Carrie's Fic

That's what you asked me the night you left. Just two words, that's all you said to me that night when you packed your suitcases with clothes, books, and picture frames. You took all the pictures out of their frames and set them on top of the dresser, as if the images were too weighty for you to carry along. You packed with one hand and held a bottle of beer in the other. You never drink beer, but that night it seemed permanently attached to your hand. You packed and you drank as I sat in the chair beside our bed, silent. Maybe I should have said something, something to keep you from walking out upset. But I said nothing. There was nothing I could say. To be honest I didn't want you to stay, so what was the use in empty platitudes? You were silent as well. You were silent up until the moment I lifted your packed suitcase and moved to carry it out to the car. That's when you spoke those words. In case you were wondering, those words, those two tiny words, have been all I've thought about these last three weeks.

I know I don't owe you anything. Our marriage was a lie. I wouldn't even deem to call it a marriage, truth be told. I don't owe you an explanation and rationale tells me I don't owe you an apology, either. I owe you nothing except life in prison, and believe me, that part’s already taken care of. But as I sit here at my desk and watch you on the security screen, part of me says I do at the very least owe you an answer to your question.

I sit and watch you eat the meal the guards hand you. You wrinkle your nose at the food. Sure, it's unappetizing, but I’d suggest you get used to it. In case you were wondering, Irina Derevko was a much more interesting inmate than you are. But back to the matter at hand.

Why her? Let's make the question a little clearer. Why is Sydney the love of my life? Why did I nearly kill myself after losing her? Why did I imagine her at the altar instead of you on our wedding day? Why was I never fully able to look you in the eyes when I said "I love you"? Are those the questions you're asking?

I've spent five years asking myself very similar questions. Why Sydney? Why did my watch, along with my heart, stop the day she walked into my life? Why did it have to be the one woman I couldn't have? Why couldn't it have been Alice? Or you, for that matter? Five years and I still don't have any definitive answers. I have pieces of reasons that I’ve tried to puzzle together into a response, so that fifty years from now, when someone asks the inevitable question—how did you first fall in love with Sydney?—I can give them facts, figures, reasons. But I have nothing of the sort.

I'll tell you what I do know.

I know that I’d do nearly anything to elicit a smile on her face. Have you seen her smile? I mean a real, full blown grin. It starts from her eyes, which crinkle up slightly at the outside corners, then it spreads to those lips, which spread widely, showing her teeth. Dimples emerge on her cheeks and her face just alights with happiness and you know, in that moment, that you're seeing something extraordinary. You know that you want to see that smile every day for the rest of your life.

I know that even though I'm by nature a quiet person, she makes me want to be open and honest. When I'm with her I just want to talk about anything and nothing—my dad, her dad, work, hockey, the universe. Yes, the universe. Maybe that’s a large enough topic to cover in all the time I want to spend with her, simply talking.

So why her? Because she's that one in a million. And you, well, you just don't seem quite so significant out of the 999,999 left. My apologies.