Old Love Dies Hard (spinoff of life happens)

Chapter XXVI - Going Home

Trepidation.

Travelling through my entire body like fire through the forest. Burning everything down.

Nothing happened, no fights, no arguments. Just plain old trepidation reminding me how excruciating it is, telling me that I cannot get through this day without tears. I shiver, trying to get rid of it.

"Hey Mason!" I enter his room and he looks up at me

"I'm setting up my laptop so you can talk to Fatima. You better set yours up so I can talk to Brie"  I say, leaning beside the door and staring at him like a creep.

"Okie dokie" he says and I chuckle before leaving.
I text Fatima to pick up my call before actually calling her.

"Hey!" She cheerily greets me, as always

"Hey you!" I reply

"What's up? Where's Mason?" She looks left and right like he's going to appear out of thin air

"I called you because he wanted to talk to you" I say, rolling my eyes

"Why? You guys getting married?" She says before sticking spoonful of ice cream in her mouth
"Brain freeze!" She says while slapping her forehead

"No we're not getting married, he just wanted to talk to you" I roll my eyes again

"Aww okay" she nods and eats another spoonful of ice cream

I get up and go to Mason's room again. Maybe I should move in here, I do come here a lot.

Yeah, sure

"Hey, you can go now" I shoo Mason away

"Okay. Bye Brie" he says to Brie and heads out and I settle myself in his chair, the area still smelling like him.

"Hey Brie" I cheerfully greet her
"You have grown so much!" I comment. She really has and she looks so much like Christina.

"Aw thank you Amna. You look so good yourself" she blushes

"How is Christina and Kevin?" I inquire

"Dad's fine and you know about mom, I'm sure" she says

"Yeah I do. I'm so sorry" I clear my throats and she nods

"Anyway, how's school treating you? God you're so gorgeous" I stare at her. She looks almost the same but wow!
"I still can't believe that this is the same Brie who used to hug my legs" I complete my sentence and she chuckles

"Hey Amna" Kevin sees me and waves and I wave back
"You look gorgeous with your scarf" he says

"Thank you" I smile

"Dad, is that for mom?" Brie points to the water Kevin is holding

"Yeah. She isn't feeling very well" Kevin replies and Brie instantly goes pale.
I see it there, the anxiety, pain and fear that she thinks she carefully stashes away. I know it all too well.

"Should I come with you?" She asks but before Kevin can say anything she heads to the room.

I wait for some minutes for Brie to appear on the screen but she doesn't. In the meantime, I take to smelling Mason's hoodie which is lying at the back of the chair.

After about 5-7 minutes she comes back. Tears on her face and I immediately sit straight, every wild thought coursing through my brain
"Brie, sweety, what happened?"

I know what happened but I just don't want it I be true

"M-mom" she stammers

"I'm going to call Mason" I assure her and run out of the room to get Mason.

This is it, this is why I felt anxious.

"Mason you need to come now. Brie needs to talk to you" I say and he looks alarmed

"B-bye Fatima" he says and rushes out of the room

"Is everything alright?" Fatima looks at me

"No I don't think so. I think Christina isn't doing good" I say sweating all over

"Aw! In Sha Allah, she will be fine. Go, be with Mason" she says

"In sha Allah" I reply and we quickly say our goodbyes before I turn the laptop off.

Please let her be alive. Please let her be alive

"Mason, what happened, is everything alright?" I sit on the floor, looking up at him and he shakes his head.

"Is Christina..?" I can't seem to complete my sentence

"N-no but she's not too good either" he manages to get out

"Oh dear God!" I whisper to myself.

"I don't want to lose her" he says, his face vulnerable and pleading. It's like he's asking me to save her.

"Mason, sweetheart, look at me" he looks down at me. The pain in his face makes my tears inevitable.

"You are going to be strong" my own voice breaks "for Brie, for your mom, for Kevin. Nothing is going to happen to her In sha Allah" another tear streams down his face but he just nods.

Reflexively, I'd like to believe, his hand finds mine and he squeezed it like I was calming him down. Like I was a medicine for all his wounds

"I'll book your ticket" I say, wiping a tear from my face and carefully slithering my hand out of his grip.

My hands shake as I try to open his laptop. I try to shut my mind for a moment and after some time of extreme difficulty, I book his flight.

"The flight is tomorrow" I  whisper and he nods

He isn't even crying, he's just numb. I want to tell him that it will be okay but I can't do it. How can I when I know it's not true?

"Do you want me to go?" I whisper yet again and he shakes his head no.

I sit there, staring at nothing.
Soon, my eyes fill up too and my thoughts seem scattered

I know that he has to go back, for his mom and I'm going to sound incredibly selfish and evil but I don't want him to leave. I don't even know if we'll ever see each other again.

What if I transcend back into who I was before he came?
What will I do without him?

I try to stop my racing thoughts by thinking that this is not what Mason would want me to think but I can't help it.

I look at him, soaking in every bit because I know I won't be able to do it again.

I guess it's true what he sang to me on the night of the carnival

"Another love that's gone to waste, another light lost from your face. It's complicated."

I don't even know if I'll ever be able to tell him that he made me believe that the stars shine out for me!

After some moments he speaks
"You can go if you want to" He croaks

"Do you want me to?" I ask him

"No" he replies

I keep sitting. I don't care how long I have to sit here but I will sit as long as he needs me to.

The day I said that his eyes weren't like the leaves in autumn but like those of spring, maybe it was because he wasn't the dullness in my life rather the brightness in it.

And right now I want to be the brightness in his life.

After almost an hour I can see that he is asleep and I start to feel sleepy too

I sit on the chair across his bed and using his hoodie as a pillow, I drift off to sleep, dreaming that maybe someday we will be together.

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