A thousand nights

XXVIII

Luke came over to our house around noon.

Dad, not having any excuse to leave the house in plain daylight, slept thrpugh the day untill Luke made his way into our living room. After waking dad, I left the two to conversate in their deserved privacy, but I was startled when I was asked to stay with them. So we ate in an eerie silence. 

I seemed to be the only one bothered by it it, so I finally decided to ask Luke about his unexpected visit.

'Hamlin is not feeling well and she wants to go back to America' Luke said over his cup of coffee.

'What happened?' Dad took the words out of my mouth.

'She knows that she shouldn't drink alcohol, because of the rye that's in it but she did it anyways' He explained. My eyes widened as I pictured her the night before.

'She's allergic to rye and she drank whiskey, rye whiskey'

'How bad is she feeling?' I asked sitting on the edge of my chair. 

'She's better now, but yesterday night we had to call the ambulance because of how severe her stomach cramps were, she also had difficulty breathing...' he trailed off.

'Goodness me, what a terrible night you must have had' dad said shaking his head to his coffee cup.

'You have no idea, Jake is there with her now, he owes me some explanations' he swallowed down some of the coffee in his mug and massaged his forehead. 'and you do as well'

'I do?' I said feeling nervous all of a sudden. It wasn't like I had done anything wrong! If it wasn't for me she would've had to call the ambulance from Jeremy's house, and Matt, of course, would have fled before she could've asked him to hold her hair as she pucked.

I tried to convince myself with these arguments but failed miserably as the guilt bobbling up inside me stung my consciousness.

'Yes, but we'll talk about this another day, I only came to ask if you could work my shift this evening, it's just a few hours' he confessed. Dad's eyes seemed to glow a bit as he muttered his next words.

'Of course, Luke, don't worry, just take care of Hamlin and call me when you can' Dad smiled.

'Thanks man, I knew you would understand' he smiled appreciatively ' now if you'd excuse me, I've gotta pick up Ali from the neighbor and take her to see Hamlin, she's the most scared out of us all' Luke breathed getting up from his chair.

'I can only imagine how it must have been for that little one' Dad said. A flash of him at the police station appeared before my eyes. His knees were to the ground as he hugged my small figure and repeated 'it's gonna be okay Pac-man, it's all going to be okay'.

***

As I sat on a window seat of bus 14 directed to school, I couldn't avoid replaying the memories of the turbulent weekend.

Except for the still-fresh images of Hamlin's almost break down and Jake's non-verbal threats, the weekend unraveled itself in surprise.

The bus stopped abruptly at a red traffic light. I turned up the volume of the music so that I could prevent myself from thinking about my weekend once again.

I wondered if Hamlin was going to come today, I had been tempted all weekend to go see her, especially after Luke had informed us that she had left the hospital. But she didn't want to see me, she said it herself that we shouldn't have become this close in the first place. We both knew it, but with this, I had lost a part of me and she had lost a part of herself. That's what happens with every true relationship, your good and your bad are given, and the mess of the other person is received. We pick ourselves up together, but sometimes the fall is so hard that someone else's hand is needed to pick us back up.