Where the Vows Go to Die

Previously

…The rain had stopped, and a weak sun was beginning to break through the clouds. I looked out the window, at the glistening leaves and the fresh, clean scent of the earth. It was a new beginning, a chance to wash away the old. But the question remained, a heavy question that settled in the pit of my stomach: could we rebuild on soil that had turned so barren? Could we find our way back to the echo of 'I do', or were the vows, once allowed to wither, destined to die a quiet, unlamented death? The answer, I knew, lay not in the past, but in the uncertain landscape of our future, a future I now had to confront with a raw, newly awakened understanding.