The Stranger

Chapter 13

I sit back down on the couch, and my heart is aching so much I can hardly breathe.  My mascara has smeared in the rain.  I pour myself a drink to ease the pain, but it does nothing.  I watch the clock.  I count the seconds, minutes and hours from the time you said you'd be here, until the time it is now.  I call, no answer.  Time tears a hole in my heart so deep in your absence I take some sleeping pills to fall asleep, but can't sleep.  I wonder how many pills it would take to sleep forever.  I wonder if death is the only way to break the curse. 

I wonder if you'd care.

As I'm slipping into darkness, I close my eyes and my father is there to put me back on the horse.  I'm a little girl again, back in his arms.  You don't have to be afraid of him, he says.  If you feel him closely, you can feel his heart, his breathing.  We're at the county fair.  The horse is huge, and I'm only seven.  I've always loved the way horses look in pictures, but this is the first time I've seen one up close, much less sat on one.  I can barely straddle it, but my father is holding me around the waist, making sure I won't fall no matter what the horse does.  The horse makes a noise that startles me, and my father laughs.  It's okay, he says.  That's just what horses do.  It's how they talk and communicate.  Now just relax, breathe, and see if you can feel the horse beneath you.  I relax, breathe, and the first thing I do is smell the horse, the hay, the barn.  Then I feel its hair, and pet it.  He's warm to the touch, but there is something else, something so alive about him that make me feel as if I'm one with this horse, and that we're both just here living together in the same space and time, and even though I was seven, I also knew that something this alive, also had to die.  I started to cry, and hugged that horse as if I were hugging myself and I told the horse I loved it, and that I would never forget it as long as I lived.

When I open my eyes, I see the white tiles of a hospital room, and my Aunty is there looking over me like the angel she has always been. 

There you are, she says, petting my hair.  That's my girl.

I want to speak, but nothing comes out. 

I can feel tears streaming down my face.

Don't worry, Aunty says, right now you don't need to say a word, just rest.  You're going to be okay.

I'm so ashamed I close my eyes, but in the middle of this silent dark where I've been lost I can hear the faint beating of my own heart.  I listen to this sound until I can feel where it's coming from, and when I get to its source I can actually feeling it working for me, keeping me alive, simply because that is what it does. For the first time in my life I feel greatful for my heart, greatful for just being alive. I want to say something poetic to remember this moment, but my inspiration comes out as some kind of babbling that freaks my Aunty out, so I just smile at her with my eyes, and tell her that I know I'm going to be okay, that I  want to live.