Author's Note: This is the first in a series of related one-shots I'm writing for Keane's album Hopes and Fears. :) One story for every song! To see the complete to-come repertoire, please go to "coming soon" on my profile. :D Feedback is appreciated - I'm soooo not used to third-person...

Somewhere Only We Know

Flor immediately regretted leaving her shoes behind when she saw the winter-eaten field sprawled out before her. She took a hesitant step forward and winced at the cracking sound of the frost beneath her bare feet.

“Florence!” Her mother’s voice echoed eerily through the morning fog. Luckily, Flor had already rounded the hill that began just a few feet from her back door, so Mona had no chance of seeing her daughter if she stayed close to the house. Flor picked up her pace. No doubt, her mother had found the shoes she’d left behind the umbrella stand and was now searching frantically—but there was no way Florence was going to wear those steel-toed boots. Not now. Not when everything was at stake anyway.

She reveled in how free she felt, not having to drag her feet. She desperately wished she could feel the jab of frozen grass blades cutting into her soles, or simply of the ice leaving cold dew around her ankles. But there was nothing. She felt the pressure and heard the crunch, but nothing more. Flor zipped up her hoodie to under her chin and trumped on, half-wishing the rest of her body were numb, too.

It was only an eighth of a mile down to the creek. The water gurgled through a dead log in the middle of the stream and then splashed down like a mini waterfall. Flor couldn’t help but smile; it was so simple, and yet so beautiful. Maybe the most beautiful thing about it, she mused, was that the log had been sitting there rotting since she was a kid—and yet it stayed the same. It never snapped in two and floated off. This was a place frozen in time, unknown to anyone but her and Josiah.

Josiah. He said he’d meet her here.

She pushed on the log a few times with her foot before spinning around and sitting gingerly on its creaking bark. It felt sturdy enough, though the seat of her jeans was soaked through. Flor dipped her toes into the water and marveled at the odd feeling of not feeling anything. Losing sensation in her hands and feet was an entirely new concept to her—though she had been diagnosed for over a year and suffered through the clunky boots, she still gasped when she took the boots off, wiggled her toes, and saw they were bruised black and blue from the day’s shuffling, jumping, and bumping.

She was glad to be rid of the boots, even if she’d gasp later at the gashes littering the balls of her feet. It wasn’t like she didn’t know they were there. She’d bandage them tonight so they wouldn’t get infected and face her mother in the morning.

Flor heard his growls before Josiah even came into view. He pulled back a branch and swatted a cobweb before he finally emerged from the messy woods that lined his side of the creek. “Florence?” he called out. Flor noted the touch of disbelief in his voice.

“It’s me,” she called back brightly. Josiah’s tense, angular face relaxed into no expression. She patted the space on the log beside her, and he hesitantly sat down.

“You look…”

Flor filled in the blank. “Different?”

“Yeah, I’ll say.”

They locked eyes for a moment, then glanced away. Flor looked down at the creek again. She’d never felt so uncomfortable, feeling his body heat through their almost-touching legs. You have to stop thinking about him like that. Come on, now. “A lot is different.”

“You still living with your mom?”

“Yeah.” She swallowed. “For now, you know. I’m thinking about renting an apartment with someone, closer to the city? Getting a job.”

“You look really good, you know that?”

Flor blushed and looked away. She’d always found it funny how her slope down to the creek was nothing but tundra, while Josiah’s path required a machete and a few Sherpa guides to navigate. She turned back to face him, smiling again. “I’d better, after losing one-hundred and forty pounds.”

“One-hundred forty—Flor, are you serious?” He looked amazed.

“Well, you know. Diabetes is a bit of an eye-opener.”

“You were diagnosed years ago, though. What finally made you do it?”

His dark eyes were wide and wondering. They hadn’t seen each other in so long, just over two years now. “You know, this place used to be such a simple thing. We could come here and do nothing, say nothing, and everything would be perfect just because it was. What happened to that, Josie?”

Josiah didn’t say anything; he just stared, a muscle in his jaw working as he ground his back teeth.

“I mean, now I sit here and I can’t feel the water when I dip in my toes. I just ripped my jeans, I’m pretty sure. I don’t even know who you are anymore. None of this would’ve happened when things were simple.”

“Florrie, nothing was ever simple. We were just oblivious.”

“Why can’t we go back to that?”

“I think that’s one of the most absolute truths in the world. You can never go back. Not really.”

“Think about what you could do, though,” Florence sighed wistfully “if you could.”

“I would have told Mom about Jason sooner.” Josiah wasn’t looking at her now—what, was he embarrassed? Shy? She’d known about his…his secret for two years now. She was over it. What was he afraid of?

“No, you wouldn’t’ve. Where would you have gone? Where are you going now?” Flor was sure he’d have no answer, and she’d have the perfect opening to throw him her proposition.

“To live with Jason, of course,” Josiah said without hesitation.

The wind picked up, forcing dead leaves to flurry around. A few landed in the stream and immediately caught on rocks or washed up on the bank, a few tattered edges still fluttering in the moving water. “Jason? The forty-four-year-old Jason?”

“My boyfriend Jason, yeah.”

“Look, I don’t mean to pry—I mean, it’s none of my business, but—”

“Yeah, it’s all true. But he’s a good guy, really. No one knows the whole story.”

“Josie, you called me yourself. Do you remember?”

“Yeah, I do—you hung up on me.”

“I’d just learned the news. You couldn’t’ve expected me to be A-OK, ready to solve your relationship problems when I hadn’t even known there’d been a relationship.” Neither of them spoke in raised voices, or huffed, aggravated breaths. It was the place. Something about it made their breathing even and their demeanors calm. They’d talked about everything here: divorces, break ups, when Josiah’s macaw Skittle died. Now, and Florence could hardly believe it, Josiah was gay and they were still calm.

“Yeah, I could’ve. It wasn’t easy for me to call you, you know. I could’ve called someone else.”

“You could’ve. But you didn’t.”

The leaves were still caught in the mud and on the rocks. They were soggy now, probably wouldn’t hold up for much longer, but they still clung, pressed their wet bodies to their anchors and prayed that no force of nature would make them move on.

“You know, that’s when I decided to change,” Flor whispered, looking up at the green light filtering through the springs on the otherwise barren trees. “When you told me. Because I knew, then, that there was no one to accept me as me anymore.”

“You had lots of friends. I don’t know what you’re talking about.” But she could see that he, too, was uncomfortable—he squirmed like a little boy waiting to speak to the principal and knowing he did something wrong.

“Josie. I mean…in that special way. When you love somebody.”

“I knew it.” There was a kind of triumph in Josiah’s voice, and he said it louder, with a laugh, “I knew it!”

“Yeah, you knew it.” Flor grinned. “So what?”

“Dang, Flor! I might’ve held off coming out of the closet if I’d seen what a babe you were. And, you know, knew that you loved me.” He winked at her and she slapped at him, laughing despite herself. “So after you knew I couldn’t love you back, you just…”

“Decided to give someone else the chance to be my ‘forever and always.’” She sighed. “Hasn’t happened yet, but I stay optimistic enough.”

“Hey, you’re still young. And you’re healthy now, right?”

“Actually, I…no. No, I’m not. I was diagnosed with peripheral neuropathy a year ago, right when I started dieting.”

“Is that bad?”

“My feet are numb. I can’t feel anything. You could drive a stake through them and I wouldn’t flinch, so long as I wasn’t watching.”

“But you look healthy now! I mean, maybe you’re a little pudgy still, but you’re doing great—”

“I’m not sure my body will ever fully recover, you know? Like you said. You can never go back. I’m damaged goods now, no matter how much I exercise or how well I eat.”

“Man. And they made it out like vegetables solved everything.”

Florence dipped her feet further and dug her toes into the sediment bottom, wishing she felt the earth beneath her feet. “You sounded so unhappy when you called.”

“I won’t lie to you, Flor—I was. But I’ve accepted it for what it is, you know?”

“Tell me about him.”

“You know pretty much everything.”

“Tell me what makes you stay with him, then.”

Josiah took a minute to answer. He opened his mouth a few times and made an “ah” sort of sound, about to start but failing to find the right words. Flor could tell he was floundering, but it was something that needed to be said. His hesitation gave her hope. “He’s the beginning. He’s the start. It all leads back to him, and I feel like if I leave him, it could be the end of everything. And, as screwed up as it all is, everything is so much better than it was, Florrie. Maybe I don’t love him anymore, but I love the freedom he gives me.”

Flor thought about her bare feet and how much trouble she’d have to go through bandaging them up when she got home. All for a few hours of toe wiggling and weightlessness.

She wasn’t sure it was worth it anymore.

“Think about this place, Josie. I’ve dreamt about it for years, and yet I’ve never come back here—I can’t, not without you beside me on this fallen tree. This is your beginning, not him.”

“It was here, you know, I discovered I was gay.” Josiah smiled, tilting his face up to the weak sunshine. “Or, accepted it, really. I sat by the river and it made me complete. I thought, out here, it doesn’t matter who I am or what I am. It just matters that I am.”

“We should run away together,” Flor said excitedly, seeing her chance. She hopped up from the log and brushed the back of her pants off. “We could rent an apartment, the two of us. No, listen!”

Josiah had turned his face back to the sunlight, closed his eyes serenely and smiled a little, like Flor was some cutesy girl with dreams too big to handle. His face jerked back to life, his mouth hanging open dumbly as he watched his old friend fume. “I’m serious!” Flor told him. “Your mom kicked you out and you have nowhere to go. If this place is your beginning, Josie, then I’m your beginning, too.”

“Us, rent an apartment together?” Josiah repeated.

“Yes. It’ll be perfect—you’ll see.”

“But…We hardly know each other, Florence. And you have medical needs I can’t be responsible for—“

“But I can be. Besides, I’m getting old and I need something to rely on—not physically; I’ve done everything I can and only God can help me now. But for everything else…you forget, Josie, but you’re my beginning, too.”

“I wish we could just stay here.” Josiah sighed wistfully and layed out on the log. Flor heard the creaking before Josiah did, so her warning shout only made the situation worse—instead of rolling off the log, he jumped and caused the tree to snap in half. Josiah fell in the water elbows-first and though Flor ran after the two log halves down the creek, trying to salvage their haven, the pieces reached the wider part of the river before she could wade far enough in. As she wound her way back up the bank, Josiah called to her, “I think it’s a sign!”

“Our place wants us to get out?”

“Either that or build a proper bench.”

Josiah and Florence linked sopping wet arms and began walking up the smooth side of the creek bank to Flor’s house. When they reached the edge of the ice-encrusted field, Flor let out a sigh—in three seconds, Josiah had her cradled in his arms and stumbled with her around the crest of the hill.

Florence couldn’t remember being happier about such a simple thing.