Crash Into Me | ✓

twenty-three

The rain started early in the week. It came down hard and didn't let up for days, which seemed to be a perpetual reflection of my mood - cold, dark, and miserable.

I had spent most of the week in bed, with nothing but Brooklyn's words haunting me every time I tried to close my eyes.

Go away. And stay away.

With the sun swallowed up behind layers of dark clouds, making morning and night barely distinguishable, the days had come and gone in a haze. I had hoped if I stayed covered up under my blankets long enough, I'd eventually just disappear into my mattress.

I heard my bedroom door open but didn't move.

"You cannot sit in this room forever," Nikki said as she plopped down on my bed.

I groaned and pulled the covers over my head. "Watch me," I said, muffled through my comforter.

"At the very least, you need to get up and take me to chemo, it's your turn and Aunt Mel is teaching again today."

I bolted upright, sending blood rushing to my head. "It's Friday already?"

"Uh, yeah," Nikki replied with a grimace. "You'd know that if you'd been up more than three times in the past five days."

"I'm sorry," I mumbled, rubbing at my face with my hands.

"You have nothing to be sorry for," Nikki said in a soft voice. "The only thing you've done wrong is place your faith in someone who didn't deserve it." She took a pause and sighed. "It's messed up right? That we're punished for believing there's good in people?"

There was part of me that knew Nikki was right - I shouldn't be wasting my time and energy on someone who reciprocated my affection with lies and secrets. But in that same breath...I knew Nikki was also wrong. Because there was good in Brooklyn, and I had seen it. It was like a dying fire, faint and flickering and barely warm, but the embers were still lit. But I couldn't rekindle a fire for someone that just kept pouring water on it.

Nikki's chemo session went by uneventfully, and time ticked by in a messy fog. Nikki did her usual social media scrolling, while I could barely focus on a single line in my book. Everything around me seemed blurred and faded, and I hated myself for how upset I was about it all. I should have just known better.

By the time we returned home, the rain had become torrential. Little waterfalls came tumbling off the house gutters, creating dirt filled puddles in the flower beds my aunt had been trying to rejuvenate. Despite the rain and the neglect, one rose had popped out of a dying bush, desperate to live its life against the odds.

I let out a sigh and lowered myself onto the couch in the living room. Nikki retreated upstairs to her room, but all I could think about was the lone rose in the bush outside.