her final stage of waiting. It felt like she’d been in a frenzy of wait for her whole life. That’s how she was feeling.

Truly believing that if she had to wait another day, her heart would literally crush and she would die.

Just like that. 

She must have completely zoned out, because when her eyes focused, she saw a pair of shoes in her line of sight and bolted upright. 

“Woah.” He said, “are you ok?”

At first she just glared up at him. If looks could kill, buddy, you’d be in trouble. But then damn reality kicked in. Nothing of this was his fault and it wasn’t fair of her to be so cruel to him. So she sighed deeply, lifted her shoulders.

  “Uhm...yeah, I’ll be ok.” She told him. A total lie to herself, if she would be ok, that too was out of her hands.

“Mind if I sit?” Indicating the seat next to her.

“Sure.”

They sat in silence for a while. She, trying to hold back her jitters and keep herself sitting, when in actuality she wanted to run the entire perimeter of this huge building, twice.

He, just sitting. The epitome of calm and patience. 

She had to hold back an actual growl as she observed his calm.

HOW ARE YOU SO CALM!!

She really could just have gotten up, stood in front of him, grab his shoulders and shake him until his head fell off. Which, of course, meant that was now all she could think of, and she welcomed such a ridiculous distraction.

Could you really shake someone so hard their head would fall off?

No… surely not. Maybe in a Friday the 13th movie or something.

YEAH! That’s it! Jason would power walk and catch you while you’ve been running your ass off, grab you by the shoulders and shake, like, 3 times and BOOM there goes your head.

She then realized he had just asked her a question.

“I’m sorry?”

“I just asked how you are doing.”

He was so polite...that’s nice but also frustrating because that meant she had to be too.

“I’m losing my mind, to be honest.”

He nodded his head, like he understood. She really hoped he didn’t.

“How are you?”

He gave her a half-smile, “oh, you know. Working hard every day.” 

She nodded.

Good thing I have my own business so I can miss all these days of work…

It was then that she couldn’t sit anymore, so she got up and just paced in front of their row of chairs. He calmly just watched her, doing nothing to his amazing calm. 

Which started to actually become almost soothing. She could easily freak out and go absolutely wild, but when she looked at this man, she felt the strength and calm from him, and she was able to take a bit of his strength and it was beginning to help her.

“Could you just, I don’t know...tell me something?” she begged him. Maybe his voice could help her too.

He smiled again, “Every time I have a few days off work, I go visit my mother and father. They’ve been together going on 65 years and they’re amazing. They drive each other crazy but love each other so much, they have to do everything together. If he’s working outside, she helps and when she gets tired, she makes sure he always has a full drink and makes him stop for food breaks when she thinks he needs it.” 

She continued to pace, but she was smiling.

“So, I went to visit, I brought my camper so I wouldn’t take up space, plus I always like using my camper whenever I get the chance. They weren’t there when I got there, so I set up, used my key to get into the house to get a drink and then I went back to my trailer, got a lawn chair and just sat in the sun.

A buddy of mine from high school knew I was coming home for a visit and he dropped by. We sat and drank some of the beers he brought and just talked, catching up.”

She was listening intently now and had stopped pacing. 

“We were sitting there for about an hour until my parent’s truck pulled in and drove down the long driveway. I had a huge smile on my face and waved, I saw both of them wave in the truck. 

So, they both get out, come over to where buddy and I stood and just when I thought I was going to get a hug, my mom smacks me on the arm then stands with her little hands on her hips and stared up at me with a total mother ‘you’re in trouble look’.” He chuckled.

“You took so damn long your father and I had to go to town and just couldn’t wait anymore. I told her I was sorry it took me longer than I thought, it took me more time to leave work that morning. She smacked me again, grumbled ‘good boy’, continued to scowl as she went to the truck. All the while dad was just watching, smiling and shaking his head. When mom got back from the truck, she held up a HUGE bag of cookies, my favorite cookies from the local bakery. She then reached up, patted my check and finally smiled at me, then left to go into the house.” 

She was smiling herself now, a true smile at his story.

“My dad watched her walk, then turned to me and my buddy and calmly said, ‘where’s mah beer?’ then plunks his butt down in an empty lawn chair and my mother, with that crazy mother hearing, yelled ‘better have one ready for me when I get back!”

He looked up at her, giving her a chuckle, and she actually gave a laugh back. 

 It took only a few minutes after his story that her panic came back and she began to pace again. She was twisting and fidgeting with her hands, a constant flow of motion.

It’s like he knew she wasn’t able to talk and just sat back, bringing back his contagious calm and waited.

How much longer do I have to wait?!

She tried to keep a strong will, and she had for this long. She’d remained as strong as she had to for this long, but she was finally cracking. This last little bit of wait was breaking her and that made her angry. 

I NEED to be strong right now! Get your shit together!

So she squared her shoulders and kept pacing. 

Everything inside her felt like she was on fire and shooting this tingling electricity through her body, even though the building was pleasantly cool, she was sweating and felt like she was going to melt. Her hair was starting to stick to her shoulders and back so she swept it up to a bun on the top of her head. Usually a look she only sported when just waking up or when she cleaned her house. There was zero caring about that right now.

He got up then and walked away.

Must have finally scared him away. Oops.

But, she actually didn’t because he returned. He came back with a huge bottle of water, a power bar, and two large Tim’s coffees in a tray.

He handed her the three things while he just took his coffee, sat back down in his seat and continued to be patient.

She unscrewed the bottle of water, downed a good portion of it, set it down on her chair, then continued to pace with her coffee cupped in both hands. 

That’s when his cell phone rang, she nearly jumped completely out of her skin. He spoke briefly, did a fair bit of listening then hung up, he checked his watch and then continued to sit. Instinctively, she pulled her phone out of her back pocket and checked it. Nothing. She almost burst into tears but caught herself, and set her phone back in it’s pocket.

Finally, when she could take no more, she bent down in a crouch, set her coffee on the floor in front of her and wrapped her arms tightly around her legs and just held on tight.

She sat even until her limbs and back began to ache, and when that happened, she just held on tighter. 

She heard him shuffling around and when she looked up, he was standing, looking down at her.

“Ready?”

She nearly lept out of her position, almost landing her completely on her face. But she finally stood and looked up at him, he was putting his hat back on. 

She stayed as close behind him as possible. They walked until they got to a door that led us outside. Once the door opened, it was loud, but it barely registered to her. The wind whipped around them. He got to one particular spot and stopped, bringing his hands behind his back in a clasp, returning to his waiting stance. 

Her body was a livewire now, her panic and impatience might finally come to an end. 

Oh my god….oh my god….oh my god…. Was all she could think.

That’s when a loud, roaring stunned her ears and when she looked up, she saw a small plane taxiing towards the two.

She looked up again at the police officer standing next to her, he looked down at her and nodded. 

They continued to wait until the plane had come to stop, the door was opened and stairs came down. The first person who came out of the plane was an older officer, he came down the steps and turned back towards the plane with his arms out.

That’s when she came out. A little six year old girl, carrying a stuffed purple bunny. She looked so lost, and when she saw that little girl, she collapsed to the ground, her knees slamming into the pavement. 

“Mommy!” she cried and as soon as her feet hit the pavement the little girl ran to her and jumped into her mother’s arms and they squeezed each other so tightly.

The little girl was so happy, and so was she but she was completely pushed over the edge and tears overflowed onto her cheeks. She just kept kissing her and hugging her, refusing to let go so when she finally stood, her baby girl came with her, holding her tight in her arms.

The older officer approached and the little girl smiled at him as he smiled at her, until turning his attention to the mother.

“We found her with your ex-husband. She’s in perfect health and just really misses her mommy.”

She was so beyond thankful, so thankful they had found her daughter after almost a month. They had all been certain it was the ex who had taken the girl, and thankfully they were all right. It just took them so long to track him down.

But it was over, she had her baby back! She was safe in her arms. 

“I can’t thank you enough.” she barely spoke the words clearly through all her tears, but he understood and nodded to her with his smile.

“You are more than welcome. Now the two of you will be driven home and all this will finally come to an end. This officer here will drive you home, following one of our cars.”

She turned back to stare at the officer who had sat so patiently with her. The man she absorbed calm from. The man who told her a story about his personal life, just to help ease her panic.

She went to him and hugged him, “thank you so much.”

He said “my pleasure,” turned his attention to her daughter and asked, “are you ready to go home?”

The little girl wrapped her arms around her mother’s neck and said, “yes please.”