Abandoned

It wasn’t so much that she abandoned him or renounced with her disappearance the time they’d vested that bothered Rick. Or that Megan discarded him and Jukes, the boxer-collie mix they’d rescued together from the pound. It was that she’d deserted him. Ceased in her support, casting him aside like last week’s recycling.

Sure, Megan had always lacked inhibition. Restraint was a word that the woman didn’t know. But it was her recklessness, that fierce drive to see a sunny tomorrow, that drew him to her in the first place. Those late nights they’d spent, staying up talking, dreaming, drinking, knowing each of them had responsibilities the next day. Her pick-up-and-go trips she’d planned on a whim; that sense of adventure that seemed to follow her even when she was doing something boring like selecting produce from the Saturday market. Megan breathed impulsiveness. She knew how to live.

Worn-out and spent, Rick decided he’d tired of trying to figure out how to live. Bending down, he traced a dirt stained finger along the colony of single celled organisms, wondering how many worlds he’d just shattered. He laughed at the irony and jumped into the river.