[ IP ] The Long Road

The Road had never begun, they had. The twins had started their walk on the Road long ago, before they even knew it was a road. The Road was not any road though, it was the Road. A black and gray line so great, the world seemed created to contain it. `` The Road will end,'' their father had said. `` I wish I could be there when it does.'' Tears had dripped from his eyes as he said those words. Riley's sister had cradled her poor father's head in her lap. Rebekah had looked at Riley, tears welling in her eyes and said,'' We'll finish it for you, da.'' Riley had never believed that. Her father did, so did Rebekah. `` What has a beginning, has an end,'' he had told her many times in her youth when she questioned the need to keep walking. Now Riley doubted it had a beginning, for she knew it would never end. The thought of the weak state her father had deteriorated to made her pull out the photograph he had given her. Four travelers stood smiling on the side of the Road in the picture, her father said it was their great grandparents as they when they began to walk the Road. She gazed down on their smiling faces, surrounded by a lush countryside and a decaying city seemingly forgotten with their smiles. Rebekah turned back and shouted,'' Riley, come'ere.'' Wiping her eyes, Riley tucked the photograph back into her pocket and hurried to her sister. She pointed to a sign and asked Riley,'' What does it say?'' Rebekah had never taken to reading as Riley had, she said the words jumped around and never stayed still. Riley turned to the sign and read aloud `` Welcome to colorful Colorado.'' Rebekah stared thoughtfully. Suddenly Riley felt a need to pull out the photograph. She yanked it out as her sister looked at the sign, transfixed by the letters. Riley scanned the photo, the faces gleaming up at her, and then she saw it. A tiny brown sign with even tinier white letters scrawled across it. She could n't make out the words but she knew what they said `` Welcome to colorful Colorado!'' She glanced up from the photo and looked at the ruins down the Road. They were here, her great grandparents. Not in this time, but in this place. She felt their smiles falter as they saw a lost look come across her face. She looked back at the way she and Rebekah had come and realized the road ended exactly where it began. Anywhere. 
 
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