The Lullaby Nights

♥ 11

NIGHT ONE

HARLEY

'Harley, no!' Nina had squealed. Her eyes had danced with mirth, much like the snowflakes in the air this evening.

I ignored her desperate, yet filled with laughter pleads, and rubbed some muddy snow into her face. It was uncommon to get it in the United Kingdom, so we cherished each single flake that swirled down from the sky.

Saliva moistened Nina's lips as she spat out the dirt, which had got into her mouth. 'You're going to pay for this!' Her laughter scattered in the air, amplified by the quietude of the evening. Then, revengeful, she threw herself at me.

Her action made the both of us end up on the frosty ground. Our breaths, hot and short, turned into misty clouds and lingered between our faces before fleeting. Streetlamps, mounted on tall posts, illuminated Nina's lovely face with their warm sodium light. She looked out of this world. I couldn't resist kissing her. I placed my lips on hers.

Her fingers relaxed and released the mixture of dirt and snow that she'd gathered from the grass, shimmering thanks to the hoarfrost that had settled in places the flakes couldn't reach. She cupped my cheeks into her icy hands and kissed me back, slower than she had ever done before.

That November night, we sneaked into my room and made love for the first time.

I shook last year's memory from my head. I knocked on the door to my girlfriend's hospital room. 'Nina?' I paused to create tension. 'Do you wanna build a snowman?' My singing was high-pitch and awful.

A soft chuckle came from behind the door. I swung it wide open and smiled. Nina lay in her bed, as she always did, wrapped up in blankets and plain, white bedding.

'Did you just try to imitate Anna from Frozen?' She seemed beyond amused.

'Yes, but for a reason,' I justified my awful singing.

'Which is?'

'We're going to build a snowman!'

At the sound of my words, her eyes saddened, and the smile obliterated from her face. 'Harley, you know I can't go outside, and even if I could, I'm too weak for this.'

I pretended the miserable whisper she let out didn't shatter my heart. 'That's why' – I returned behind the door and grasped a box I'd left there – 'I brought this,' I said, showing it to her.

A single wrinkle appeared on her forehead. 'What on earth is that?'

'This, my darling, is a box full of cotton balls. We are going to build the snowman one way or another.' I approached her bed and placed the box on a chair beside it. 'What do you think?'

Nina's eyes shifted to the box, then back to me. A brief but silent minute later, which felt like an eternity, she finally responded to my offer without using any words. She just smiled, and I didn't mean the feeble smile that sporadically twitched her lips. She grinned like a child.

'Can I build the head, please?' She pouted.

I looked at her chapped lips. It'd been months since they lost their plump and moisture. Driven by that thought, I glimpsed over at the bedside table. The cup of tea Gina brought in the morning was still there, untouched and cold. It concerned me. Nina had to hydrate regularly, but she'd been losing interest in food and liquids even more than she had during chemotherapy. I had suspected it was a bad sign, and then Neil had confirmed my suspicions.

I tried to fight the cramp in my stomach. 'Of course, babe.' I smiled at her. 'You can also paint his nose if you want to. I brought brushes, acrylic paints, scissors, tape, even stickers for the eyes and buttons, but—'

'Just not the but's.' She shook her head in feign frustration, acting like her pre-leukaemia self again.

Something inside of me melted at how cheerful this idea had made her, but I also couldn't shake the guilt that had crawled under my skin. The eagerness she was showing must've cost her a lot of energy. The energy she really needed and had been needing for a while now. But she felt happy, so nothing else mattered.

I willed my voice out of my mouth. It sounded like a desperate plea. 'You've got to drink and eat first.'

She clearly didn't want to. I hated myself for forcing her to do it, but it was crucial. She had to gain strength for the last few—

I wasn't capable of even thinking about it. I didn't want to think about it.

'Okay,' she muttered, defeated, yet a sunny smile quickly reinstated on her face when I passed her the first bag of cotton balls.

#

Nina had a cup of freshly made tea and, with some effort, she ate a sandwich. Meanwhile, Neil had popped in to check up on her, and seeing what she was doing, he let out a mighty chortle. He was so taken with the idea of building a snowman that he dashed after Gina to show her. Her reaction was just as brilliant.

Nina didn't even have to leave the bed. She only had to use her hands. She moulded a nose, which she then painted orange and taped it to the head she had already made.

Myself, I formed two balls – one, which became the fundament of the snowman, and another one, way smaller, that served as a belly. Ripping the cotton into a fluffy mess was fun. Wrapping the whole bastard with tape and putting it together, not so much. Nina was laughing at me the whole while.

At last, we added black dot stickers in places the buttons and eyes were meant to be. The result was ridiculous. The snowman was nowhere near round. It was rather thin and wobbly, but once I'd put it in the corner, somewhere where Nina could look at it from her bed, it stood on its own.

'I love it,' she said, beaming.

Her reaction caused me to excuse myself to the loo, where I let out my cries.

By the time I'd returned, Nina was blankly staring ahead. It made my heart stop. For a moment, I imagined the worst. Then she shifted her head in my direction. Her eyes brimmed with tears.

I scuttled over to the bed. 'What's wrong, babe?' I asked softly, crouching beside her. The tiny chin of hers was trembling. It devastated me. She was so merry just a few minutes ago. I didn't understand this sudden change.

'My—' she strived to begin, but her voice broke. 'My parents came by today...' She swallowed the tears that had rolled down to her lips. 'I told them.' Her eyes pooled with a new wave of sadness.

I sat on the edge of the bed and grasped her hand. 'What did they say?' I asked not out of curiosity, but because I knew she needed to talk to someone.

'My mum fainted and dad... I've never seen him cry before. Never,' she disclosed in a whisper.

I didn't know how to respond. There was nothing I could say to make her feel any better. Nina wasn't talking about failing an exam or being grounded, even though this place had become her prison. She was falling asleep and waking up to the thought that one day she wouldn't wake up at all.

My chest felt heavy again. I kicked the shoes off my feet and moved further onto the bed so that I could lie right next to her. She didn't mind my proximity. I gently threw my leg over hers and rested my arm across her waist, concealed by blankets. I brought her body closer to mine and pressed my cheek against her own. It was damp. I brushed away her tears and ignored the new ones that soon after had moistened her pale skin.

I let her cry. It was the only way I could help. I held her close and planted feather kisses on her face. The last thing I wanted was for her to feel lonely. Her convulsive cries eventually died down, and after having poured the rain of tears, my sweet Cloud had finally fallen asleep.