By Chris Van Langenberg

She had never had a home. A home was a dream, one she never dreamt about until he came along. The dream now felt far away, the distance growing with each passing moment, like it was being carried away along a river. She wanted to wade out into the water, place herself as a dam against the current. Halt the dream in its place. Bring it back into existence through the sheer force of her will. But she had been in the river before, and no woman can enter the same river twice. Because it is not the same river, and she is not the same woman. 

She once had everything she desired, just didn’t know she desired it until it was gone. How was she to know how sweet the air of that life was, until she felt the chokehold of this one? Isn’t it strange. You don’t think about breathing until you can’t. Then it becomes all you can think about. And you would do anything to get it back. And she would. Do anything. To get it back. That man. Their home. That life. 

That man had gone, this one came back…Those men had gone, these ones came back. He was one of the ‘lucky’ ones. He had returned, ‘unscathed’. There was no physical manifestation of what he had lost. But sometimes unseen wounds can be the most painful. He had lost his life. He was still alive, but he was no longer living. 

That life was gone, all that remained was this one. The dream, once so vivid, now a fading memory that lingered like the scent of a passing stranger’s cologne. She would grasp on to it. It would be enough to sustain her. There was no alternative.

She had once lived that life, with that man. Now, she would live this life, with this man. In this house, which was once a home.  

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Chris Van Langenberg resides in the suburb of Diamond Creek in Melbourne, Australia. Despite the fact his mother is a poet, he never thought he had it in him to write. After years of putting it in the too hard basket, at the age of 40 he thought he should give it a shot… so he did. Writing is all he has been able to think about since.