“I’d wait a lifetime for you and then some.” He kisses my forehead, the tip of my nose, and then my lips. “Or at least another 5,256,000 minutes…” He smirks. “Now, hurry to work so you can hurry to me.” He playfully pats my butt as if I was running into a football game.

I pick up my bag and start toward the door. I tell him I love him.

“Love you more,” he says.

2

Adam Morgan

My fingers tap against the keyboard a few more times just as the sun is leaving its final stretch of light on this side of the world for the day. A breeze rustles the trees, shaking them of their fall-colored leaves, while laps of lake water gently lick the shore. I save the work I’ve done for the day and close my laptop—three thousand words will have to do. I toss my black-rimmed reading glasses onto the desk and run my hands through my ash-brown hair, pushing it off my forehead. I rub my temples a bit to alleviate a lingering tension headache and let out a deep sigh. As I stretch my arms out and roll my neck, a black squirrel darting across the yard catches my eye. It’s not as if I haven’t seen a black squirrel before, but it’s a rare sight, and demands to be watched and noticed. I stare out of the large window behind my desk as the creature bounces from place to place, searching for food, complete in its sense of purpose and direction.

The lake house is an hour away from our home outside D.C. and it might as well be on a new planet. It’s a verdant land that our forefathers would actually recognize, unlike the concrete and horn-blasted monstrosity that plays the part of our nation’s capital. The house is far enough from the city to ensure no unexpected visitors but close enough for me to travel to whenever I need to be alone—or not alone, for that matter.

A secluded cabin on Lake Manassas surrounded by woods in Prince William County, Virginia, was just what my writing career needed, or at least that’s how I sold the idea to Sarah. I had struggled to get the words out up until just over a year ago when we purchased this second home. It opened another world for me, a world in which I could write, a world full of obtainable desires, a world I could live in without feeling the constant pressure that I wasn’t good enough. The natural beauty of the environment around me could be reflected into my work, and in this world I felt reborn.