And as I peer down into the coffin, it morphs. I expect to see Badal with his short-cropped black hair, closed eyes, and peaceful expression, but it isn’t his face staring back at me.
It’smine.
My eyes burst open, ragged breaths tearing from my chest. A slick sheen of sweat coats my skin, making the sheets cling in ways that make my body revolt.
It’s no secret that chemo sucks, but I’m consumed by ire nonetheless, my frustrations only mounting because it’s my doing. I had no business counting on years of playing football to lessen the impact today’s infusion had on my body. And as I lie here in my queen-sized bed, surrounded by crystals, my favourite orca LEGO sets, and other items that would usually bring me comfort, I relinquish myself to the fact that I may never be truly comfortable again. Not in body or mind. They’re small tokens of order in a world falling apart, but even they can’t save me tonight.
I remain in a foetal position with a headache that won’t leave me despite my many efforts, curling myself around my body pillow and begging the nausea to lessen, knowing it’s the dreaded optimism that failed me.
This is precisely why I always say to remain cautiously optimistic and decidedly realistic.Nothing good has ever come from overwhelming positivity.
This is a fact that has been proven to me time and again. My temples throb as I remember last month: I’d gone to the cardiologist for an echocardiogram, certain that the many workups I’d had after losing Badal to a hereditary heart condition would have revealed anything I’d need to worry about. I was confident that my heart was in tip-top shape and everything would be fine.
Alas, like so many other things lately, I was dead-bloody-wrong.
Not about my heart. That I managed to guess right about. My ticker is still ticking away, how it should. Small blessings, and all that.
However, the fate that had befallen me was far greater. My skin prickles at the memory of my heart pounding erratically as the tech pressed the cold gel-covered probe to my chest, a fight-or-flight response from hell erupting inside me like a volcano as I thrashed against her, dry-heaving with panic.
“Are you alright, dear? Your pulse is flying,”the tech had said, her wide eyes doing nothing to calm my racing heart as it continued to ramp up the pace.
“I'm—y-yes, I'm fine, just a little nervous is a-all,”I'd told her. I'd clenched my eyes shut, my hands balling into fists as I sucked in a breath for four, held for four, and out for six.
It did fuck-all to stop me from spiralling though. Behind my closed lids, a motion-picture film of the day I'd undergone that exact diagnostic test played on repeat, featuring Mummy's tear-filled eyes and Papa’s pleas for me to calm down. His arms had been wrapped tightly around me, pinning mine to my sides as the ultrasound tech wrestled through the thirty-minute test that felt like hours.
Nothing prepares you more for a cancer diagnosis than childhood post-traumatic stress disorder inflicted by the sudden loss of your other half.Or so I’d thought.
I groan with lethargy, tucking my body pillow between my legs and pressing my cheek into the cool satin pillowcase, aching for a reprieve from the discomfort spilling through me. My mouth feels dry, my eyelids heavy as lead, and even breathing takes effort.
That stillness is disturbed by the slam of the front door as my new flatmate, Elijah, comes barging into our now-shared flat. The noise fractures the fragile quiet I’ve built. My fingers twitch with the desire to strangle him, fury lighting my blood in a violent assault on my senses. Luckily for him, I’m too weak to act on them.
“Hey, Adhira,” he calls through the panelled door, his voice a low, unsteady whisper. “I just wanted to introduce myself.”
His voice is too gentle for the day I’ve had. The sound doesn’t belong in this room full of ache.
I moan in frustration, pulling my pillow over my face. I bite my tongue to keep from screaming into it and instead silently beg him to go away.
Another knock, this one softer. I hold my breath as if he can hear it through the door. A few moments later, and I’m met with the sweet sound of his retreating footsteps. I sigh in relief, but it’s short-lived.
I hear him opening and closing doors, not slamming them this time, but maddening all the same. An hour passes before the sound of his footsteps halts, and I hear the front door lock, my body sagging further into my mattress.
Bloody hell, I hope he’s buggered off for the night.
CHAPTER
FIVE
I gulpdown a cool glass of water, placing it top-down in the large metal sink, careful not to muck up the pristine marble kitchen counters out of fear of further earning Adhira’s wrath.
It’s strange and unsettling moving into a flat with someone I’ve never met, especially when it’s someone who has no apparent interest in meeting me. I know she’s home. I could hear her tossing and turning on the other side of the door, making my chest cave in.
Who’d have thought that I could be in such close proximity to another living, breathing person and somehow feel even more alone than I had before? Certainly not me. Not when I’ve been nothing but lonely these last several years, even with people constantly needing me, tugging me in every direction. I’ve been so utterly, miserablyalone.
Despite all of this uncertainty, I can still see the light. I’m hopeful and excited for the future, even more so after checking out the pottery studio located along the street beneath my new flat. For the first time in forever, it feels like something is truly meant for me, and me alone, without the pretence of improving someone else’s life. The cold block of despair lodged behind my breastbone melts with the feeling.
It’skismet, as Mum would say.
I finish putting my things away, careful not to utilise more than half of the cabinet space while following my new roomie’s clear instructions for where my things belong in the labelled cabinets.
