“There’s a world that was meant for our eyes to see.”

Standing the precipice of the coming new decade, at the crest of a mountain with a curving road winding ahead, he looked into her eyes and waited, hand out stretched for hers, the sun shining in his eyes and wind playing through their hair.

“Will you follow me?” He asked, voice soft and sad, though he smiled a little. She hesitated, glancing from his hand to his pretty dark eyes, her own fingers knitting together tightly.

“If you won’t, I’ll say goodbye.” It wasn’t a threat, just a statement free of doubt. There would be no resentment if she said no.

And she did, with a slight shake of her head.

His smiled genuinely then, wistful and sad but understanding. He nodded, and a stray strand of hair fell over his forehead, catching at his lashes. He let his hand fall, turning to face the distant mountains. She hitched forward awkwardly, making as if to reach for him but stopping herself.

“Why must you go at all?” She asked, a pleading note in her question. He sighed heavily, eyes on winding yellow and gray lines running into the foothills. The sun was a line of fire tracing the horizon, the mountains outlined in orange.

“What good is living the life you’ve been given, if all you do is stand in one place?”

And so they parted, her getting in her car for the small quiet life of stability and home, to live and die in the same place she was born. As for him, he started walking, boots beating like a steady heart as he treaded pavement, the sun drawing up wavering heat from the asphalt. The growing breeze buffeted against his body, carrying the biting edge of cold from the north where he was headed. There was no certainty in where he was headed or what he’d find, or if he’d even ever return alive, but on he walked, bound for the ends of the earth.