Sunday morning I wake up to the sound of pouring rain beating against the window. I open my eyes and see the room is gloomy and dark. I smile to myself. This is my favorite kind of day.
I feel Ty's arm around my waist and his hand on my stomach. I hear him breathing behind me and I intertwine my fingers with his. I just lay there for a little while glancing at the clock -it reads 10:26- and listening to the perfect mixture of Ty's breathing and the rain. He moves a little and I have my eyes closed when he kisses my neck. I still don't open my eyes when he kisses my shoulder and mumbles a groggy, yet awake, "good morning Ros." I move closer to him and say "ssshhhh. If we lay here long enough, it'll go away." He laughs quietly.
"Okay." he's quiet for a few minutes. "Rosaline."
"Hmm."
"Happy birthday." He whispers in my ear.
Ugh. I forgot. "Ssshhhh. If we lay here long enough, that'll go away too."
"Nope. Not optional. Get up."
"Nooooo. Ty, we agreed I wasn't having an 18th birthday. Its not happening."
"Yes it is. Get up." He sits up and leans over me, his hand on my hip, shaking me gently.
I open my eyes finally. He's looking down on me with a serious expression.
"Can you do me a favor?"
"Anything for the birthday girl."
"Ugh. Okay first, don't call me that. Second, can we please just have a normal day? I don't want it to be my birthday but it is so the least we can do is just act normal."
He makes a face while he considers. "Fine. But we do what you want to do today."
"Great. Let me lay here for a few more minutes. Then I'm gonna shower and we'll go from there."
"Okay." He lays back down next to me and resume position for about 10 minutes. I groan and roll out of bed. I rub my eyes, scratch my head and pull my hair over my shoulder and go take a shower. When I get out, I go back to my room and pull out a pair of gray joggers and a white tanktop with the sides cut out.I wear an aqua colored bandeau under it and brush my hair out and then flip it so it gets messed up again. Just how I like it. I go back to Ty's room, grab my laptop and put it back in my room then go downstairs.
He's waiting by the counter with a strawberry in his hand. As I get closer I see that he pulled out the middle and where the stem should be, a pink striped candle takes its place. I laugh at his creativity and take it. "What is this?"
"You said you wanted to act normal so I figured that meant no cake but I can't just let you go without a birthday wish. So here's your chance to make a wish."
I can feel my smile getting bigger and my eyes watering up a little. "Thank you Ty." I blow out the candle and I start crying a little bit.
"Wait. Why are you crying? Its supposed to make you happy." He gets closer and tilts my chin up to look at my face. "Don't cry! Awh, Ros I'm sorry."
I let him hug me and I say, "its not your fault. Its my first birthday without Sky since I was a year old. I don't remember not having her sing an off-key, obnoxious happy birthday."
"Oh. I'm sorry." He takes the candle from the strawberry. "Let's do something else to distract you from it. You up for a movie?"
We sit down on the couch after I eat my strawberry and he leaves the lights in the living room off. I sit in the corner of the couch and he sits next to me so I turn and put my legs across his and he puts his right arm around me.
The movie starts up and I see he's picked on of my favorite black and white classics. This one is about a murder case and the criminal falls in love with the detective. The detective starts up a relationship with her, not knowing she's the murderer. In the end he figures out its her and she has to decide whether to kill her newfound love or flee the country. The lighting in the room makes it all the more realistic. The dark gray light coming in from outside and the rain pattering against the window causes everything to be in the same shades of black and white as in the movie. I glance up at the window for a second and a second turns into a minute as I watch the wind blow around the orange blobs of trees behind the white opaque curtains. It makes the room seem more cozy and I huddle in closer to Ty.
The rest of the day goes by a lot like that. Tyler makes sure we have a back-to-back marathon of black and white movies. Avenlea and Zion get home late afternoon. Zion comes in the front room and rubs my head and messes all my hair up and says, "happy birthday, kid."
I look up at him and give him a smile. "Thank you."
Avenlea makes dinner. Lasanga and salad and she bakes a peach pie afterward because she knows its my favorite. After dinner, we all sit down and watch a few more movies and halfway through our third one, Avenlea and Zion decide to go to bed. Tyler and I watch a couple more and by 11:30 we're both about to crash on the couch. So I get up and put the movies away and turn off the tv and pull Ty up and lead him into his room. I kiss him goodnight and when I turn to go to my room, he grabs my hand and gently pulls me back.
"You're not staying with me tonight?"
"No. I think I should sleep in my own room tonight. I need a little alone time."
"Okay." He kisses me a few more times and then closes the door.
That night I dream about all my past birthdays. Skylar dancing around the living room with my present and rubbing it in my face that she knows what it is but I don't. Birthday parties with both of my parents, happy and smiling and laughing, still together. Even birthdays with Ty blowing out my candles before I could as a joke. We'd have to relight them and then he'd let me blow them out on the second try. My dream was special that night.
