A Month to Love :prologue:

"I didn't wish to get heartbroken, so I hid my feelings. I was happy, for you gave me that smile…someday, when I walk with you in the cold morning mist, the shining road will stretch on forever; always."

-Aya Hiroshige, "The Shining Road"

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On a warm spring night, the sky was clear and the stars were bright with hardly a cloud floating in the darkness. The sun had set over two hours earlier before my eyes, painting the sky different pinks and purples. The colors made me think of several different things as they swirled about in the sky, both sad and happy things, but it made me reflect on what happened to me in the past. It was amazing to watch night come into view and to think how much time had passed by just by sitting and waiting, something I thought I would have never thought I would have the patience to do.

For me, patience had been one of the aspects of my life that I couldn't control. It was that, and love.

I had loved a hedgehog named Sonic for countless years, only to realize that it wasn't love at all, but more like a childish quick conclusion that would only lead me down a dangerous, heartbreaking road. After Sonic had saved me once from a villain, I thought that it meant we were destined to be lovers forever; someone who came to save me without any hesitation was a dream come true, and surely it meant he was my prince charming. So I chased Sonic around everywhere he went, and he only ran away from me, leaving me in the dust with his unmatched speed; it was his choice method of rejection.

Once I grew tired of running after him 24/7, my mind was flooded with groundbreaking thoughts. Perhaps he wasn't the one for me; maybe it was just a mistake to jump the gun and assume romance between us. I distanced myself from the blue hedgehog, but didn't tell anyone that I moved on. Soon enough, I went into a spiral of depression, never wanting to love again. I felt meaningless and hopeless, constantly kicking myself for falling into such a joke. Yet somehow I managed to look at Sonic and be alright with him there; I never once confronted him about what heartbreak and sadness he caused me. My heart denied his presence but my mind was still locked into our so-called "destiny".

Then Shadow came into the picture.

He was daring, mysterious, and quiet, not to mention strong and brave. He didn't consider himself a hero, but considering what he had done in the past for the planet said otherwise. Shadow was originally created as a cure for a diseased girl named Maria and was an alien-hedgehog hybrid. Shadow carried the body of a seventeen-year-old black hedgehog, but was truly ageless and immortal. He loved his human family aboard the Space Colony ARK, keeping them close and wanting only protection for them. But as soon as the military heard of Shadow's incredible power because of his alien genetics, soldiers invaded the ARK and his human family was killed, he narrowly escaping, leaving him to roam the world in despair. It was the saddest story I had ever heard in my life, second to the death of my own parents, and everyone thought that his seek of revenge for Maria's death would go on forever.

But when it came right down to it, he stopped the world from total destruction three times; once for defeating his prototype from crashing the ARK against the world and suffering amnesia for it, once for helping fight off Sonic's metal copy from taking over the planet, and once for defending the humans' reign on Earth from his alien creator, Black Doom. He sacrificed his life for everyone and whether he wanted to admit it or not, in all of our eyes, he was a hero. He was to me, at least.

Shadow impacted my life in more ways than one. He had unknowingly pulled me out of despair and showed me the way to hope and a chance at love once more. When I saw him come into our home one night, I remembered everything about him, and something in me clicked. My heart found its way to Shadow, and I followed him like a magnet until I had a particle of courage to summon up to say one word to him. I felt honored whenever he said something back; it was as if he were a god speaking to me. I was just an ordinary girl, after all. Just as I felt like I could have gotten close enough to him, something happened, and our connection was broken.

I felt empty once more and convinced myself that nothing would ever make me happy again. The only place I wanted to be was underneath the stars, the very stars that he showed me and sat with me under countless times. Cream, my best friend in the entire world, had a hard time keeping me happy, and I knew it. I felt bad for her, but I was helpless to do anything about it. I returned to the immortal sadness that would never leave me; I fell in love, for real that time, and it vanished from right under me. Every time I saw the bright moon, the very moon that Shadow helped save, I wanted to cry.  

I hugged my knees as a breeze caressed my pink quills. It was just a month ago that I had missed the chance to tell him of my feelings.