Tease - Dusty Chapter Twenty: All of This
It was just after two o’clock when I left Ally’s bed. It’s almost three a.m. now.
I stretch out on my back, sliding my arms and legs through cool gray. Edward’s sheets and pillows encircleme, but I want him here. I want him surrounding me, moving with me.
Turning onto my side, I face his window. I haven’t spent a night alone in his bed in so long, but I haven’t forgotten this anxiousness or this longing. I’m fully aware of the battles I chose. I’m well acquainted with every ache and twist and tear that comes along with being Edward’s safe spot.
I close my eyes and feel my heart beat, and wonder how his is pounding in this moment, and I wish so hard he’d come home.
It’s summertime, but even if it wasn’t, it’s not unusual for him to be out two or three nights in a row. This isn’t like that though. I can’t quite get my head around it, but this absence is foreign. Even when he used to go out for a few nights on end, he would still stumble in sometime during the day after for shelter, rest and food, but not today.
Not yesterday.
I close my eyes tighter.
The last time I heard from Edward was Saturday afternoon. I was sitting on the sofawith Ally, watching Jeopardy and missing him. I hadn’t heard from him since he left me for Pete’s the day before.
Hey boy, I love you. Hey trouble, come kiss me on the lips, I texted.
And he replied so quickly. Soon.
So, I thought he’d come to me that night, but he didn’t.
And when I texted him Good morning, I miss you, yesterday, I never heard back. I was hurt, but I sucked it up and took it for what it was. Edward doesn’t want to answer to anyone. I get it. I feel that.
I do.
But then I didn’t hear from him all of Sunday either. Things were crazy for a minute, when he heard Alice and I talking about California, but he knows. He has to know I can’t go anywhere without him. How can he not? He kissed me before he left and he said he’d be back… but this silent absence is stretching way too long.
Earlier today, I called and his phone went straight to voicemail. I told him I missed him. A lot.
I called again this afternoon, but didn’t leave a second message. I was scared my voice would shake. We haven’t gone this long without contact in almost two years.
I blink and try to relax my eyelids easily closed. I tell myself he’s fine. He’s with his friends and his phone is probably dead since he hasn’t been home. He knows I love him. He has to know this is killing me. And he’ll call. Or text. Or break in.
And surround me, just exactly how I want him to.
Curling tighter and smaller on my side, I press my lips together and scrunch all the muscles in my face to hold my tears back. I don’t want to cry, but it hurts so deep because what did I expect? This is exactly how we are.
The truth is, I love a boy who can’t get his shit together for anything, but without him I can’t breathe. Edward is love to me. Something inside me deeper than my blood and stronger than my heart, needs him and has us forever connected.
How can I not wish he was here, always?
How can I not forgive him anything and everything?
I purse my lips and blow air out intentionally slowly.
Worry creeps up my back. The goose bumps it sends down both my arms feel prickly-painful, freezing cold. I pull my boy’s flannel sleeves down around my fingers and swipe away my drops of sad and scared.
I’m here. I’m right where I’m supposed to be. I’m the only place I want to be. Why isn’t he here?
I want him here so much that I’d take him in any state of mind or repair. Bloody knuckles and a dirty conscience. High as a kite in the clouds or in tears on his knees. It doesn’t matter. None of that matters. I just want him here.
I pull air in cautiously through my nose. It burns. The hurt in my sinuses makes oxygen feel like fire.
Love is learning how to breathe.
Over.
And over.
And over again.
I take in a little more burning. I concentrate on it, on breathing. It’s all I let myself focus on. I don’t think about how I wish the air was shared, tinted with Double Mint and true love instead of fear. I don’t think about what could be, or where he should be. I don’t even think he has to be okay, because I can’t. He’s pushing me every minute he’s gone, and I’m slipping to the point where I can’t think about him in any capacity at all without starting to panic.
So, I curve my knees even closer to my chest and burrow deeper under his blankets. I hold my inhale for one, two, three needy heartbeats before I let it go.
Slow.
Steady.
An action that should be thoughtless and natural has become one I have to constantly measure out.
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