Scream

I caressed his hands as his head laid on my chest while the sound of his breath pacified me. Holding on to the last bit of peace was my way of ignoring the sound of the clock ticking, even though it only got louder and louder. There was white light in the room but the world just kept getting darker, and while I could breathe, I also knew my throat was about to close; my lungs would collapse and I would just spin as I fell into uncertainty. That was loving him; a warm orange sunset in the afternoon that would eventually turn into the freezing night. Anxiety.

“This is it. Isn’t it?” I asked once he opened his eyes again and stared right into mine, turning the four walls that surrounded us into blue stars. “You’re not coming back.” I saved him the effort of saying he had to go, but I also meant to strip the power off of him by saying it myself. He had to go.

He looked right at me for a long moment, probably figuring out the best thing to say. He smiled, the way he always did. During the time I got to spend with him I never saw anything else on his face other than a smile. In fact, every time I pictured his face, I could hear a giggle echoing around my head from the good days next to him. The bad side of it was not knowing if he could also feel pain. “I’m sorry. I just have to-“

“You have to save the world.” I said blandly. I had seen him attempt to save the world multiple times by now. It made me happy to think of him as a voice that is always yelling, but sometimes he would just go silent. “And I am not part of it.” I had to accept it.

A smile again. By this point, it was hard to tell if he was happy that we had met, or making fun of me and the fact that he would walk out and it would just be me. Either way, I put my arms around him and held him against my body. The moment I touched him I felt the rush coming from my chest and circulating around my bones. I had no intention, but all the reasons to let go.

As I rested my chin on his shoulder, I flashed back to the day I met him. His confidence found a way through the shell I had created for myself, one from which I didn’t dare come out. I hesitated before showing myself to him, afraid that there would only be blood after all. I thought about how I did not want him the day he gathered the courage to ask for my name, and how I wished I didn’t want him still. But that was a different person. I wanted to fool myself thinking that if I could go back to the day I met him, I would turn around and pretend I didn’t hear him, but the truth is I would fall again.

“I’m sorry… For everything.” He said, still smiling. It was hard to hear him apologize while his eyes were still shinning. I wondered what was hiding behind the smile and if I could feel whatever it was if I kissed him one last time.

It felt unnecessary to hear him apologize. What was he sorry for? The beautiful sinking feeling in my chest every time we crossed stares? The magical kisses that lifted me from earth and took me flying into space? I sure hoped he didn’t feel sorry for those, but I’d for sure take his apologies for walking out that day. “Don’t apologize. I’ve had a lot of fun.” I said reaching for his hand.

When my fingers touched his I was no longer in that room but in the middle of a bunch of neon lights. I felt dizzy while his arms rested on top of my shoulders and he smiled again, the way he always did. I could smell the multiple drinks we’d taken that night in his breath every time he looked for my mouth trying to give me a kiss. For a moment we were alone, even thought the crowd was so loud we could barely hear each other talk. But we didn’t need to talk; all we had left was to embrace each other’s bodies and that was enough for me.

“I just have so much going on.” His voice brought me back to reality. I didn’t want to show this part of me to him, but I could already feel a tear sliding down my cheek. In a way, my heart wished to stay in the middle of the neon lights with him.

“I know. The world needs you. Could you just do me a favor?” I was about to speak from the fondness of my heart, being completely sincere for the first time. Most of my sadness I had put away for him, but right there, waiting in pain for him to go, I could only become agony. “Take the silence away with you. I don’t like it and it hurts.” I added, wondering how someone that screams so much could at times go mute.

He knew what I meant. I saw on his face a mix of shame that he disguised behind the same smile he always had from cheek to cheek. Perhaps that’s what the smile was; a shield. “I have to go now.”

My brain was warning me not to do what I did next, but my soul heard no reasoning and my heart had nothing else to lose. I grabbed him tight and kissed him deeply, knowing that I would not feel these butterflies again. When I closed my eyes I saw us both in peace, while he held me against the kitchen counter and kissed me slowly while the music played in the living room. He would stop, stare, and smile, then kiss me again. Now I wondered if that smiled covered up the tragic future we were yet to face.

I opened my eyes and found him ready to leave. He looked me in the eyes one last time, grabbed his coat from the bed, and walked out of the room without anything else to say. I had asked him to take the silence with him but that was all that was left behind. The silence I wanted to run away from was now perpetuating and embracing me as the walls were crashing down. I could barely breathe.

In the middle of my affliction I realized what he apologized for. He was sorry because, before we had the kisses on the kitchen counter, I had to endure minutes and minutes on silence waiting for him to fit me in his schedule. He apologized because before the neon lights were over our heads, there were days and days of wondering if he’d really be back. Overall, he apologized for the silence. And now, drowning in it, I found it fit to scream.

For days I wondered why he cared enough to show me his little world and every single thing that was beautiful in it, but not to take me along with him. But those answers are trapped somewhere in the silence he left me in, and I cannot hear them because I can’t stop myself from screaming.