Behind those eyes, a battle rages. One that’s not fought overseas with guns and tanks, but one that wreaks havoc in the homeland with harshly spoken words and misguided beliefs.

One week is all we were supposed to share. One week as strangers. Yet you became so much more.

You were the echo in my storm.

All the little things you did differently irked me. I thought it meant we couldn’t get along, that there was no chance we’d work out. But when it came time for me to leave, you know what I figured out?

They were the faint call of home, lost on the wind and the roar of thunder. It was you calling me, hoping I’d hear you and find my way out of the dark that I had lost myself in when I shut off to survive.

You were my echo. My call back.

And damn it all if I didn’t find home in the end.