Read Come Back to me:Short Story for Free Online Page A

of letters, I never heard from him again. No one ever heard from him again. I kept the things I had left of him in an old shoe box in my closet. Pulling them out to reread his words as I stared at his face. A face I use to be able to touch.
     
    As much as I hate to even think about it, my mind keeps trying to guess step for step what might’ve happened.
     
    Was he thinking about me as joined the other soldiers in the back of the truck? Was he scared? Was it quick? I had tortured myself with those questions since the day the Broadsons had the soliders arrive on their doorstep.
     
    Jayse had only been gone fourteen months when he was heading back to their camp along with fifteen other soldiers and a suicide bomber stepped in front of their path, blowing himself up along with the men in the truck.
     
    Just like Alicia, there was no body in the casket at the funeral. There was nothing left of him to send to the family except the few things he kept in his station. One of those things being the picture I held in my hand. I’d stare at it for hours, dreaming up what he thought when he looked at it.
    Jayse’s parents showed up at our house that day to break the news. I laid on the living room floor screaming and crying for hours until Jayse’s father carried me to my bed. Before he left, he placed a kiss on my forehead …just like Jayse would have, whispering so softly I almost didn’t hear him over my cries.
    “He loved you. Always remember that.”
     
    I didn’t come out of my room for two weeks along with barely eating. My mother found me one night on the floor laying on one of Jayse’s old jackets with pictures spread out beside me. My room was a wreck from the mad spells I’d have,throwing and breaking things. I was angry at the world, angry at Jayse for going but most of all angry at myself. The damn shiny ring stayed on my hand at all times. I slept and showered with it on. In the back of my mind I knew I should be worried about it tarnishing but all I could think about was if I pulled the ring off my finger it would officially be over. That, maybe as long as the ring stayed on he would find a way back to me. Part of me didn’t feel like he was really gone. I’d wake up screaming in the middle of night thinking it had all be a horrible nightmare, only to find it was my reality then I’d cry until morning. I’d lost a good fifteen or more pounds within the few weeks after his death and with my already thin frame, I looked like death.
     
    “Oh AnaLee.” My mother crouched down on the floor beside me.” You can’t keep living like this.”
     
    “I can’t live at all anymore. Not without him.” My body shook.” It h-hurts so bad to even breath.”
    She laid on the floor next to me careful  not to disturb the pictures ..” Honey.”
     
    “Mom please  ...just let me wallow in my pain for one more week. I can’t stand the thought of doing anything without him beside me...or anywhere.” I stopped to sob. “I feel like the world has dimmed without his smiling face.”
    My mother held me the rest of the night while the pain kept me awake, screaming out for Jayse.
     
    Three years later and the pain was still as fresh as it had been since the day I’d lost him. I don’t think losing your first love would actually ever stop hurting, but I’d once hope, with time I’d learn to cope. Losing Jayse would never stop hurting though, and.my heart ached for him daily. I eventually had to move out of my mother’s house, I couldn’t walk out my front door without breaking down on the door step. It’s still hard to visit. She usually comes to see me once a week. I took a job at one the many title loan businesses, doing filing most days or collecting money. The pay was decent ,not spectacular but it kept the rent paid on my small apartment. The Honda was still going so luckily I hadn't had to worry about a replacement …yet.
    My life was supposed to be so much different by now. I might still be living here