A Familiar Stranger

When he opened the door, all I saw was his silhouette. He was big, big enough that I wasn't sure whether he was truly filling out the door or whether it was just my imagination making him that big. Imposing and intimidating, right up until the point where he stepped out into the light with a bemused grin on his face.

"Well then?" he asked, "Are you going to stand out on the sidewalk all day?"

Lucas Powell was nothing like I'd remembered. I'd remembered a big man, a powerful man, but a man gone to seed a little. A man a little stooped by the years, a little aged beyond the time he'd spent on this earth even. I'd remembered a man with narrow, judgmental eyes and little patience and that personality was reflected in every part of him.

But this man was not that man, and yet seeing him now I knew it was my memory that was wrong.

He was still the same Lucas. Tall and broad shouldered and strong. He had the kind of build, the kind of muscle, that was put on from hard physical labor rather than built in the gym. This rigid solidity to him that was thickly corded and tightly knotted. Like an old oak, hard enough that you know you could push with all your might and never move him an inch.

But his attitude stood in contrast to his body. The grin on his face was calmly measured and reassuring and there was a mischievous twinkle in his eyes that said he could be a grand co-conspirator if the mood struck him.

With greying hair that was long enough to just brush against his shoulders and a rough stubble of a beard on his chin, he was almost disheveled but it was a careful kind of disarray. It was a deliberate kind, not so much careless as it was beyond caring, a line that was only too hard to clearly define.

He had lines in his forehead, but more crinkles around his eyes from smiling. But if you traced them clearly enough you could see the familiar pattern and see the expression in him. You could see what he looked like mad. You could see what he looked like determined. You could see his past, with all of its weighty history.

Lucas stepped forward a little, expectant. The footfalls of his boots sounded against the wood of his porch and I glanced down, noticing that they were steel toed workboots in spite of the fact that he had no where to go. A pair of jeans and a button down work shirt on top, the first few buttons undone, and it was all loose around him but you could see from the way he moved and the way that his body pressed at the fabric that he was built, hard and lean and powerful all at the same time.

And I realized, in a heartbeat of an instant, that I'd lived for years in this house with this man and had no idea who he was. I didn't know what he thought and I didn't know what he did. I didn't know how he made his money or why or how he had retired younger than anyone else I'd ever known.

Yes, the man standing in front of me was a mystery to me. And I was about to walk into his home.

"Well?" he asked again, shocking me out of my petrified silence.

"Lucas?" I asked unnecessarily, "I'm Emily."

His smile broadened and his voice came out in a gravelly tumble that sounded a little like a drawl, "I mean I could guess. It's been a while since I saw you but I recognized you all the same."

"We've met before?" I asked him.

He gave a little chuckle and ran his hand back through his hair. It cascaded in grey waves through his fingers, falling into his eyes a little. Lucas was stepping forward during all of this, closing the distance between us so he didn't have to yell quite as loud but up close and softer his voice was no less gravelly but somehow leagues more comforting. It was softened mossy rocks tumbling around me rather than an avalanche, but it might just have been burying me all the same.

"Oh it's been years now," he reminisced, "Went back to the old town more than a while ago. You were a little thing back then full of fire and fury. Didn't like to be told what to do. Didn't like to be told where to be. Trust that won't be a problem now, in my home?"

I shook my head, feeling a little lightheaded, "No Sir. I'll be good."

"Relax, Emily," he laughed and he turned back to the house, taking one step before looking back over his shoulder at me, "I'm just poking fun. Why don't you come inside and we'll get you settled?"

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