“Steep? I can see that,” I said, looking around. We were really beginning to climb now. Huge imposing mountains surrounded us on all sides, rising up as far as the eye could see. In the distance, carved high into the side of the mountains, a gray line coiled and snaked around them.Was that the road?Surely not?
“And the road winds too,” Alex said.
“Winds?” I started getting slightly nervous as I looked up at the mountains. “How steep and windy does it get?”
“Let’s just say, there are over two hundred reviews on TripTaker about this drive, many of them referring to the fact you need nerves of steel to drive it.”
“What?” As he said that, a sudden and dramatic turn made it look like the road straight ahead of me simply disappeared. To my left, a sheer cliff face dropped down, to my right, a huge rocky cliff rose straight up.
“Oh my Gooooooooddd,” I said, inching my way around the thing and feeling like if I made the slightest wrong move, I could lose control of this car and we would simply fall over the side.
“Just keep calm,” Alex said in a hushed voice.
“You’re not the one driving,” I said through my tightly clenched jaw. My eyes were wide. I was too afraid to blink. I was afraid that if I closed them for a second, we might go plummeting off the edge of the cliff.
The road was so narrow that in places it was only big enough for one car at a time. We continued to wind our way up the steep mountain range, curving and coiling with the most intense hairpin bends I’d ever seen.
The road twisted endlessly up and down the sides of the cliff faces. But when I took a deep breath, and my nerves weren’t on a razor’s edge, I had to admit that it was beautiful up here. The views were breathtaking; jagged rocky pinnacles rose high into the air. Dramatic, electric-green mountains jutted up in uneven peaks with diving valleys, cutting through the mountainous panorama.
Alex suddenly started reading. “ ‘Number Seven. Reality Check. There’s a reason your relationship didn’t work. Take a moment to think about the relationship and why it didn’t work. Take those rose-tinted glasses off and take stock of what went wrong, as well as what you might have done wrong too. And once you know what those thing are, admit them out loud, own the reality of what happened and then vow to never make that same mistake again.’ ”
“Wow, that one’s quite deep,” I said looking over at Alex thoughtfully.
“Pull over here,” Alex suddenly said as a lookout point arrived. I pulled over and we both climbed out. It felt good to stretch my legs and arms, and it was only when I was out of the car that I realized how tense all my muscles were from the scary driving. We walked over to the edge and looked down into the green valley below. Everything looked so crisp and clean from up here and the air felt fresh. The sky was overcast and the sun was hiding behind the fluffy clouds. But every now and then, through a crack in the façade, a shaft of bright sunlight shot out and illuminated a part of the world below.
“This is just so beautiful,” I said quietly.
“So what’s the reality of your relationship?” Alex suddenly asked me.
“I don’t know,” I admitted.
“What mistake did you make?” he pressed.
“Well that’s easy. I loved a man who didn’t love me back. I poured everything I had into him, every single last drop and I got nothing back for it, but I just kept going.”
“Like pouring water into a bucket with a hole,” Alex added.
“Yes, exactly like that.” I looked at him. I liked that analogy, because that was how it had felt. “And the more I poured, the emptier I became. The more I loved him, the more it hurt.” I sighed. I actually felt empty and drained. Like a part of me had disappeared somewhere along the way. A part I didn’t even know was missing . . .until right this very second.
This realization hit me all at once. Suddenly, I ached to be whole again. I ached to find that piece of myself that was missing and plug it back in. I needed to fix the leak. I wanted to feel like I’d felt when I’d been free-falling through the sky; peaceful. Whole. Complete. My vision blurred as I felt the sting of tears creep into my eyes. My heart lodged itself in my throat and a tightness squeezed my chest.
“Shit.” My voice quivered now. “I didn’t realize, until right now, how truly destructive loving Matt has been for me. And how much energy it’s stolen from me.” I grabbed my chest as a sharp pain pressed into me.
Alex stepped closer to me and grabbed my shoulders tightly with his big hands. The gesture was both reassuring but forceful. He then lowered his head so that he was looking directly into my eyes.
“Val,” he said slowly and deliberately, “you deserve someone who will love you back, with as much fire and passion as you love.” He gave me a little shake, as if he was trying to snap me out of something. “Promise me you won’t spend another wasted day pining for someone who is too stupid to see your worth.”
His words hit me like a punch in the gut. “Yes. I promise,” I said softly, the words struggling to climb out of my constricted throat. At that, Alex smiled at me. The smile swept across his face, transforming him and all his features. The genuine warmth contained within it spilt out into the world and inhabited the space between us like a bright rainbow after a storm might do.
“And what about you?” I said, lifting my hand up to move a piece of silver hair out of his face. “You deserve that too. Someone who will love you back like that.” I didn’t stop at moving that one piece of hair though. After putting it back, I ran my fingers through his hair, watching as the separate gray and black pieces mixed together to form a new gorgeous color.
“You know,” he said quietly, “the worst part is not the actual cheating. It’s feeling that you just weren’t good enough for them.”
“You are good enough, Alex!”
“Not to her,” he said.
“Then she’s not the one,” I quickly added.
