IKIGAI / Jake Sully

32

"Like I said. I wasn't prepared.....to come here to lose you. Again."

"Tru...are you ok? You're acting so erratically"

He just lets out a half laugh "uh yeah. I'm sorry. It's just weird...seeing you with..you know, not me."

There is silence between us as I try to change the subject. "Oh I think this is the one"

Reaching down to look through which plant my mother was asking for.

"Can I borrow the knife?" I ask holding my hand back to Tru'it, who was still standing behind.

"I can do it." Tru says towering over me to cut the plants. He is so close to me I can smell his scent. "Sometimes I forget you're so tiny" he chuckles into my ear.

I immediately stood up attempting to put distance in between us. "I...um..." I say stuttering

"You ok?" He asks walking over to me and looking into my eyes.

"Yeah" I responded quickly backing away

"Something wrong?"

"No I'm fine." I let out a sigh trying to control my heart racing. "So...how's your mom?"

Maybe changing the subject will help me relax a bit.

Tru just chuckles "she's uh..doing good. She misses you. So does my dad."

"I miss them too. Does your dad still um...paint?"

"Yeah. You should visit sometime."

I let out a sigh "Yeah I..um...I will"

"Great. So tomorrow. You and me"

"I think I have something to do tomorrow" I lie but Tru picks up on it

"Ok the next day after that"

"Well I have that..."

"Anytime." Tru'it insist. "Give me when and I will make it happen."

"Tru...I don't think that's..."

"Would you feel better if Jake went along?" Tru asks

"Yeah. Actually. I would feel a lot more better"

"Ok that's fine. You, me....and Jake" he worded purposefully

"I'll see." I sigh walking past him to another plant.

"You know they're hoping I come here to fix things and everything just goes back to normal between us"

"We are normal." I corrected "we use to not even be on speaking terms so I call this progress"

"Ouch" Tru'it replies

"That wasn't an insult" I roll my eyes "you're being dramatic"

"Me?" Tru laughs "you use to cry when I fell asleep before you."

"Um! Excuse me! That was only twice" I retorted back turning to look at him. Who misses every moment that he has lost. "to remind you"