Solitude and The Long Road Evelyn's Path part 09

I should have mentioned it before, that summer of 2012 right before college ended Ellen and me broke up.

It wasn't a screaming match/I hate you-wish you'd go die in a fire-kind of break up, it was more a quiet ending as we both realized we wanted different things from our life partners.

I wanted a girlfriend that would be excited, rather than rather than terrified, about the prospect of tearing along the beach on raptor back chasing seagulls at sunset.

As for Ellen, well I was her rebound. It was three years in the making for her, but I was her rebound none the less.

With a promise to never forget one another, and to still have infrequent get together's near holidays and what, not we parted quietly and Ellen flew home for the summer.

I moved out not long after so as not to traumatize poor Sarah with who, or more likely, what, I'd bring home some nights for companionship. As I said in my last entry, that summer I was once again more animal than human, and experienced enough to be able write three more books.

Clear Waters and Strong Currents, the life of a Dolphin. I'd had a crazy amount of fun as a cetacean, especially after I learned female dolphins have their nipples inside their vagina's. The book was full of insights and solved mysteries for oceanographers, and I learned the difference in taste between several dozen kinds of raw fish.

My other work of note that summer was Tranquility and Blackberries, the life of a Bear. It was a hit among teenagers for some reason, likely because of my humorous stories of trying to obtain honey, and the time I accidentally stumbled onto the set of a horror movie being filmed 'on location.'

That fall Sarah began taking post-grad courses and Ellen accepted a part time job as a production assistant at the studio. She turned down full time, wanting to finish college first. I think she dated, but no-one serious that I knew of.

For my part, I lost myself more in the animal kingdom, spending holidays and later even the weekends, in the wild, finding acceptance and happiness in ways I never could as a human. I admit I drifted away from Ellen and Sarah a fair bit during that time, but they were too busy to really notice, their own lives keeping them preoccupied.

I'd (barely) gotten my Bachelor's at the end of college in 2013, after only three years. Then entered grad school, eventually working at the museum of natural history part time, the pay out from my books making them too lucrative to stop working on.

That and the call of the wild blossomed in my heart. Every trip into the wilderness took me further from my ties to humanity. The strangest part was I barely even noticed, the reality of having more in common with the wilds than civilization just became the way it was. I bounced around a lot in those days romance wise, never really setting down with anyone, or thing, for long, always chasing after my 'perfect match'

Ellen too graduated in June of 2013, and moved to full time as a producer at Vocal Dynamics. She'd came a long way, and no longer hid herself, through she still dressed tastefully and professionally.

When I saw her briefly during that time, she talked about musicians and singers being mostly a bunch of babies who just want the payday, but she loved it when she found one willing to work. She soon gained a reputation which let her begin choosing clients, and that enabled her to start kicking metaphorical asses.

Katrina Yamato's second album was hailed by critics as a masterpiece... and completely flopped. Go figure. Some people hated her because she was Delta. Some hated her because she was a lesbian. Some hated her because she was what was 'in' right then.

Sarah earned her Masters at the end of a fourth full year of study. She spent two months working full time as a civilian administrative worker until the next round of training began at Quantico. At 22, she was four years younger than the minimum age, but she had a sponsor. She graduated, and was a probationary Special Agent by the early part of 2014.

That casual friend Ellen made love to a couple years ago began to develop into something more serious. become more permanent. But it was a slow process I watched from a distance, my own life a blur of animalistic pleasure and the continual struggle to keep my day job. In the meantime Ellen still occasionally dated but mostly focused on her career, which she seemed love more and more every day.

My part time job at the museum kept me pretty busy during the times I was forced to spend as a human. releasing several more books in my series, and I even did a small stint on a kids nature show, which turned out to be a complete dud given most of my experiences were either too adult to talk about on a kids show, or only of interest to scientists and more mature nature lovers.

Sarah by that time was a real fed. Wore a suit, carried a gun. I didn't see much of her for a long while after that, her circles were no longer my own. After her dad died in March of 2015, Sarah seemed to pretty much check out. She lost her job, and ended up working night-shift security for several months, and I had my own challenges with museum galas and book signings to occupy what little time I still spent on two legs.

It was that summer, after I released the first of my more explicit novels public opinion turned against me. (Who knew the sex lives of otters would be so off putting?) As I mentioned earlier, the more I was disconnected from humanity the more I became candid and 'tell all' in the sexual areas of my writing, as I just ceased to care how people would react. Eventually it lead to my termination of employment at the museum, and scandalous tabloid articles as time went by. These days my books are not widely read, but have quite a loyal cult following and are kept in stock by a small specialty publisher.

Ellen finally moved in with her girlfriend, Stella Lancaster, shortly after Thanksgiving of that year. The two got engaged not more than a few weeks later.

That was the point where I finally realized why Ellen was being so coy about the friend she was seeing. Stella Lancaster... Well... I'd read the articles. She had a hell of a rep. Sort of the polar opposite of Ellen. The tabloids called her 'more Paris than Paris.' Her exploits nearly made my books look tame by comparison. Nearly.

I was still pretty close friends with Ellen, even with weeks in the wild my usual home address, so when I found the invitation to her wedding in my over stuffed mail box, I didn't think twice before attending.

It was a much smaller affair than I expected, about a hundred guests, on a beachfront north of San Diego, June of 2017. It was a lovely seaside wedding. I saw Sarah there, but only briefly. She watched the ceremony, and a while later kissed Ellen and slipped away.

Ellen and Stella looked so happy, I remember feeling slightly jealous, and more than a little lonely being a single woman at a wedding party. I tried harder after that for a short while to find someone among the human race that would accept me for who, and what I was, but I didn't have much luck; although the restraining order was an unwelcome reminder of the challenges of human interaction by animals such as myself.

It was a few weeks after her wedding, when my publisher came to me with an idea for my next series of books I would embark upon a journey to far off reaches, and find myself faced with a painful reminder of my lingering humanity, and discover how much of a monster I could become.