Normal With You

Chapter 22

He could feel it pressing down against his chest. He wanted to breathe, he needed to breathe but breathing now would only be the death of him. Water surrounded him, pushing against him, crushing him, swallowing him into its dark depths but the more he pushed back the more his chest burned. He needed to breathe.

He was panicked and terrified.

He could feel his limbs slowly go limp from the crushing weight above him.

Breathe...

Breathe...

Breathe...

Wake up!

Riaz woke with a gasp.

He rubbed his eyes, reaching for his watch with the other hand before he tried to make out the blurred lines of the dark black arms painted across the white face. It was past 2- he was sure about that but his eyes were too tired to look further than that. The soft light from the lampshade between their sleeping bags comforted him. He needed to see it.

He needed to know that it was light.

That it wasn't dark. He still didn't like the dark...

He closed his eyes, trying hard to find sleep but yet again his magical slumber had evaded him. He could never go back to sleep after dreaming. His mind just simply never allowed him to. But perhaps he didn't really want to go back to sleep. There, lingering in the very shadows and corners of his mind, he was afraid. He was afraid to remember what it felt like to die. What it felt like to have the ocean above him crush him to pieces as his father let go of his hand. He had tried in vain to forget it; to pretend it had never happened to him. But it was as much a part of him as his lungs or his heart and he simply couldn't be rid of it no matter how hard he tried.

He heard the soft grind of paper as she turned the page of her book...

He reached forward shifting the sheet slightly to look at her. She was sitting up with her arms wrapped around her knees as she immersed herself into another time and another world that belonged to neither of them. She dropped herself happily into illusion barely even aware that she was being watched until she heard his scratchy voice call out to her.

"Hmm?" She turned to look at him, surprised that he was awake.

"Didn't you sleep at all?" He asked softly.

She just shook her head, smiling at the way his hair was pressed down against the one side of his head.

"Will you..." He stopped, considering his request.

"Will I what?"

He just needed to hear her. He needed to know that he wasn't alone. That someone was there with him.

"Will you read for me?"

He was so sure she would deny his request as she turned her face back to her book, trying to find her place. He shifted the sheet back into place...

"...I can't explain. When I like people immensely, I never tell their names to anyone.'" Her voice sounded hesitant as she read out loud. She had never read out loud to anyone before- much less to her husband at 3 in the morning but as she carried on reading she had forgotten that he was listening to her or that he was there or that they lived the lives they were living as she fell unknowingly into a world that had never truly existed.

It is like surrendering a part of them. I have grown to love secrecy. It seems to be the one thing that can make modern life more mysterious or marvellous to us. The commonest thing is delightful if one only hides it. When I leave town now I never tell my people where I am going. If I did, I would lose all my pleasure. It is a silly habit, I dare say, but somehow it seems to bring a great deal of romance into one's life...