I JUST WANT YOU TO LIKE ME | ✓

▬ 06: soap sliver

            Ziri's hand pokes between me and the laptop screen, holding my glasses. My ears burn as I thank him and slide them on, surprised, as I always am, by the sudden clarity of the text.

Ziri hums in response. He takes a t-shirt from the laundry draped over his arm and holds it out to me. 'Is this wet or cold?' he asks. 'You know, one could think you'd learn to wear your glasses after four years...'

I scrunch the cotton a few times. 'Just cold I think. And I can see fine without em.'

Leaving the t-shirt on the table, Ziri wrestles a grin. 'Can you?' he challenges and holds out a pair of cargo trousers.

'Definitely wet.'

Thanking me, he returns the trousers to the airer between the telly and the sofa because it's the only place it fits without being entirely in the way. Scooping the pile of folded clothes into his arms, he carries it to the bedroom. 'All I'm sayin is the world ain't supposed to be blurry.'

I tell him to shut up and, smiling, return my attention to the eight tabs of different internet providers I have open. The price of our current wi-fi plan increased so I need to check if there are better options but, with or without glasses, I can't understand half the words. I get delegated the administrative tasks because Ziri can't handle them with his ADHD but even I can't quite focus right now.

Checking that he's still in the bedroom, I open Facebook. Since we share this laptop, it's logged into Ziri's profile and I log out just in case there's a search history he can check. My leg bounces under the table as the tab loads before it finally logs me in. Even as a voice at the back of my mind tells me not to do it, I type Dominic Eaton into the search bar. Over fifty people come up and I scroll through slowly, peering at the small profile pictures for a familiar face.

It don't take long. I'd know those eyes anywhere. I click on the profile and his picture blows up. He's visibly older — his face has lost some of its structure and his smile carves deep parentheses on either side of itself — but he's no less handsome for it. If I saw him for the first time tomorrow, I'd still be struck by him.

My hands tremble. A canyon opens in my chest. I'm a single thread away from plummeting into it. But I can't look away, can't even blink.

Ziri's shuffled footsteps return from the bedroom. He talks about summat I can't comprehend. Is he accidentally speaking French? He does that sometimes when he's tired. But it don't sound like French either, it sounds like static over a radio.

A hand falls on my arm.

I flinch away so violently I fall off the chair. His confusion blurs as tears flood my eyes. Though I can still make out the flattening of his lips when he glances at the laptop screen. If he asks me why, I don't hear it.

Ziri sits on the floor in front of me. He reaches out to touch me but when I jerk away, knocking against the table leg so that the whole thing shoves back, he folds his hands in his lap. 'You're okay, hayati. Everything's okay right now. You're safe. No one's gonna hurt you. You're home.'

I can hardly hear him over the screaming from the basement, so loud it shakes the house foundations. Whatever tries to crawl out, it feels like it claws my physical brain in the process.

I grab Ziri's hand as I start to shiver. I squeeze it so tight, the tendons on the back of mine shove out of my skin like spears. Ziri caresses them as you would an abused animal — No one will hurt you, you can relax. He repeats affirmations that I'm home and safe but I'm not sure. As the sky and the ocean collide on the horizon, the past and future collide on my spine. I know the body can never exist anywhere but on the precipice of both but at this moment, I don't exist on the hairline fracture of the present; I exist in the past and in the future.