1 Prologue

Chelseaville, Alabama. July 1976

It was just another normal night in the quiet small town of Chelseaville. Being deemed as the least chaotic town of East Alabama, things were quite uneventful as usual. Sometimes it was all way too quiet to comprehend, that the town looked as if it had ceased to breathe altogether. However, though the town was small and reserved in it's own ways, there were rare souls that dared themselves to take a chance on rebellious thoughts in this seemingly dead haven, and a few of these were none other than a young restless couple.

Beside the dry, breezy bank of Pebble stone river, underneath the silver moon light, Harrison and Hope were lying next to each other, with heavy, weary thoughts weighing them down. regardless the radiance emanating from them did not fail to hide under all that weight. They were helplessly in love. It wasn't a mystical love like the one of fairy tales, it was flawed in it's own ways, but it was yet raw and pure. But as all powerful romances go, this too had an expiration date. They knew their end was nigh, and as much as they wanted to forget that feeling of imminent loss, it always happened to crawl around the corners of their minds, petulant to be ignored.

On the dewy grass, Hope laid her head on his chest and sighed, forgetting that her parents were probably on their feet by now, waking up half the town trying to find her whereabouts. She knew the last thing her father wanted was to find her in the arms of "that Crawford boy". But she just couldn't care, every minute was important, and she wanted all those minutes of her to be consumed by him and him only. At that moment Hope realised, to never see someone again was a novel kind of terror. She stared across the river bank with still glossy eyes, looking at nothing in particular, only focusing on the rhythmic heaving of Harrison's chest against her head.

She began to reminisce all their memories from the moment they first fought over for a petty bale of hay for the town's herd festival. It was a bright and simultaneously sad event in town, when everyone rallied up their best cows to auction off for the big city dairy moguls. Hope had been helping her grandfather prepare to auction off his best prize winning cow, when she was asked to fetch a bale of hay from rancher Crawford, and as expected Harrison was there at his ranch, and his grouchy attitude wasn't a real catch for Hope. Or so she thought. From a haughty argument for a bale of hay, sparked a whirlwind romance that neither expected to end so soon.

Each memory played in her mind like a smooth phonograph and as her thoughts dived deeper, she clenched her fists in his shirt, out of fear and anger, realising she was going to leave the man she will ever love. Harrison felt her tighten and kissed her forehead, and pulled her closer. He did not have to ask or implore on how she felt, at least not anymore, because he knew everything she felt. It was almost out of this world.

The river splashed against the rocks noisily, and the pebbles beneath glimmered. Her eyes rested on this peaceful scenery and she smiled. Hope was a believer of the elements and its spiritual resemblance to humans, while Harrison used to scoff at her "mystical gibberish". They were worlds apart that it was hard for the town to believe Hope and Harrison could ever find sanctity together, and for a pair who said a lot of words to one another, Harrison and Hope found peace in each other in a way of their own way that didn't require the use of words.

The mimosas right beside Hope's legs were dozing away at the touch of her spotted red dress, and her tangled plait was strewn across the dewy ground, unaware of the dew forming on it as she buried her face into Harrison's chest. He turned to look at her wild disposition and a sad smile curled up his face. He was crazy about her, which he had hated at first, because there was no way in hell a Crawford boy would even stand next to a Mayfield girl.

Chelseaville maybe a small town, but there were minor feuds to build fences against for and the Crawfords and the Mayfields were one, but neither Hope nor Harrison could care in the end. Hope was not the belle of the town, as her mother had hoped her to be. She was the wild girl, found entertaining her fans at the diner with her songs and poems, helping her grandpa Joe with his ranch or mostly at Pebble stone river with her usual bunch of lavenders, and anywhere helping anyone who didn't share a radiant smile as hers. Harrison knew she was his problem when he began to skip rounding up the horses at the ranch to only to take a quick walk past the river with hopes of seeing her. He eventually found it was hard not to smile at the sight of her, she was too bright it blinded him sometimes.

Tomorrow she was going to leave for Portland to start a new life, a life where she could stand up for herself and be the woman of the century without having a man for support. It was Hope's mother who had insisted this revolutionary change, but to her mother's horror Hope had blatantly said she would rather wander around Chelseaville and die here than lose herself to a city. But all words pronounced were a waste of breath when Mr. Mayfield declared than she must or else she wouldn't be welcomed home again. Hope Mayfield who placed her home above all was finally defeated down. Harrison could do nothing after that.

He turned to her , "Remember I once said I was going to surprise you with my poetic skills?" he asked in a low tone.

Hope laughed, "You can try darling ." she smirked, and he tickled her in defense.

"Hear me out alright." he said and cleared his throat.

Hope is the thing with feathers

That perches in the soul

And never stops--at--all

And sweetest--in the gale--is heard

And sore must be the storm

That could abash the little Bird

That kept so many warm--

I've heard it in the chillest land--

And on the strangest sea--

Yet, never, in Extremity,

It asked a crumb of--me...

She listened to him intently with her eyes closed, and when it ended, she urged to hear more in his unpoetic husky voice.

"I was beginning' to wonder where my Dickinson collection vanished off to." she said.

"I think she's better off with me." he grinned cheekily. Hope raised her face and planted a kiss on his cheek, "but that was beautiful." she smiled and suppressed the tightness in her throat, at the thought how she was going to hurt this man on her behalf, and it killed her.

"Come now baby, don't cry." he sat up with her and wiped her face. Hope had never shed a tear in front of him, but the past few days she hadn't been able to control herself, it hurt him to watch and not do anything of much help. He tilted her chin to him,

"Hope Mayfield," he said sternly and looked into her eyes. Her grey eyes glimmered behind tears like the pebbles in the river. "wherever you go on this earth, I'll be here waitin' for you. Thinkin' of you and rootin' for you, even when I'm fit to be tied." she laughed softly through the tears and felt hopeful and miserable at once.

"But mostly I'll be waitin' here for you every single day, till my body turns weary and that last old cow in the ranch is sold." He said reassuringly than anything he had ever said, and that made her believe things would be back to normal as long as she would come back. It was the tiniest tinge of confirmation that Hope searched for right now, because deep down Harrison knew that the chances of seeing her again weren't in his favour, but right now he didn't want to believe that. He didn't want to give into reality when the very thing that showed him a better life was slipping away from him fast.

"Then I better get back before old Betsy is gone huh?" she smiled ruefully, wiping her tears hastily. Her smile reassured him, as his words did her. They held onto all the exterior promises as neither dared to venture into the looming rationality of their minds.

He nodded, and kissed her, "That's my girl," he said in-between breaths and kissed her deeply as the dark sky began to unravel shades of purple and orange--a dawn to a new day that neither of the starstruck lovers would expect.

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