Dreams

The rabbit had dreams.

Not little dreams, but the kind that stretched far beyond the horizon. Dreams of building something that mattered. Of finding a place where it belonged. Of being loved without having to earn it. Of waking up excited for tomorrow instead of frightened by it.

The rabbit believed that if it just kept running, those dreams would eventually become real.

So it ran.

It worked harder than it should have. It chased success, thinking it would bring peace. It chased money, thinking it would bring freedom. It chased people, hoping one of them would finally choose the rabbit in the way the rabbit had always chosen everyone else.

Every dream felt just close enough to keep going.

But somehow, every time the rabbit reached where it thought happiness would be, it found another hill instead.

The dreams moved further away.

The rabbit became older.

And quieter.

Sometimes the rabbit wonders if dreams are dangerous things. They give hope to a heart that has already carried too much. They whisper, "Just a little further," even when the rabbit's legs are shaking.

The hardest part is not that the dreams did not happen.

It is that the rabbit truly believed they would.

The rabbit imagined a different life so many times that it almost feels like a memory instead of a fantasy. A home full of laughter. A person who looked at the rabbit with gentle eyes. Children running through the garden. Growing old beside someone who never made the rabbit question whether it was enough.

The rabbit can see that life so clearly.

It just cannot seem to reach it.

Sometimes the rabbit catches itself smiling at a future that probably will never arrive. It quickly looks away, embarrassed by its own hope.

Hope has become something the rabbit hides.

Because every dream that stays a dream leaves a small crack in the heart.

Enough cracks, and even hope begins to leak away.

Still...

There is a stubborn little part of the rabbit that refuses to die.

It is bruised. It is exhausted. It no longer speaks very loudly.

But every now and then, it whispers,

"Maybe tomorrow."

The rabbit has learned not to trust that whisper anymore.

But it still listens.