Excerpt: The Man Who Shouldn't Be

As if aware of what he was feeling, his midnight companion gently took his arm in hers to guide him. He was grateful that she didn’t feel the need to fill the silence with words. They walked on, listening to the sounds of the countryside around them. “There was someone… someone I was close to,” he said suddenly. “I had known her for a while, and I guess we were going to be married.” He sniffed and wiped his eyes. She remained quiet, but he could feel the slightest pressure where her hand rested upon his arm. “She died suddenly, just this year. In the winter time. Back home.” It was rare for him to cry; all the more so when he wasn’t alone. He had been stoic at the hospital, comforting Nicole’s sister as she went to pieces… he had been stoic at the funeral, taking his place with Nicole’s parents as they had stared uncomprehendingly past the coffin… he had begun to think of himself as someone immune from emotions, that he had somehow gone through to the other side, where emotions held nothing for him and he would just go on living without feeling anything… and now here he was, sobbing in the arms of this girl, this young women that he had only met that evening, crying as though he had only just gotten the news.