The Suitcase

After walking for hours, I go back to the motel room. It's not much, but it's all Bear could afford after spending months searching for me. Only, maybe he shouldn't have. Maybe, he should have let us fade into twilight like even the best of days must.

My throat aches.

Sunlight fights through several layers of dust on the drapes. The bedspread is faded, the carpet stained and threadbare. An old dinosaur of a television glares at me where I sit in the only chair twisting my hands. Sounds of water running in the bathroom filter through the quiet.

He's lived out of a suitcase, a small travel sized one. It's open and spilled out on the bed. I try not to notice the familiar size of jeans he wears. I try not to remember he prefers wearing those boxers with colorful patterns, island pictures, and a pair with hula girls, which I gave him on his birthday. I try to ignore the flames licking my insides, the aching of my skin, my breasts for his touch. I try to forget he likes sleeping naked, without any boxers at all.

The shower faucet turns off. One, two, three minutes pass. My heart hammers wildly in my ears. I wish disappearing was a possibility, but Bear will just come looking for me again. I must face him, put us both out of our misery, give us a goodbye.

When the bathroom door opens, I stand, wringing my hands, my throat dry. Bear steps out into the main room.

I try to remember to breathe.

Bear's lips part when his gaze locks on mine. His features are soft and warm. His eyes are dazed as if he's not sure he's seeing me, not sure if I would face him when we both know that even though he found me, I need to find myself.

His tanned body glistens with a sheen of water. Droplets follow the tracks of brawn across his chest, following the trail of sun burnished fuzz from his belly button and disappearing underneath the towel slung dangerously low around his hips.

I lift my gaze from his towel to his face. He watches me like I've lit a match on him with my eyes. His chest rises and falls, slow and deliberate.

I forget how to speak. I forget how to get words into my mouth. The only thing I remember is how to burn.

Burn.

Burn.

Burn. 

"You want the shower?" He breathes vapor into the room.

"Yes." I bite my bottom lip.

He moves to the suitcase. "I packed as much as I could. I figured you'd want all your bathroom stuff. So, I used most of the space for that, but I brought a few things. I thought you'd want your... I mean..." He loosens a shuddered breath. "I only brought stuff to go home."

Home. I don't know where that is anymore, and everything inside of me aches just to play along, go on as we'd been. Go home with him.

He unloads his pants, shirts, and boxers onto the bed. I step beside him and feel the steam coming off his wet body. Gooseflesh runs across his chest, hardening his nipples.

Underneath his belongings, in neat piles, my lacey panties and two bras sit in the bottom of the suitcase.

He moves to pick them up, but thinks better of it and wipes his hands on the towel wrapped around his thighs. My eyes burn, at all the memories, at all the times he slid the lace from my body, trailed my skin with his lips.

He runs his hands through his wet hair. "I just...I don't know how..." His voice catches, and he looks at a stained tile in the corner of the ceiling. 

Thinking Bear's life and mine could be easily separated was naive. He packed my things right alongside his stuff, folded my underwear, rolled my socks. He thought nothing of it, only how even in a suitcase our lives could keep going on and on and on, tangled up together, matching breath for breath, inside out and outside in.

It's where I'm standing on my head, or I'm standing on my feet, and I don't know which is up or down. And I don't care. And I don't have any idea where my skin starts and where his ends. And we keep breathing for each other, and it's not my own heart keeping me alive. It's not my blood pumping through my veins.

It's his.

And somewhere along the way, I lost myself.

"I'm sorry." His blue eyes glaze as he studies me. "I just. I just...I don't know how not to be us. And I didn't..." He swallows. "I didn't plan on going home without you. I didn't plan on ever repacking this suitcase alone."

Words clog in my throat, aching. I think about the woman Bear packed this bag for and I wish I knew her. I wish I could sort through the memories like a stack of cards and have her again.

I wish I could be brave and shine until all the darkness would disappear until I wasn't afraid of this hollow, lost feeling inside of me.

But I can't.

Because I'm just a girl, who forgot herself somewhere on the road to happiness.

"Lizzie, if you ever find what you're looking for...if you ever miss me...anything...I'll always be waiting." His voice is hoarse, and he chuckles sadly. "You probably want me to shut up so you can shower,"

"I'm sorry, Bear." I gather my things and slip into the bathroom. 

I weep so long that my throat is raw, and I'm sticky with the salt of my tears. When I step out of the bathroom, Bear's already gone. And only that dinosaur of a television stares back at me.

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