Since Feeling Is First

Chapter Six

You walk a lot slower than you should. It's still just barely above freezing and both of you are buried in your heavy coats, yours a blocky, formless black, and Audrey's a more form-fitting and fashionable purple. But it's sunny and still so your hoods are down and your scarves are pulled a little loose as you walk, ungloved hand in ungloved hand, down residential streets and back alleys, away from the noise and bustle of the busy main streets.

The streets are clear. It hasn't snowed in weeks, and only a few ugly clumps of dirt-black slush linger in the corners here and there. Spring is still a long while off. It's only January. But now that the year has turned, you're that much closer to sweet smelling grass and bright flowers and trees heavy with leaves and buds.

"Are things ever going to be the same again?" you finally whisper. Audrey's step slows, though she doesn't stop, and you slow to match her pace.

"What do you mean?" she asks. Your whispers are louder than screams in the silent, still air.

"I mean... I've always been different. I know that." You pause. "We've always been different." You glance over at her, unsure, and she smiles, so you know you haven't caused offense. "But now I'm like... really, really different. It's one thing for people to ask you if you're a boy or a girl. But it's something else when you're visibly missing a limb. They treat you like a child or like you're made of porcelain or..." You trail off and look down at your slowly moving feet.

"Do I do that?" Audrey asks softly. You look up at her, at her bright green eyes, worried and sad, red hair fluffed up and messy from her hood before she pulled it down when you got outside.

You open your mouth to say, no, I don't mean you, but you have to be honest or it'll eat you up and you'll end up resenting her. "Sometimes," you admit.

"I'm sorry," she says. "I don't mean to --"

"I know," you interrupt. "But... Audrey, the accident was a long time ago, and it was scary, and it was fucked up, but it wasn't your fault and everyone's fine now. I'm fine now. My body's a little different but I'm just as capable as I always was."

A mix of so many emotions that you can't name them all flashes across her face -- fear, sadness, anger, panic, a hundred others -- and her hand tightens on yours.

"I know," she whispers. "It's not... I don't think you aren't."

"Then –"

"I almost lost you," she suddenly sobs. She covers her mouth and nose with her scarf and breathes in deeply to steady herself. "What if it isn't just 'almost' next time?"

You stop and she does, too, just one step ahead of you. You gently tug on her arm and she turns to you, looking down, still covering half her face. "And it was my fault this happened and I just... I can't fix it and... and so I want to help you in any way I can. I'm sorry I was being overbearing. It's not that I think you can't do it. It's that I want to be there when you do."

Your breath catches in your throat and you have to force it out in a thin, staggering white puff of air.

"Have you felt like that this whole time?" you whisper. A lone car drives by, at the slow speed limit of twenty miles an hour, and then it's just you again.

She nods. "I took my eyes off the road. I didn't make you roll up your window. I didn't --"

"I didn't listen to you when you told me to pull my arm back inside the car," you say gently. "I told you you were overreacting. Remember?"

"But I should have –"

"No," you say firmly. She flinches and angles her head a little further away from you. "No, that other asshole should have been paying fucking attention and going the speed limit. You were in your lane, Audrey. He swerved into you."