Pandemic panic.
 Strolling downtown.
 Not the same.

 Virtual friends, virtual meetings, 
 virtual hugs, virtual love,
 from six feet away.
 

This week’s installment of Russell and Hanna’s adventures. Get the whole story. The book available at http://www.amazon.com/author/edwardlehner

I pondered that last remark, did she mean music wise or something else? I didn’t pursue it. There was so much going on in my mind as it was. I was trying to figure out what the hell I was really doing. My life as I knew it was disappearing and I wasn’t too sure of it all. I didn’t know if I’d ever go back to my position with the bank. I had a clearer picture of Dana and why she left me. Then there were my parents., I felt guilty about what I was doing because I knew they worried and disapproved, thinking they must have somehow failed in raising me.

Then, Hanna, what she was starting to mean to me, the sexual frustration I was feeling. I liked her free spirit, but how long until she found some other travel companion that was more interesting or better musician. I didn’t see me as a prize for someone like her.

“Hey, in there, are you still here, still with me? Come on back now, Russell, I’m looking for you. I’m hungry. Let’s eat something.”

I blinked my eyes and looked at her smiling face, her head cocked, twirling a strand of hair. I melted. “I’m sorry. I was just lost in my thoughts.”

“Care to share?”

“It’s just, I don’t know . . . I’m having a hard time, Hanna. I’m scared.”

“Scared of what?”

“I’m afraid of what I’m doing, afraid of where I’m going, and . . . and, well, I’m afraid of what I’ll do when you’re gone.”

“What?! When I’m gone?! I’m not planning on going anywhere.”

“You will, when you get tired of me. Dammit, Hanna, I’m scared. I don’t want to go back to Iowa. It’ll never be the same. I don’t know where I’m going. My parents think I’m nuts, my sister probably does too. You’re the only person in the world who I care about and when this is over, what will we have. Is there any future for us? And I can’t keep on sleeping with you snuggled in next to me every night. It’s driving me nuts . . . I don’t know what it’s like for women, but for me . . . I’m just god-dammed sexually frustrated!” My voice had risen and I was almost shouting.

 Surrounded by books.
 Nothing to read.
 Mountain snow means summer water.

 Days grow longer.
 Blackbirds haunt the trees.
 Follow the light.