Back to the Trees

Chapter 2 - A History Worthy of a Repeat

Mitchell slept on my sofa for 18 solid hours. Alannah and I used that time to prepare the spare room. I'd never had to use it before now so there was only a double air mattress on the floor.

"Sorry I can't do any better for you at the minute."

"Are you kidding? You've pulled this together in such a short space of time. Thank you." She hugged me tighter than she'd ever hugged me before. Beneath her baggy top I could feel the beginning of a small bump.

"So how far are you? I mean now that Jeremy is one, Denise has put him in one of those toddler beds, so we have a spare cot we can bring in for you."

"Four and a half months. And don't worry about all the baby stuff, we'll be out of your hair by then."

"Nonsense. We'll have my old bed sent over from mum's. You guys can stay as long as you want." I left her to organise the rest of the room as she wanted.

I walked into the bathroom, locked the door and leant over the sink. I didn't know if I wanted to cry or throw up. I'd been a fool to think I could handle all of this alone. I was stupid to leave Kieran at that alter. For all I knew Lee might never come back because he believed I was married to someone else. Tears burnt my cheeks as they fell from my eyes and splattered into the sink. I moved away from the sink, ran my fingers through my hair and began to hyperventilate. I was losing everything. My father had left mum for a younger woman, I lost my first child, then my memory and now, the only person I could never live without. What did I have left to lose? After all, I had only my brother and Alannah, and soon enough the little bundle of joy that Alannah carried. Yet somehow that wasn't enough. Somehow I still needed more. I needed what I'd pushed away.

So distracted by my own train of thought, I almost missed the scratching at the door. An earnest, deep, almost solemn, bark sounded right outside the bathroom door. Slowly I opened it to find Rocky sat with his head low. He stood and began to hedge at me hand with his nose, not that that was difficult; his head was level with my waist when he stood with his head up.

"It's okay boy, I'm here." I knelt down beside him despite the pain it caused down my left leg. I placed my hands on either side of his lovable, fluffy face and fussed him under his ears. Then I placed a simple kiss between them.

"Look at you. Not even here a day and you already know when something's wrong." He let out a small bark in reply and I couldn't help but smile a little. As I tried to move to stand, I realised I was stuck. My joints had locked.

"Ah. This is a problem." In response, Rocky barked louder and repeatedly. "Oh shhh, it's okay boy, it's okay." He continued.

Mitchell stumbled through, smacking his shoulder on the doorframe as he went, and Alannah came out of the spare room.

"Lil! What are you doing on the floor? You know you shouldn't be doing that."

"I just wanted to be at his level, I'm fine. Just a little stuck."

"Lily, Rocky came from the home of an elderly lady, if you fall and can't get up his previous training will kick in and he will bark until someone comes to help." Alannah held on to my hand as Mitchell put his hands under my arms and lifted me up. Here was popping and cracking as my leg straightened out. I shouted out in pain. It was like nothing I'd ever felt before.  Somehow it was worse than the knife I'd put through my hand and the birth of my premature little girl.

Mitchell held my up by my waist as Alannah left to collect the wheelchair from my room.

"Guys I'm fine. I'm not dead yet, I just need to take my painkillers."Rocky ran back into the living room ahead of me. "What if I forget everything again? How will I remember? Because I can't wait another eight months."

"Write it all down while you remember, like a story for you little girl when you get to see her again." Alannah smiled sweeter than I'd ever seen her smile before. Rocky jumped into his armchair and curled into a ball as Mitchell helped me into the sofa. Alannah pulled a blue notebook and a pack of brightly coloured pens from her bag and handed them to me. As I opened the first page and put pen to paper, Alannah and Mitchell left me to my own devices.

There was once a young woman, her life almost a living hell, her heart shattered and her mind torn. The young woman was me. My parents were on the brink of divorce, my sister was pregnant and the father of her child had done a runner, my brother was in a coma, and my best friend was dead. To top all of that off, the reason I was so broken was a ex boyfriend who lied, cheated and then left. Until i met someone I thought would turn my entire world upside down. I was wrong.

I did find someone though. Someone whose hair was a dark as the sky at midnight and his eyes were like two deep muddy puddles after a rainstorm.his heart was hidden from the world and even from me for a while. The first time I met him, he was quite rude to me, demanded I stay away from his then best friend. Our second meeting was even less friendly. He'd challenged me to fight him. If he won I had to leave his friend alone, if I won, well then he had to leave altogether. I have to say now that I'm ashamed of my behaviour that day. I did in fact beat him, and he did in fact leave. Turned out he was trying to protect me. His friend wasn't who he seemed to be. He left me hurt and broke. And with child. I ran, like any respectable young woman would, and I found myself again in the company for the very man I'd beaten. Of course we put that in our past and he became my protector of sorts. His name was Lee, and I fell in love with him.

We barely left each other's sides. We went swimming in the freezing lake behind the house we were staying, we went walking through the trees on clear nights but my favourite memory was walking in the rain. There was no better way to clear my mind of thoughts and just live in the moment then to stand out in the rain. On one of those occasions the rain had fallen in buckets and my hair had fallen across my face. It was the first time I realised I loved him, as he pushed the sopping hair from my face, cupped my jaw in his hands and kissed me. Kissed me so gently that I could feel all the little shattered pieces of my heart glue themselves back together.

The last memory I have of him so far, is him saving my life. Bruised, broken and bleeding, I lay dying at the base of the stairs, our past come back to haunt us, if he hadn't have kept me still and safe, I wouldn't have lived to tell this tale. Now I wait for his return to mend the the pieces of his heart that I broke.

My hand and wrist ached by time I'd completed, Rocky was snoring in his chair and I was exhausted. I pick up the blanket that Mitchell had clearly flung on the floor, wrapped it around my shoulders and drifted off to sleep.