“Yeah, I’ll give you that,” he agreed. “It’s messy to love after heartbreak. Moving on is painful and it forces you to be honest with yourself about who you are…and what you want.”
“Your turn,” she challenged, trying to move on. “What’s the story behind you being middle-aged and single?”
That made him chuckle. “Ouch! Middle-aged? I’m only in my forties.”
“Well, unless you plan on gracing this earth until you’re one-hundred and twenty, then, yes, middle-aged.”
Their exchange, tinged with humor, momentarily lifted the heaviness of the conversation. Yet, Reva’s curiosity had been piqued. She wondered about the experiences that had shaped him, the ones he alluded to with his understanding of love and pain.
He had a story, and she was anxious to hear it.
Kellen was now looking right at her. “I was twenty-six when I married Liz. She was the love of my life.”
“What happened?” Reva asked, searching his expression for answers.
In a quiet, somber tone, Kellen began to recount a chapter of his life she suspected he seldom opened. “She was always so vibrant, you know? Even when the doctors diagnosed her with severe coronary heart disease, she faced it with a bravery that made you believe she was invincible.”
He paused, seeming to collect his thoughts as if to weave them into a narrative worthy of her memory. “The doctors recommended Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting, CABG. It was supposed to be her way back to a normal life, to alleviate the angina that had been shadowing her every step, to restore the flow of life through her veins.”
A wistful smile flickered across his face, but it didn’t reach his eyes. “She knew the risks. We both did. But the chance to reclaim a piece of herself, to no longer be defined by the limitations of her condition, was a siren call she couldn’t resist.”
Kellen’s gaze drifted, focusing on a memory only he could see. “The surgery…it was supposed to be routine, but complications arose. An unrelenting infection led to more surgeries and more hospital nights than we cared to count. Each visit, each procedure, I saw less of her. Not just physically, but the spark that made Liz ‘her’ started to dim.”
He let out a long, deep sigh, a testimony to the weight of his words. “In the end, it was her heart that gave out. Not from the disease it bore, but from the battle to fix it. Her decision to move forward with that corrective surgery, it…it cost her everything.”
Kellen looked at her then, his eyes saturated with emotion. “That night, I sat on my porch and cried. She was only thirty years old. A day doesn’t pass that I don’t realize I’m a better man because of how she loved me.”
Reva listened, her heart heavy, as Kellen’s words painted a vivid, poignant picture of love, hope, and loss. As he concluded, a profound silence enveloped them, the kind that speaks volumes, carrying with it a shared sorrow.
She reached across the small space that separated them, her hand finding his in the water, a gesture of comfort and understanding. Brimming with empathy, her eyes met his. “Kellen,” she began, her voice barely above a whisper, laced with the depth of emotion his story had stirred within her. “I…I’m so sorry. For your loss, for the pain you’ve endured. It’s unfair, the way life can unravel, taking with it the dreams and hopes we most hold dear.”
Reva’s heart ached for him, for the love he had lost and the burden of grief he carried. “Your love for her, it’s evident in every word you speak, in the way you honor her memory. Your words are a testament to your wife—beautiful, yet heartbreakingly sad.”
She squeezed his hand gently, a silent promise of her presence, her support. “I can’t begin to imagine the depth of your pain, but please know, I’m here for you. In this moment, in any moment you need a friend, a listening ear.”
Reva’s perspective on Kellen started to change. He wasn’t just a straightforward kind of guy who was good with his hands; he was thoughtful and complex, with a depth to him that she hadn’t noticed before.
Tears, unbidden, welled up in her eyes, not just for Kellen’s loss, but for the profound connection they were forging in the shared vulnerability of this conversation. “Thank you for trusting me with her story, with your feelings. It means more than you know.”
It dawned on her that Kellen was right. Hiding only robbed you of intimacy. The deepest human connections are forged in these moments of raw openness, where hearts are laid bare. And for the first time in what felt like an eternity, she found herself yearning to connect with a man on a level she never anticipated.
Reva had never revealed the entirety of her soul without hiding—not with Merritt, and not even with her girlfriends.
When she least expected, her world shifted.
Kellen felt something, too. She could tell.
“You know,” he said. “You can be lonely even when you’re with a lot of people, even when the busyness acts like a shell.”
His comment pierced and left her unable to speak.
“I’m lonely, too,” he said. “What say we try to shed this isolation together?”
Reva hoped Kellen couldn’t see her heart pounding against her chest. Before she could answer, he closed the space between them and kissed her slowly.
Her stomach tightened. She was powerless against the emotions raging inside her. His lips against her own felt wonderful and terrible and scary.
She was heading into unknown territory. If she moved forward, it would be difficult to stop.
