❝Kid, don't do that!❞ It was as if I could almost feel him smile-Hear it in his voice, let the warmth of it deluge my heart.
❝Why not?❞
❝It tickles, Allan.❞ I looked into his eyes as he chuckled. Just then i noticed a strange spark of uncertainty a...
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The warmth deluged my eyes as the sunlight danced onto my eyelids. The feeling of that brightness—that almost white-like feeling of utter comfort, a glow of pure ardency—loomed across my skin as my eyes fluttered open to the drawn curtains.
A sudden surge in my body was the result of my realization. I had fallen asleep in his room. I recall opening the box, scrambling to find my name on them—one of the few envelopes addressed to certain people.
I don't remember much of what happened after I found the one with my name scribbled over it. All I do remember is that I had held it close, tucked it to my chest as my heart sank into an evermore gloom. The feeling seemed to return as I laid my eyes on it again.
I shifted as I felt a hand on my back.
I wasn't alone.
Her eyes were moist. The face, a bleak woe. I looked at my mother and watched as she caressed my back. She sat on his bed, whilst I leaned against the frame, tucking away the envelope far from her notice.
Had she seen it? I wouldn't know. But what I did know was that something like this never faded away from a person's memory—grim that remained carved onto one's soul, almost eternal.
"Jess," Her voice, a feeble misery. "we've decided to operate."
A part of me broke—an inexplicable crack as my eyes shot up with betrayal of tears—my vision, a complete blur. They had known of the risks, every last one of them. To agree was as fatal as it was to deny.
And so I wailed in my mother's lap. Until my chest bled into a hollow. Until every breath became a struggle to survive. Until the very last of my hope flickered into smoke, as though an inferno quivering in snow.
