[ OT ] Sunday Free Write : Leave A Story , Leave A Comment - Another Call for Moderators Edition

My husband drove down the crooked path to the unknown, darker part of America ’ s Happiest Town, in our banged-up old Jeep Wrangler, bent and bruised from our adventures past and future. No Imagine Dragons playing. No Fallout Boy. This was not a trip for music. This was a trip for silence. 
 
 This was not the first of our intimate encounters with death. My husband had a bullet wound over his right spare rib, and another on his shoulder, where he threw himself in front of me to save my life. I don ’ t like to talk about it, but suffice it to say that my brother Michael is a remarkable doctor. 
 
 We were twenty-four now. That had happened six or seven, maybe eight years ago. I ’ m unsure exactly. As I ’ ve said, I don ’ t like to talk about it. 
 
 He turned onto Ensign Lane. 
 
 “ You okay, May? ” he asked me, eyes undeterred from the twisted path. I was sitting with my arms crossed on the window sill, my mouth hiding behind the folds of my wrists, my eyes heavy and sad. I shrugged. 
 
 “ I ’ m…I ’ m not, ” I responded. He put his hand on my shoulder. I leaned across the center console and put my head into his collar, and we pulled into the desolate field. He put the car in park and helped me out. 
 
 Not many were buried here. The only tombstone I could see for horizons was this one. My husband took my arm and walked me to the rock. I knelt down and placed a single blue rose. This soul had always loved blue roses. I remember us and him always going to this part of the forest with him where there were probably millions of those flowers lining the field, filling its volume and scent. It was beautiful. 
 
 A green leaf was on his stone. I flicked it off aggressively. My husband placed a gentle hand on my shoulder as I read what was printed on the grave, despite having been told not to, and held me as I cried on the way back to the car. Then we left, going down the old crooked path and back into the town. 
 
 *R.I.P* 
 
 *Soccer Davidson* 
 
 *February 2, 20XX—May 11, 20XY* 
 
 *A good dog. * 

