Almond Boy

Almond Boy - 31

"Did I ever tell you..." Drowsy Elliot, quieting mind and limbs like weights, he felt heavy in his bed. "Did I ever tell you..." Was it his meds or his overwhelming exhaustion or emotional weariness that made him so weak to sleep? 

"Go to sleep." 

Breath came out like a sprung leak, a half between a laugh and a scoff. "No, no, it's important."

"Tell me later."

"No, it'll give you something to do." 

Fingers began weaving through his hair, a touch a moment ago that electrified him but now was damnably relaxing. Sleep was hitting him hard, these damn meds so damnably calming. Perhaps his heart would hit him so fucking hard all the time with them. Calm hearted, for once. 

"I get to mock the way you sleep," Emma teased. "I bet you're a kicker." 

Emma had this shit-eating grin on her face, he knew it, but he couldn't even will his eyelids to rise enough to look at her properly. She blurred, all copper haired and pink-faced and bright eyed. So bright he thought for a moment his curtains were open. 

The rustling of the curtains, swish-swish, it was like a dress on the floor of those old movies. Kind of calming. Emma would be pretty in one of those dresses, right now. She didn't look so sick. At least, not in his head, not to him. 

He had something important to tell her. Something he kept forgetting. Something she made him forget every time, because she always had her mad genius plan and he was all too happy to follow it, even if he hummed and hawed. Can't let things be too easy, can't be too desperate, even though his head was beneath his feet and he saw the world upside down right now. It was a good ride, but it was like he went from It's a Small World to Thunder Mountain, and yet they didn't do much at the same time. Like right now, she was in his bed, petting his hair. 

Did he say she was in his bed?

"Where are we?" 

A chuckle. Bells rang outside, chimes, mom's chimes. She used to make him tons of them. He had to put them outside so they were fainter. They were tinkling. But there was also a laugh. The breath smelled like honey. Tea and honey. Sweet but not so sweet it made your nose crinkle. Just enough to wake you up and then put you back on a comforter. 

"We're in your room."

Huh. She was in his bed in his room. He was right. "Huh."

The skin on the inside of his arms is really sensitive. All of his veins are there, and no one touches  it really unless they're grabbing to draw blood. However, there's a slight brush against them, a grazing of the nail back and forth. Probably the kindest touch that part of his arm has ever had. 

He had something to remind her of, but he needed a reminder to remind him of it. What the fuck is with these drugs? Was it the drugs, or the brush of her hands on his arms? It did something screwy, made him blush across his nose, made his lips curve and his arms want to curl around something. But he had something to say to her. But it's old news, news he should have already said something. When did he start taking Isopropy-- that's not this one. Adri--no that's not what it's called. This should be what Emma says. She would be a good doctor, with her science and her atomic way and her outer-planetary stuff she says. Always comparing him to stars and to science and to things like "lunar" and "extraterrestrial", words he forgot existed until she said them. He just thought of "moon" and "alien". Could science make you a poet? Maybe science would help him sketch better. 

Sarah. It was something about Sarah. 

Say it out loud, dumbshit. 

"It was something about..." What was her name again? "It was a person."