All the bruised lives, searching hearts...Everyone wants a love story but few will risk what it takes to live one.

Connecting with someone is not necessarily a bond with a significant other, or even a friend, but can be the indefinable - perhaps the rarest and most precious thing in life to find at all.

There is the purity of love, harmonious in every way, but not meant for a lifetime, and then there is the steady love of commitment - no less real but completely different. She had both.

Even "meant to be" takes work.

People change us. It is a rare, if not an impossible occurrence, that we come out of relationships unscathed. In our dealings with people we take something with us and we leave something behind. Some people are haunted more than others, either by the sweet perfume of another or the stink of regret.

There was once a spirited feral mustang broken in by her stern rider. It was a harmonious relationship for the most part but, like any relationship, she tested the boundaries he placed on her and threw him...Would the rider, having suffered his own wound, retaliate, discipline or forgive?

She is playing a game that she doesn't want to play, but can't seem to quit. As a player she wishes to see how the game concludes, but she also wishes the other player would retreat. She wants to win after-all and she makes for a sore loser, but her combatant uses his moves to keep her off-guard and primed for his advance. Should she block him, outmaneuver him, or just play dead until his back is turned? Isn't the last the way of the female?

If they were there for you when you had nothing, they are the ones worth having now. If they only notice you because of what you have gained, are they worth having at all?

If there had once been a chance and there had once been love, then it will still be there in spite of time and obstacles. If you can get past that, you can get past a lot.