Heartbound Part Two (Lovestruck Series)

Day 1.3 | E

#HeartboundWP

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Day 1.3 | E

ELIAS FINDS IT hard to breathe when he wakes up alone in bed the next morning. Nadi is still in the air, and he chokes. Like a monster underneath his bed, Nadi's pink slippers almost kept him up all night. He doesn't remember what time he fell asleep. Did he even sleep?

He reaches for his phone on the bedside table. Mas maaga nang ilang minuto ang gising niya ngayon kumpara sa usual niyang bangon every Sunday. He makes his best efforts to get off the bed, fighting the claws that Nadi's slippers underneath his bed seem to have grown overnight and now try to take him hostage.

He doesn't know what to do with it. Yesterday, he convinced himself that keeping those slippers out of his sight would be enough to keep her out of his mind, but as evidenced by the bags under his eyes and his first waking thought today being about her absence, he's wrong. Shall he just pick those up, then chuck it in the trash bag in the kitchen with the eggshells, transparent peels of garlic cloves, and leftovers from their breakfast yesterday?

But who is he kidding? He knows that won't work.

Nadi is in the air. There is just no getting rid of her.

He checks his inbox. Nadi still hasn't read his messages from yesterday morning. He types in a new message. His fingerprints are almost a permanent fixture over the letters that spell out her name, and his thumb has seemingly left a dent on the side of his screen where the backspace button is. He doesn't know how many 'Hi, Nadi's he has keyed in but never had the courage to send.

He doesn't know why thinks he now has the courage he didn't have last night. E wala namang nagbago. He's still here, and she's still gone.

Yesterday, he forced himself to study after blanking out after his bath. He barely made progress on his to-reads, given that he had to take in every single word slowly or else it would not make it past the thoughts of Nadi plaguing his brain. Every time he read aloud he almost sounded like he was praying, the desperation to think of anything else other than Nadi and his regrets spilling out of his mouth.

He did more spacing out than studying. Looking at the neat, blank margins of his notes was another reminder of Nadi being gone. He originally had his notes formatted that way to give enough space for his big handwriting, but later on it became space for Nadi to doodle on whenever her interest and attention on her task at hand would dwindle. There are no longer any hearts, smiley faces, random phrases, nor stars that frame his notes now.

He locks his phone after writing Nadi a text he did not again bother sending. Elias doesn't know if he's being careful towards her boundaries, or if he's just scared that Nadi not replying would paralyze him again. Those can be true at the same time, so maybe both.

He makes his bed. While fluffing his pillows, he remembers falling asleep last night. Now he's certain, because he vividly recalls dreaming about her not leaving. In his dreams, he was able to hold Nadi's hands whenever the traffic would allow it on the drive home. He didn't fall asleep right away. He watched her settle on the space beside him, and waited until her even breathing matched his heartbeats. Her light snoring was his lullaby. He kissed her cheek, and the spot on her forehead where her three moles were positioned to seemingly form a triangle, before giving in to his body's need for rest. In his dream he had less regrets, and now that he's awake his regrets weigh a little heavier in comparison.

He takes his phone and gets out of his room, hoping that there would be less Nadi in the air in the other places in this unit. He slides open the door to the balcony. Goosebumps dot his arms when the cool morning air meets his skin. He checks on the plants his older sister has eventually grown fond of after he brought them here impulsively. He crouches. The ceramic chicken figurines he bought just because of Nadi stares him down. If those could talk, Elias was sure that it would mock him for his poor decisions.