Narrative

"So, what is this?"

He runs his fingers over the small scar at the dip in my back, can't be longer than four inches long. The smooth landscape of skin interrupted by leftover healing. I stop typing on the laptop and the absence of the tapping makes this silence stiff with hesitation. I don't know what to say. In my head the film starts to play and I don't want to watch this movie again. 

Maybe he can taste the torment when he kisses me because 

"Never mind, it's not that big of a deal if you don't want to talk about it."

Doesn’t seem like the words he really wants to say. The bed creaks relief when he slumps out from the covers and into the hallway. The quiet thunder of his socked footsteps tells me he went to the kitchen. Then the bathroom. I just lean against the bed, still sitting on the floor of his bedroom. I am anchored to the same spot for an eternity, it seems, with nothing but my own breath to keep me company. He gave all this to me, a place where I am allowed to slump and succumb to the past. 

I get up so fast, I slip on the worn carpet. Hurdling down the short hallway, I walk into the living space. The room is bare all but for the TV, floor cushions, and this coffee table we found together in someone’s garbage pile at the end of a driveway. When we found it, it was three in the morning and we were on our way home. Astonished at all the dark windows, I breathed "I forgot most people are asleep at three AM." He only scoffed in reply.  But since then, I kind of came to cherish the small table. It was a treasure of sorts, for me.

I found him in one of the floor cushions, eating Lucky Charms out of yesterday's bowl and spoon with a glass of pulpy orange juice. 

"I hate pulp." I said plainly

"You don't have to drink it." he replied with a mouth full of cereal. 

"The texture throws me off the whole 'it's a liquid' thing." Adding a quick, sarcastic hand gesture for emphasis.

I can taste the salty hesitation in my mouth again. "You know, when I was younger, I was really sick. They couldn't figure out what was wrong with me."

He had stopped chewing his soggy cereal now. He put the bowl and spoon on my coffee table, readjusted his sitting position, so as now to face me. I looked at his face, I had heard him shave earlier in the bathroom, but he still had some stubble on his chin. He carried heavy bags under his eyes from all the places he'd been, he knew how to pack light now, but regrets are heavy weights to carry. His eyes were hard to see through. They were reflective and protecting all his secret regrets he'd never let anyone know, some nights he even denied himself the luxury. But he held my trembling hand with certainty and understanding. 

"They tried every test in the book. Well, first though, they did all the common procedures. Checked my blood, my heritage, family history, common problems with kids my age. They could not figure out what it was. I had lost all this weight fighting whatever it was, I didn't have much of an immune system to begin with, honestly. But I would spend days at the hospital, lying in that bed. I was covered in white day in and day out. I was suffocating and going through people withdrawal. People visit faithfully at first, they do. But you get admitted so many times, tell people you're sick with something so many times, and the visits start to wither out." 

I had to stop because I was getting really upset. Remembering how lonely and frustrated I was, I was reliving those feelings. The only thing I had at the time to keep me occupied was daytime television and the occasional nurse. My mom stopped calling me at one point, I think it was after a week with no phone calls that I realized she'd abandoned me. It wasn't that much of a surprise, but the shock was bigger than I had anticipated. I cried so much my unobservant doctor at the time noticed the next day at check-ups. 

Tears were spilling now and he pulled me into his lap, I fit perfectly. I was having a bit of a fit, to be honest. I had cried hard enough I was getting the hiccups, but I tried to breath smooth.

"Eventually, we figured out I had a major infection in my lower spinal cord. I had to get it surgically removed. I went under at 4 AM. When they wheeled me through the halls, my heart wouldn't slow down. I was lying on my stomach, but I propped myself up on my elbows. We passed room after room, I hadn't expected there to be so many sick people in one place, or for all of them to be asleep at 3 AM, I was always awake and staring at the ceiling at this time."

When I looked back at his face, in his eyes, they weren't so reflective; they were just soft and teary. I kissed him back just as softly.

These days, I didn't spend my three AM's alone anymore.