The Hill Between Heartbeats

I didn’t know I was breaking until I met stillness.

For years, I moved through life like a ghost in a familiar house—mother, protector, survivor. My laughter was rehearsed, my smiles were armor. There was always something to do, someone to save, a crisis to manage, a fear to silence. I held my boys like shields against the world, even when the weight of everything threatened to buckle my spine.

And then came Marcus...

He met me halfway up a steep hill—literally. That hill became a metaphor for everything I’d been climbing: loneliness, trauma, exhaustion. I never expected kindness to meet me halfway, let alone walk the rest of the way with me. He did, even with sore legs, even when the rain started. It should’ve meant nothing, but to me, it cracked something open.

I didn’t fall in love that day. I didn’t even believe in love anymore. But something shifted.

For the first time in years, I felt safe. And that terrified me more than anything else.

Because safety meant rest. Rest meant feeling. And feeling… meant facing everything I had locked away.

It started quietly, as most transformations do. A forehead kiss. The way his eyes softened when he looked at me. The gentle weight of his arm around me as we watched movies I used to love but forgot how to enjoy. Twilight, sci-fi, Bridget Jones.

It wasn’t about the films. It was about the silence between us—not the awkward kind, but the kind that wrapped around you like a blanket. In that silence, my mind—usually so loud, so sharp, so frantic—finally exhaled.

And that’s when it hit.

Grief.

For the girl I used to be. For the years I spent surviving instead of living. For the love I gave so freely to people who left me bleeding. For the parts of myself I had carved away just to be enough.

I cried once, quietly, in his bed while he slept. His breathing was steady, peaceful, and I curled around that sound like it was the only thing keeping me grounded. I wasn’t sad. I was unraveling.

But not in the destructive way I used to.

This time, the unraveling felt like blooming.

Like my soul was thawing after a long, bitter winter.

There were still shadows—old ghosts whispering doubt. I’d look at Marcus and feel the pull to sabotage it all. To push him away before he could leave. To protect my heart by building a fortress of sarcasm and distance.

But he didn’t flinch.

Even when I threw my overthinking at him like knives, he stayed. Even when I questioned everything, he offered nothing but calm.

One night, I asked him why. Why he didn’t run.

He just said, “Because you’re worth it.”

And I believed him.

Not fully. Not right away. But in pieces.

Piece by piece, I reclaimed myself.

I started speaking softer to my reflection. I started believing maybe I could be held without being broken. Maybe I could want without being punished. Maybe I could love—slowly, tenderly—without losing myself again.

Now, I walk with him sometimes, side by side, up and down that hill. It’s still steep. Life is still heavy. My kids still need me. Some wounds still throb.

But I’m no longer walking alone.

I still don’t know where this ends. Maybe with him. Maybe not. But that’s not the point.

The point is—somewhere in between my broken past and my uncertain future, I found peace in the present.

I found breath.

I found me.