When she’s fallen asleep, her soft snores act as a reminder that she’s still here, anchoring my fractured pieces into place. I slip out of bed and walk on silent feet to her door. It creaks open, a thin stream of light slicing across her face. Her lashes flutter, lids lifting as her eyes meet mine.
“I’m sorry, sweetheart. I didn’t mean to wake you,” I whisper. “Go back to sleep.”
“Stay with me?” she asks, and I have to fight myself, knowing I’m no good to her like this.
“I’m just hopping in the shower. I’ll be right back.”
“Promise?” she asks, letting herself be vulnerable with me in a way I’ve never seen before, her walls washed away with her tears—at least for now.
“I promise.”
She nods, rolling onto her other side, slinging a leg over her body pillow and tugging it close as she settles back down, her eyes drifting shut.
I go through the motions of feeding myself, sending a quick message to Mum to explain why I missed the girls’ call earlier. Her reply is immediate, reminding me to take care of myself, too, likely remembering all the times I hadn’t.
I chug a glass of water, grab a pair of joggers, and slip into the bathroom, tugging my clothes off and stepping into the hot stream. The water is scalding, painful in a way that lets me feel something other than the gnawing emptiness I’ve given myself over to in an effort to preserve my sanity—while Adhira did what I’ve asked her to do all along: let me in.
I stand there far too long, the water eventually growing cold. I drop to my knees on the smooth acrylic beneath me, the sting of pain no match for the flood of emotion ripping through me, my heart beating in an unsteady rhythm. My sobs are drowned out by the pelting water slapping against the hard floor, and I fall forward onto my palms, getting lost beneath the weight of my anguish.
She could die.
She could leave me here, walking this earth with nothing but the memory of her to carry me through, dragging me back to a world where I’d felt so alone in a room full of people.
It’s selfish.
These thoughts are not mine to dwell on, but they’re real and raw, and I can’t contain them. Better to release them here than to carry them with me, tainting whatever time we might have left.
But what if she lives?
The better, more optimistic part of my brain battles to breathe life back into me, centring my thoughts around showing her how she makes me feel, on bettering her life as she has mine, on giving her the strength to keep fighting when her stores have run dry.
For Adhira Shah, I’ll make every moment from here on out worthy of her time, and I’ll show her how to do it without getting lost in the fray myself.
Time ticks by, my chest heaving, chills racing through me, goose bumps littering my skin, until my tears run dry. Only once I know I don’t have a single tear left in my body do I push myself up, shut off the water, and get ready for bed, returning to Adhira as promised.
CHAPTER
THIRTY-SIX
I’ve runmyself ragged in an attempt to drown out the misery that feeds me at the thought of watching Adhira become a shell of herself like Mum had.
It had only taken a five-kilometre run to wear me down, which is no surprise after waking to Adhira’s muffled cries and panting from nightmares. Still, I’m thankful I was there, and that she let me be. That she’sbeenletting me all week.
Our conversation the morning after she received that awful news keeps racing through my thoughts. The steadiness of her voice when she’d explained what Dr. Alvarez said provides the hope I needed to latch on to. There are too many factors at play to know if that hope is misplaced or not, but I learned a long time ago that if I want joy to fill my life, I have to keep searching for that shred of light in the dark. Otherwise, despair might swallow me whole.
“I guess we’ll have to get more crosswords for Archie since he won’t be expecting me at my next infusion,” Adhira muses. She’s seated beside me with her legs tucked under her, my sweatshirt swallowing her frame as she polishes a small crystal with fine-grain sandpaper and a cloth.
“I’ll make a note of it,” I say with a low chuckle, basking in the glow of her improved mood.
“Do you have any plans tonight?” she asks. “You could finally take me to that pottery studio you seem to love so much.”
My heart squeezes. “I’d love that,” I tell her, just as my pocket vibrates with a string of messages. My brow furrows, theThigh Daddiesgroup chat running rampant.
Jelani
There’s an art festival this weekend. You blokes wanna go tonight?
Rafael
