Midnight Day
"When we hold each other, in the darkness, it doesn't make the darkness go away. The bad things are still out there. The nightmares still walking. When we hold each other we feel not safe, but better. 'It's all right,' we whisper, 'I'm here, I love you.' and we lie: 'I'll never leave you.' For just a moment or two the darkness doesn't seem so bad."
— Neil Gaiman, Neil Gaiman's Midnight Days
Playlist: 9 Crimes- Damien Rice
It's rather extraordinary how life can be so ordinary at times. How we forget to breathe.
The clock above her head said one, the sky is blue. The same as yesterday.
Her skin is raw and pale and her heart is on the outside of her chest but the blue soothing flowers are haunting and riveting in her mind and the window ushers nothing but floating diamonds of iridescent light- a rainbow intertwined.
She sinks beneath the water, slowly then all at once, at first holding the rims of the tub, then letting her hands slip beneath with the rest of her. She watches as the hand on the clock mechanically, sluggishly move…
Ten...Nine...
She waits for some sign
Eight...seven...
It's raining- her favorite kind of weather. She is nine and snuggled under layers of blankets where she is safe. No parents. No sister. No world beyond the multitudinous Egyptian cotton surrounding her tiny frame. She peeks one eye out of the duvet and the rain has left a residue on her window, so she reaches over and her tiny finger scribbles hearts all through it, until it is a window full of hearts.
Six...Five…
She is happy, smiles, her front teeth missing, her smile shames the sun. In this little world of hers, she is founder and creator. She is king and queen, she is the writer, the orator and the actor. She is whatever she says she is.
Four...three...
It's the type of darkness where the blackness stretches on forever in all directions. She's not scared but brave and as her heart slowed in pace and she thought over a day so simple in its course, yet powerful in its teaching, she watched the darkened sky, washed in the consuming peace.
Back in the present, her eyes are fiery against the water, but into her view he comes- misty and wavy- like the ripples of an ocean. His hands are strong against her shoulder, they leave a red impression there and she is suddenly re-united with oxygen, for which her lungs desperately reached for.
His mind is screaming, it is written all over his face, but he dare not let his lips betray his thoughts. He looks at her, frantically moving the tangled mesh of hair from her face before lifting her out and wrapping her in a towel.
He did all of this without uttering a word and by the time she had finished dressing, the silence carried such a tangible weight that she was forced to speak. "He's going to die." she said "I know it."
He had been leaning against the window, looking out but as she said this he turn around, the sun washing him in full glory.
Spencer looked down, there is a loose thread on her shirt. She doesn't pull it, for fear of an unraveling "I think I can do it, you know. Let him go. Forgive him. What I don't know I can do," she pauses fixing her eyes onto his "What I'm not sure about is existing without him, you know. I mean after he's gone and I want so badly to talk to him. And the time when something really big happens and I automatically dial his number and then it hits me again, that he's gone. "
He listens to her, his eyes never leaving her as the defense that she had created slowly crumbles.
"I wanted," she continues "I wanted him to be there, when I got married. I wanted him to walk down the aisle with me on his arm, a smile on his face. I wanted him to give the blessing to marry his little girl to my husband. I wanted him to say he's never been prouder of me. I wanted my children to know him. I wanted them to know his laugh and how it can fill an entire room. I wanted my children to know him, to have him. I wanted him to have them. I wanted him to love me as much as possible. I want for the last thing I feel for him is the insurmountable love I felt for him when he was my superhero, my savior..."
She sits on the bed, her hands intertwined with each other between her legs. "I want to say goodbye. But I don't know what will happen after I said it and he's gone. If I say goodbye, then I can't take it back. It's non- refundable. If I say goodbye, then it's forever…and I'm not sure about forever."
Toby joins her on the bed. Where he sits has cause a ripple of effects on her bed spread, like crackling fire expanding. She looks at him, taking in his tired disposition- the hunch of back and his head hanging low and she realized that when she is in hell, he is there too.
He draws close enough to her that she can rest her head on his chest and he wraps his arms around her waist. Placing a light kiss above her brow, Toby savors the scent of her.
"I love you. I love you." He whispers and she is instantly in that place again, where she is exposed at his mercy and she is broken to the point that everything is right.
Pulling her face to his, oceanic blue meets brown with an electrifying intensity. "We'll storm it together…" he assures "whenever forever comes." He kisses her simply, wanted for her to feel the truth of his words, wanting her to know that they were tied by the hinges of their souls.
"Thank you," she said resting her head on his shoulder again "for still being my safe place to land."
The evening is idyllic and silent. Everything happens quietly. No dramatic exit, but a subtle unfolding does the time transform and just as a moment ago the orange and yellow light that painted the sky shone fiercely, the blue and violet now create an peaceful ambience across the vast sky.
Her eyes shift from her reflected image in the darkened window to her father almost lifeless on the hospital bed. His pain is evident, clear. It is the moon on water- visible but cannot be touched. He is a work of art, he is a masterpiece created by her agony.
She steps into the room, the dim yellow light casting a semi- halo around him.
Pausing, she aims to gather enough strength to go on when she feels Toby's hands slip into hers. He holds on as though she is life.
Nearing her father, she sees that he is awake and he calls for her in an inaudible gasp. She is in a moment by his bedside, her hands in his frail ones. Suddenly aware of the other presences in the room, she looks and sees that her entire family is there. Her mother is somber, yet steady and her sister face is tear- streaked and sorrowful. It is Jason, who offers her an encouraging smile when climbs onto the bed next to their father. Knowing that this would do him more good than harm, she lies in the space that his body does not occupy, resting his head on her bosom.
He has, at this point become a lightweight and the notion of cradling him in her arms brought a pang in her chest at the reverse roles. She is dried- throat and the atmosphere of the room has thrust her into further despair. Bowing to place a kiss to the side of his head, she whispers, tears flooding her view "I forgive you, dad. I forgive you and I love you." She cradles him like he used to do when she was tiny enough for his arms. She cries and he cries a soft throaty cry- barely audible- because there is nothing left to do but feel the brunt of it. There is nothing left to but to be crushed under this weight .They exist, in this place, where words have not entered. Where silent is the measure of pain and the things unsaid says it all perfectly. There, in this place, words cannot exist, and the taste of wordlessness stings the tongue and is gall to the stomach.
Time becomes like a container with no rim, at this point. It just pours on and on. There is no difference in the time past. She dreams of a clock with no hands and with it comes the feeling of being stuck in eternity with no way out, of being suffocated, of not being able to free herself. She wakes hours later, her arms sore from the position she slept in at her father's bedside.
Night brings restlessness and morning brings a renewed sense of hopelessness. Her mother is praying in the chapel and her sister dutifully kneels next to her. Jason is alternating between his father's and Spencer's side. He is thoughtful and keen, quietly grieving for a father he had not enough time with.
And slowly morning takes the plunge into afternoon- eventless, the entire family waiting for Death.
She keeps waiting for some salvation, for anything that would produce some alternate consequence but there is nothing. The afternoon begins to show signs of morning when Peter, who had been in a deep sleep, opens his eyes. "I'm sorry" he rasps. "I'm sorry."
It is enough for her.
"I know." She comforted as he slip back into unconsciousness.
She forced herself to believe of death as the enemy. 'But sometimes there's healing in death' her mother had told her earlier. If she was being truthful, what she really wanted to believe in was life. She wanted to believe than we are more than just whispers in the dark, that we are all the loud crashing sound of triumph. She wanted to believe that we do more than ache and bleed and die and return to the dust only to live on in the living. She wanted more than anything to know that our victories meant something and that did would not become untold until unknown.
Something nagged inside of her, the need to believe that we are all affected by someone and we in turn affect and that our presence brightens and when removed, dullens.
"Even death has a heart" she mulls.
….
The day is breaking. They are soft patterns washing her face. The sky is a newborn blue when she feels him go. She feels a shiver in her soul but she dare not cry. The sky is washed out faded like the ephemeral beauty and she is left behind feeling as hollow and empty as the space between the stars.
Sorry for the decade of silence, first of all. Had a tough time recently but here I am.
I had to seriously weigh my options on whether to continue the story or to just delete the entire thing. I'm still hanging on because I don't want to give up on this stories.
So seriously, I love to hear from all of you and if you want to chat or anything and you have a tumblr feel free!
so until next time!