“It’s about four.”
“Fuck, I slept all day,” she groans.
“Are you okay? Are you sick?”
“Not in the physical sense.”
She rolls over to face me but closes her eyes once more.
“What’s wrong?” I press, trying to get some answers. “I’ve been worried about you.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You don’t need to be sorry, but I just want to make sure you’re okay.”
It takes a minute for a response, and when it comes, it’s just, “I don’t know.”
“Can I get you anything?” I ask.
“No. I think I just want to sleep.”
I’m tempted to stay here and do whatever I can to make her feel better, but I don’t think hovering over her is going to do any good. So, I leave her in the capable hands–or paws–of Mia, and I leave her be.
To keep myself occupied, I get dinner going. I opt for chili since it’s something comforting and relatively easy. As I add all the ingredients to the pot, I think about Jo.
I know depression when I see it. After my brother and dad died, that was me. I wanted to do nothing but stay in bed. No matter how much I slept, it never felt like enough. I didn’t want to face the world or any of my problems in it. I just wanted to be left alone to process things my own way.
I figure I can do the same for Jo. I’m not sure exactly what has got her down, but I’ll be here when–or if–she wants to tell me. Knowing Jo, she might never want to actually divulge what’s wrong. I just need to be okay with that.
When I went through my depression, my friends all tried to be there for me, but at the end of the day, I didn’t want to talk about it with any of them. I’m now realizing how hard it was for them to stand by and do nothing because that’s exactly how I feel right now.
After I get dinner going, I think about sitting down to play my game, but my mind is too frazzled at the moment to even mess with it. I try some TV, but I don’t want to deal with the noise. Finally, I end up pulling out the book I’ve been reading. Although it takes reading the same page about five times to grab my interest, soon enough, I’m hooked enough to get lost in for a while.
A couple hours pass when I hear the bedroom door creek. Mia comes out, and I assume she is just coming to finally eat her dinner, but moments later, Jo appears.
“Hey, beautiful,” I greet.
She walks over to where I am on the couch. I put down the book so that she can climb in my lap.
“Hi,” she murmurs.
“Did you sleep okay?”
“Yeah, I was out.”
I hold her for a few minutes, neither of us saying anything but just taking in the moment. I don’t want to push her, so I decide silence is the best option.
When it’s broken, she’s the first to speak. “I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what?”
“For getting in my own head, passing out all day, and then ignoring you even after you got home from work. I just had a shitty day.”
“Jo, you don’t have to be sorry. I’m not going to get mad at you for having a sad day.”
“You’d be the first guy I dated who didn’t feel that way.”
“Hey, look at me,” I say. When she does, I go on. “Look, I don’t know what’s going on, and you don’t have to tell me. I know what it feels like to want to shut out the world. Just know that I’m here for you–whatever you need.”
