When the morning comes

40 | onions and ice cream

Quick, painful breathing. Chest rising and falling rapidly. Transpiring heavily. Almost choking. I sat up, grasped onto the covers, hoping they could save me, but my hands felt numb. Chills running down my spine. Weakness taking over.

"Benjamin." I looked around me, finding out he wasn't beside me. "Benjamin?" My hands patted the covers, my mind desperately trying to find him. Hadn't I put him to sleep beside me last night? Had he left the house? Was he outside all alone?

In the middle of the night? In Italy?

"Benjamin!" My chest hurt by the heavy breathing, but I couldn't think straight. Couldn't tell myself to calm down before I had found him.

Something moved beside me, he pushed the covers away from him. They had covered him fully. "What's wrong, Papà?" He blinked his eyes sleepily. I let out a deep breath, the shaking becoming less. The painful chest becoming less. But chills still ran down my spine, my mind pushing me to think of what could happen to Benjamin, to where I could lose him forever.

The thought killed me. I lied back down. Wrapped my arms around him. Squeezed him against my chest.

"Papà?"

"Just go back to sleep. It's nothing." I managed to bring out. I should have never let him go like that each time. How could I have sent him away to Teddy, Daniel, so many times before? Tears pricked behind my eyes, but I squeezed them away. Focused on the smell of his freshly washed hair. The pajamas that faintly smelled like detergent still, mixed with his sleepy body. Thought of my promise to Aurora, about Benjamin. And then lastly, restlessly thought of Salomé.

Before the sun was risen fully, I awoke out of my heavy slumber. It took me a moment to wake up properly, my rather heavy dreaming being the cause of it. It had been a chaotic mess in my mind while asleep. The trip was still going on in my head, the confused feelings, but then mostly, Aurora had appeared.

Glancing beside me, my eyes fell onto Benji, who was deep and far away still in his slumber. With his arms stretched out above his head, the light frown on his face and his lips parted slightly. Pressing a kiss to his warm cheek, I stepped out of bed, unable to close another eye. Dressed in joggers and a sweatshirt, I made coffee. Took it outside and sat on the porch, staring at the calm and quiet lake.

The sun had yet to appear, although the first signs of it were starting to come. An orange glaze fell over the lake, and since there were no waves, it looked like mirror glazing on a cake. Some far in the distance I heard the rumbling of a motor belonging to a boat. The water touching the edges of the world I was standing on made a soft, splashing sound. Benji moved, making the bed creak softly, the covers shift and a sleepy sound erupt from his mouth. I held my coffee on my thigh, taking slow sips while my thoughts left to go on their own waves, mostly of emotions. I thought about Salomé, about Benjamin, about Aurora.

Thought about how many times we had sat here on the porch, watching the sun breaking the horizon while holding the hot coffees in our hands, our shoulders and thighs touching as we would sit onto the steps of the porch, or the feeling of Aurora sitting on my lap, with her left arm wrapped around my shoulders. Soft. Warm. Sleep engulfing us, still. The thing she used to say hurt more today than ever. "Can you imagine, us sitting here, wrinkles decorating our worn out skins, grey hairs from living a life time on this earth, but the traces of crinkles by our eyes because of the beautiful time we spent together? Looking back at our lives and thinking.. we lived it to the fullest?"

"That's the only thing I want, Aurora." I'd reach for her hand, hold it like it was fragile, the only precious thing in my life, not wanting anyone to get a chance to take it away from me. But no matter how much I had tried to hold on, the disease had been stronger. Ripping her away from me. And when she went, ripping half of my heart within, too.