Final chapter…please kindly read and review. Thanks.

Chapter 8

Face to Face

He was startled from his memories by the sound of someone signaling their stop. He looked up and saw that it was Julie, who had pulled the cord, she was getting up carefully as the bus rolled to a stop. She reached for her shopping bags and knotted them through her hands.

She caught Mason's eye as he watched her and gave him a quick, uneasy smile as she made her way to the front of the bus. There had been no recognition in her eyes. She had not seen even the smallest trace of the young man who had once been her husband, nearly forty years ago. Mason jumped to his feet, not even aware of what stop it was or for the matter much caring. He hurriedly got off.

He had lost sight of her, twisting his head from left to right, he desperately tried to catch at glimpse of her.

A second of panic past, were he thought he might have lost her but then he found her in the crowd, she had her back to him and was hurrying down the street as if she had somewhere important to be. He started following after her, he wasn't sure why.

Would he speak to her? He wanted to, more then anything. He had dreamt of her for so long, wondered about her, tried to imagine what life would have been like if they had stayed together. He wondered now as he studied her purposeful strides if things had been different would he now be a hunched over old man, holding her arm, carrying her shopping bags?

It had seemed so long ago, a lifetime since the old woman in front of him had been the beautiful young girl who had taken his heart and never given it back.

The realization of that, of time and it swiftness nearly overcame him.

Where had he been for forty years? What kind of limbo was he stuck in?

He quickened his steps, needing so badly to speak to her, apologize. Yet, how could he? She believed him dead and buried? What did he need to prove? Hadn't he done enough damage to both of them?

He knew that the only thing he would succeed at would be frightening her and possibly pissing Rube off if he actually ever found out. Yet, he had lived so long keeping on the edge of society, blending in but never fitting into it that here and now, this moment, as he kept in sight the one thing, the only person he had ever truly loved. He realized that he could no longer shut out the past. Forget it and lock it down deep within himself. He had to face it. Face her.

He knew he had only this one chance to tell her how sorry he was, how sorry he had always been and how if he could he would most certainly do it all over again except this time, he would stay with her.

He would never leave her. He jogged up to her before he could change his mind and reached for her, touched her shoulder. She jumped and turned, hands clutching tightly to her shopping bags, her blue eyes wide with shock.

He was taken aback for a moment, overcome by her nearness. His heart broke as he took in the ravages of time on her once glorious face. She was still so beautiful though, so beautiful that it hurt.

"Can I help you?" She muttered coolly. That voice, it was hers alright – a little rougher, a little lower in tone but it was the same. That was Julie's voice. He went to speak, willing away the lump that had found itself in his throat.

"Um – is your name Julie…Julie Patterson?" He asked quickly. She got a funny look on her face, startled she nodded and put her bags down on the ground beside her.

"It was – no one has used my maiden name in years."

He nodded, and had to turn away from her, he could feel the tears coming, the flood of them.

He turned back to her, eyes shiny. His voice thin and trembling.

"You married?"

"Who are you?" She asked puzzled and he felt her reach for his arm, rest her hand on it and he couldn't stand it. This awesome feeling of regret that consumed him, the knowledge that here standing before him was merely the ghost of the girl he had once loved and he could not turn back time and go back and make them both young and alive again. He stifled back a sob, choking on it, he bowed his head and shifted uncomfortably.

"I'm – I'm a no one…"

"Your English," she said quickly, "I lived there for a while, a small while – maybe I knew your parents."

He looked up. There was so much to say and he wanted to say it, get it all out but there was no time for it and certainly no place.

He allowed the dam to burst, the words long kept inside rushing out.

"I am so sorry Julie – for everything, all of it – I love you, I never stopped and I never will."

"What is this?" Her eyes grew even bigger and she grabbed her bags in a panic and began to back off from him. He had scared her and badly and he reached for her, saw her recoil from his out stretched hand

"Leave me alone," she hissed, "or I'll call for help."

The tears came now and he could do nothing to stop them. He wiped at his eyes and nodded.

"I didn't mean to scare you; I just needed to say that…when I left you, I made the biggest mistake of my life, one I have spent every day I have had since, face first in a bottle trying to erase but I never could and I never will, I love you Julie…Ju-lu."

At the sound of her long ago nickname, Julie's eyes with tears of her own. She began to shake, a look of utter surprise on her face, something very akin to relief and horror.

"How - how do you know that name?" She managed to gasp out.

He was shaking his head, stepping away from her.

"I'm sorry that I have scared you, I didn't mean too, I just wanted to tell you goodbye." He then turned and ran away from her, quickly less once again he lose his nerve. He had to get away from her and yet, though his heart literally felt torn to pieces inside him and he was shaking all over with nervous fear. He felt strangely good as if a huge weight had been lifted from his shoulders. He was crying, near sobbing and yet amidst of it all - he felt alive. More alive then he could ever recall feeling. He had been given a gift. A great one. The chance to apologize to the one person he had spent every undead year wanting to make things right with.

Down the street, standing rigid and still, watching as his retreating figure rounded the corner; Julie watched as the strange and disheveled young man that had spoken to her, disappeared from sight.

Tears rolled down her face, one by one – her lip quivering and her hands aching from the heaviness of her bags. Unable to look away, she found her lips forming a name. A name she had not uttered in nearly forty years, less it threatened to bring with it – a hurt to horrid to bear.

It was the name of the only man she had ever loved in her long life. The one who had left. Who had died.

"Mason?" she whispered.

Thank you to all who stuck with this story through the long hiatus. You guys are awesome. I hope you liked….