held

The house was dark.  We knock on the door and no one answers.  Turn our backs, walk back to the car, as my eyes catch a sliver of light as the same door opens and she sticks her head out.  Looking for us.  Inviting us in.

I hear their voices.  Upstairs in the darkness.  I see the tiredness in her face, sharpened by shadows.  I turn and literally crawl up the stairs, finding his old, dark face halfway up.  I open my arms and he throws himself into them, prying himself away only to go get the other two.

There is nothing in this world, which can compare to a sleepy boy.  Eight or twenty-five years old, no matter.  He appears at the top of the steps, eyes half closed, warm from napping.  He mutters something in a voice still choked with sleep and collapses into my lap.  Arms around my neck, face on my shoulder, he keeps murmuring as I rub his back.

There we were.  The five of us.  More family than I've known in quite some time.  Sinking after a long, cold day.  After so many days in a row, which have felt like defeat.  There we were, clinging to one another, because love has found a permanent home in our hearts.  We belong to each other.

I sit there, in a brief moment which feels like eternity, holding my small one.  Wishing two things, simultaneously.

First, that one day I would have my own.  My own child, son.  Who I would not have to put down, but could rock to sleep at night.  Who would share my name.

Second, that someone would hold me this way.