the last year has been one hit after another. he finally opened his heart again to love someone again — not replacing the loves he’s had before, but making room for something new, allowing himself to share so much of the love he has left to give. and then, too soon, jesus was gone too. he wasn’t sure if he could recover from that, not after his heavy heart had come to learn that multiple people could become the love of your life. it was like things had just gotten started, like his heart was just beginning to beat entirely new, like he was just starting to plan what the rest of his life would look like, how his family could grow, how alexandria may not feel so hollow anymore.
and just like that, alexandria had suffered, too.
it’s easy to say that he won’t accept losing any more, but when she calls him on it, he can’t commit to it. he knows that someday, maybe he will fall in love again, too. someday, maybe they will be able to make this place home again — or maybe they will find another, because while this was the only real home he ever knew, he knows that just like the love of his life, his heart can make room for another. that would not be replacing alexandria, either — because it’s the people here who are the heart of this place, isn’t it?
he sighs, shaking his head and finally looking back to her. ❝ i want to believe it. close myself off from anything that could hurt me again—- ❞ but he’s never entirely connected with people who can do that so easily, because he could never comprehend it himself. he chuckles, though it’s empty. ❝ i’m not sure that’s the kind of person i am. my heart has a mind of its own. ❞ he wonders if hers does, too. he believes that she could find that love — that it is in the cards for her, if she so wants it to be.
he looks down at their hands together, his thumb brushing over her knuckles ( just as it has so many times before — in happy moments, in sorrowful moments, in hopeful moments. ) ❝ it is. if you want it, maggie, you’ll find it when the time is right. right in front of your eyes, even. when you’re least expecting it, too. ❞ and he wants that for her.
he grins, because that’s familiar to him — and it’s likely obvious with the sparkle in his eyes. for so long, his meetings with jesus were kept quiet, not for the sake of their relationship, but for the sake of their communities, who didn’t yet know how to come back together. ❝ i did. i fell in love again, ❞ he admits quietly, and his smile grows, because this right here is what he missed so much. the story has a sour ending — but the beginning, the middle, it was all beautiful. ❝ you think it’s going to be scary, that your heart is going to close up on you the moment you start to think you shouldn’t. but—- if you’re with the right person, your heart will know when to open up. and you’ve just got to follow that, ❞ he assures her, finally allowing himself to reveal the man in question. ❝ jesus taught me that. ❞
maggie’s laughs says what she doesn’t: that all hearts do. that even when the mind is telling you to be guarded, to not give yourself entirely to anyone because the possibility of getting hurt is always there; when hearts choose people, when hearts open up for somebody else... that’s it. fighting it isn’t a choice at all, not for the likes of maggie, and by what he’s saying, it isn’t a choice for aaron either. they’re cut from the same cloth, she thinks, and it’s funny to her how it’s possible to be this connected to somebody you only met through circumstances.
the touch on her skin is soothing, it’s grounding, it’s needed. maggie’s nature aches deeply for affection and she’s never been one to close herself off to it, just like she knows she won’t be able to say no to the moment her heart starts growing for somebody in the way it grew for glenn when they were just kids who stepped into adulthood together, holding each other’s hands and each other’s hearts — looking back now to who she was when they met and who she became because of his love, she is certain that if someday life puts somebody else in her path like that, she’ll want to be ready to accept it. maybe not right now, but someday.
❝ i do — i think i do, ❞ a whispered confession like it’s a secret, but the good kind. the way his eyes tell her there’s more to the story... of course there is, she figures, they’ve lived apart for a long, long time and even if she came back when ( because ) things were bad, it doesn’t mean it was all bad. it wasn’t all bad for her on the road, with the new communities and groups she met, with the time spent alone with her son, or learning from georgie and teaching other what she knew. so of course there’s more to aaron’s part of the story, she just didn’t expect that this was going to be the turn it took.
her eyes become softer, a mixture of excitement and anticipated sadness to them. happy, because he’s got to experience love like that again, and sad because he’s speaking of it as if in the past — she knows how the story goes.even before he says the name.
❝ jesus... ❞ she repeats, assimilating the lessons he taught aaron on love, and the way they became that person for each other after she was gone. ❝ he was good at that; at making the scary things feel like adventures, ❞ nose wrinkles slightly, she looks down with a smile that keeps growing. she would’ve wanted to watch them grow old together, both of them deserved that lifetime of happiness, even if it had momentary lapses of dark and sad times. but she knew better than that, and it made her happy to know her friend had found a way to get close to someone in that way ( even if it didn’t last ), it made her even happier that that person for him was aaron. ❝ —i didn’t now, ❞ had it happened when her letters stopped? days like this she wishes she would’ve made more of an effort to stay close to those she loved. ❝ can you tell me? from the beginning? ❞