I walked through the woods, bracing myself against the wind howling through the trees that, as tall and old as they were, swayed and creaked, threatening to tumble over me as I came right alongside them. Not that it mattered if they did. I was done. They could crumple me under their combined weights for all I cared.
The rain continued to pour, the cold icy drops stinging like needles of ice upon my skin. Above, lightning streaked across the sky with the crackle of thunder, sending a shudder down my spine as I plodded through the undergrowth, my boots ankle deep in earth at every step I took.
Exhaustion soon took over and I had to stop. I couldn’t bear to walk on any further, although my mind kept screaming at me to carry on. I bent down, leaning my hands against my knees as I caught my breath. It was in that moment when my mind melted into a state of clarity and quite suddenly, my eyes welled up with tears. I had quietly attempted to dismiss it as the rain getting in my eyes at first, but I would only be lying to myself. Yes, I didn’t have the hood of my raincoat over my head, so technically whatever moisture that was clouding my eyes was quite possibly part rain, but there was a separate sensation, a gentle yet painful squeeze, that one could never deny feeling at the inner corners of one’s eyes that rain alone could never blamed for. And so I was forced to admit it: I was crying.
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