Sands Of Time

Half Of My Heart

  I sat down on my bed in defeat. It had been a year since Bruno disappeared, and after that first night, I found no other sight or sound of him. It was like he really had left the Encanto. But why? Didn't he know that if he asked I would have dropped everything for him? I sobbed as the light from the setting sun set my room a blaze in soft orange tones.

Through the tears I looked around my room. The intricate hourglass that sat on my nightstand still glowed with the emerald sand made from his first vision of me. On my desk sat two large vases filled with the roses he used to bring me for our lunch dates. I remembered how I had told him he didn't need to bring any more because my vase was full, and the next day Bruno brought another rose and a new large vase for me to put them in. I had to insist that he didn't have to bring any more once that one was full. And there they sat now. Quiet and beautiful, made from Isabela's magic, to remind me of a time I couldn't return to. The clear glass bowl that sat near the vases that held all the little crystals and rocks that Bruno had picked up and saved for me "Because it's pretty and it made me think of you," he would say. The little smile he would give me as I held the simple, sweet trinket close to my heart floated in the forefront of my mind. I had gotten that bowl specifically so I could always see all the different colors and shapes of the rocks, even if they were all piled together. I hadn't opened my wardrobe for months and my clothes have just been left to pile on the desk, chair, floor. Anywhere that meant I didn't have to open the door and see the fabric bag that held my useless wedding dress.

  My hand shook as I fiddled with the engagement ring that I still kept on my finger. It had gotten loose but I couldn't bring myself to take it off. If I did then he really would be gone. So I started crocheting a piece of yarn around the band to keep it in place. It had gotten loose because in the past few weeks I could barely bring myself to eat. Julieta would drop off a basket of foods in the mornings, but if I ate anything it was just a bit of buñuelo or a nibble from an arepa to keep me going for the hunt. I put on a brave face for her when she would ask how I was doing, she didn't need to know just how dead inside I already was from loosing my heart.

  Now, however, I was just too spent from my search to do anything but lay down, and try to sleep. I ignored my shallow breathing and the tremor in my body as I let my bag slump on the floor beside the bed, and I didn't even bother to get undressed as I just curled up on my blankets. Pulling my pillow into my shaking arms I sighed and closed my tear stained eyes. Sleep engulfed me in its cold, unforgiving darkness like an old friend.

_______

  It was a dream. After so many other times, what else could it be? My imagination willing me to see his exhausted face blurred before my half-lidded eyes. That had to be it, because Bruno was gone and he wasn't coming back. It wasn't him patting my forehead with a damp washcloth as my vision faided in and out. It wasn't him humming a song to calm me as my breathing rattled in my hollow chest. Bruno wasn't really breaking pieces of arepa off and begging me to eat as he put them in my mouth. My dream-self couldn't stomach any food and my tongue pushed it out with a gag. It had to just be the memory of him speaking as I heard him saying, "Por favor, Corazón. No te rindas." I felt another piece press against my lips and I turned away.

  "¿Cuál es el punto de?" I heard what could have been my voice speak, but it was quiet, dry and cracked with pain. "You're not really here. This is just another dream." I felt the bed shift a little under me.

  "If you don't eat you'll die...I-I can't-"

  "I'm already dead. My body just doesn't know it yet." My dream went silent for a moment.

  "I did this to you..." I laid there with my eyes closed, a small sigh left my lungs as I realized my dream Bruno wasn't going to leave me just yet like they always did. I felt his hand under my head as he lifted it up off the pillow. Something was being placed around my neck and once again my mind drifted off with the feeling of lips pressed against my forehead. The black void of sleep chose that moment in my weakness to engulf me again. Adrift in the darkness I heard his voice, begging.