Hope & Ray Story #19 (an excerpt)
The Breath Between Words
Instead, they wandered to the big lawn near the reservoir, the one people mostly forgot about. Wide open, speckled with clover, gentle slope toward the water. Nobody around.
Hope dropped her backpack and fell straight back onto the grass with a soft thud. Ray sat down, tugged off his shoes, then eased onto his side.
A breeze lifted the edges of the tall grass. Somewhere in the distance, a bird called once, then again. Ray lay on the grass, one earbud in, one out, staring at the shifting clouds. Hope was beside him, not talking.
They’d been quiet a while, but it wasn’t awkward. Just… still.
The kind of still where something real is happening, even if you don’t have words for it yet.
A breeze moved through the branches above them. Far off, someone laughed. Closer, a dog barked. Then there was again only a smooth silence
WHAT THIS SAYS ABOUT STRENGTH
We often think strength has to be loud, active, or seen. But some of the deepest strength lives in the quiet spaces, between words, between moments, between actions.
