After exploring writing a piece that uses only dialogue in Episode 5, Hana pushes Ana even further by challenging her to write a fiction piece that mixes dialogue and expository text. Ana - ever ready for the challenge, finds herself writing an emotionally laden conversation between two people working through a tense exchange. Ana surprises herself with how easily she was able to work in some of her own experiences with allowing emotional acceptance and finds that dialogue doesn't have to be spoken to be heard.

Originally recorded on September 20, 2020

She sat down. It was an intentional sit. Slowly lowering herself to the cushioned chair, prim, poised, and ready. Her heart kept beat. A waltz. 1-2-3, 1-2-3. The steady rhythm calmed her. In her mind she imagined conductor’s hands, baton flying through the air holding pace, keeping steady, leading with ease while orchestrating the conversation at hand.

Firmly seated, she raised her eyes across the room to him. There he sat eyes aglow. Waiting. For what? For the baton to drop? For the still air in the stifling room to suddenly shift, a ghost of a breeze wafting as if on cue to begin the inevitable?

Her heart ached. Still pounding with the dance, counting, pulsing, whooshing blood in and out, up and down. He seemed so far away even if it was only several feet, it felt like miles. Miles of distance, untouchable.

“I’m not afraid.” She stated. Only her lips moved, her eyes locked into his. He didn’t move or react. In his silence there seemed to be a placid allowing, as if he knew exactly what she was about to say and he agreed.

He breathed in deeply, letting the breath expand his chest, his eyes not moving from hers.

He spoke now after with the last few beats of exhale. “I might be.”

She was not surprised by this response. His body posture gave the false impression of utter calm, yet his eyes shone with such intensity it seemed as if the emotion might burst forth in a flash of light and fear. Instinctively she wanted to reach out and touch his cheek as if to comfort a child. Her hand didn’t move. Nor did her body. The space between them had become far too great, far too expansive for such a singular journey.

Sensing her inner conflict he offered reassurance. “I can hold this. I can bear it.”

“What if I can’t?” She asked, eyes near to tears. Her barely held back grief had begun to leak out, tearing at the seams with the pressure of holding in it. Holding it down. Keeping it close. “I’m scared I’m losing. Losing this game of pretending it’s all ok. I’m wavering.”

At this he smiled slightly. The smile spoke of understanding and immense love. He knew only too well that sense of slipping and of losing. It was his turn to feel the urge of bridging the echoing distance between them. To take her in and bring her gently to his heart so she could hear the waltz beating consistently within his own chest. The same rhythm. The same song. The same desire.

After several measures he finally spoke. It came out in a heartbreaking whisper and floated towards her with fierce tenderness. Yet no words actually escaped his lips. It was the very essence of his meaning and emotion that transmitted instantly into her core and she knew without knowing the message he needed to send.

A mutual acceptance filled their void and held the space within.