Chapter 4
Our days
"And then he told me to go away, you hear me, he told me to go away," my friend shouts right into my ear, although there are others sitting next to us, so she can shout at any of them. Actually, I don't understand what she's talking about, it seems like I lost the thread of the conversation two years ago when I met her in my first year at university. I run my hand over my temples, my head hurts like hell.
"Headache again?" Lily notices.
I nod.
"Have you talked to the doctor? Maybe you need some stronger pills?" A gun.
"Don't worry," I tell her and pretend that someone has written me a surprisingly interesting text message.
"Mr John is a bastard, he wants us to take the exam ourselves," Yara shouts indignantly, and I want to throw something heavy at her.
"Well, that's just out of line," Adele supports her, still shouting in my ear.
I realise that we are in the middle of the university, where thousands of students are talking to each other at this very moment, but there’s no reason to shout so loudly.
I jump to my feet as if scalded and walk away. I don't care what they think, as much as I love these crazy blondes, sometimes I can't stand them.
"Ami," Lily catches up with me, "what's going on with you?"
I stop walking. I don't want to say anything bad.
Just don't say anything that will break this innocent little girl’s heart. Just don't say anything.
"Fuck off," comes out of my mouth and I storm out of the university.
I breathe in the cold autumn air, wishing I hadn't decided to leave my jacket in my room that morning.
"How are you?"
I receive message from Sebastian. It wouldn't be him if he didn't ask me a thousand times every day how I'm feeling. I'm a third-year student, almost twenty-one years old, and he treats me like an eight-year-old child.
But I can't blame him for that, without him this world would seem even more meaningless.
Me: I'm tired, I'm going home.
If you can call going sitting at a bus stop and freezing from the cold.
Him: How many times have you skipped class this week?
Me: It’s just the second time.
Him: It's Tuesday, Ami.
I roll my eyes, wishing he could see that.
Him: I'll come over to your place after work.
If you can call it work, he's lying in bed all day, clicking buttons on a laptop and getting paid a lot of money for it.
Of course, I'm glad that Sebastian decided to stay and work in Kyiv when I finally decided to go to university, but the fact that he comes to my dorm every day is starting to get annoying.
Me: No way, I have plans.
Him : What plans?
Me: A therapy session to get rid of my annoying brother.
I send the text message and turn off the phone. I exhale and close my eyes.
"Rough day?"
Whoever that voice belongs to, I want to kill it.
I turn my head to the right to see who is talking to me. I notice a student, probably a fifth year.
"Why do you care?" I raise my eyebrows.
"Just asking," he smiles out of the corner of his mouth.
"Oh, is that it?" I change my tone to a more friendly one.
"What?" he is surprised.
"The smile that makes everyone jump into bed with you."
"Yes, babe, and not only do they jump into bed, but then they can't get over the unforgettable night for a week. Did it work?" I start laughing. As loudly as I can.
"Yes, it worked. Now I want to kill myself so I never have to see your smile again."
He moves closer to me and whispers in my ear:
"Let's see who has the last laugh," his rough and low voice echoing in the pit of my stomach.
I haven't been with anyone for over three years. I forgot how it feels to have someone's body on top of me. And he noticed it. Fuck.
"You're the last person I'll ever end up in bed with," I wink and get on the bus that finally pulls up.
When I take my seat by the window and see him staring at me with his penetrating brown eyes like the trunk of an ancient tree, I pretend to be struck to the core. A smile spreads across his face, dimpling his cheeks, and I smile too, and then take my hand out of my pocket and give him my middle finger.
Your spell does not work on me, Prince Charming. Indeed, if someone was choosing to draw the prince in the Shrek cartoon, they were familiar with this Mr. "everyone's favourite, who thinks that one smile will knock anyone off their feet". The only thing is that his hairstyle is shorter and his hair is darker, almost perfectly brown.
But not so perfect that you would faint for it. For some reason, I'm sure the donkey was also drawn from his face. With his hair seemingly randomly unstyled and flying in all directions, he spent the whole morning trying to look like "I'm so cool I don't even need a comb". Though I can't help but notice his sharp cheekbones, which the most famous sculptors would fight over to get the right to sculpt his statue. His confident gaze is still directed at me and it seems like I can still feel his warm breath on me.
I turn away and close my eyes, trying to focus on other thoughts. I wish I hadn't left my headphones in the room.
I feel like I'm drowning. Slowly, but so painfully, the abyss is pulling me deeper and deeper. Day by day, my time bomb, or as normal people call it, "heart", is slowly killing me. Every day I lose my chance to live. And the worst part is that I don't even worry about it. I do not care. I have nothing to live for. Yes, I am selfish because my family loves me and I should live at least for them, but I have no place in this world.
No more.
That day changed everything and forever. Changed me. Broke. Destroyed. Took away any will to live and strength to fight. I didn’t just lose a part of myself, I lost the whole universe. I don't want to cry, because even tears are tired of flowing from my eyes.
I take the phone from my hands and start flipping through the gallery in search of a book I once saved to read.
My breathing slows down. I deleted all the photos, as my psychologist advised me. But I forgot about this photo. I am eighteen, we are standing with Denys, and he hugs my waist, I show a finger on which a huge diamond is visible. He proposed to me and I felt what happiness is.
2018
We celebrated my eighteenth birthday, and if someone had told me a few years ago that I would have the perfect boyfriend, lots of friends, and an accepted application to the university where we would soon all be going to study together, I would have burst into tears of laughter.
Although then I also cried, but from happiness.
"You are the best sister in the world, and I know that I am far from a perfect brother, and that you miss your father as often as I do, but I always tried to replace him for you."
Well, that's the end of makeup. I cried like crazy. And although I almost never allow myself to show emotions, it was still my birthday then.
Denys hugged me, and stupid Sebastian couldn’t finish his surprisingly amazing speech.
"You always knew me better than anyone else in the whole world, even more than I know myself, when I was hurt, I felt it inside, and when you were hurt, you are everything to me, I love you from your first day and forever." Sebastian put the microphone aside and approached me.
"I love you," I said.
"So," Denys took the microphone in his hands and went on stage, all eyes were focused on him.
And of course, it was impossible to tear them off, he was one hundred and eighty-six centimetres tall and weighed eighty kilograms. And add to all of this he was training in the gym and the charming smile that was always on his face.
"I don't remember the day we met, but I’ve never regretted it. You are my light, my universe, and I hope it will remain so forever. You're not like everyone else, I realised that when in seventh grade, after I didn't take you with my friends for a bike ride, I saw that my tires were flat, and then I realised it again when your fist flew into my face. I fell in love with you on the first day, and then I fell in love when you beat up Sophia for looking at me. And then I fell in love again when I saw you protecting a little cat from dogs on the street. I have fallen in love with you again and again every day, and plan to do so for the rest of my life. "
Again everything in the world froze, again only we remained, only me and Denys, who is now standing in front of me on one knee.
"If you say yes to me, then I will be the happiest man in the world. "
"Aren't you the happiest now?"
"Ami," sighed Sebastian and twenty other people who were present there.
"Yes," I finally said. "Yes, yes, and I will continue to say this until the end of our days."
Denys got up and put a ring on my finger, it was just a huge diamond. We dissolved in one kiss, we became one, we couldn't get enough of each other, and it seems we never would.
Everyone raised their glasses of champagne, I smiled at my mother, who was already wiping her face from tears and taking pictures of us, and Svyat, who was trying to calm my mother down.
I’m glad that they met each other, and although it hurts me terribly to realise that my father should have been in his place, but Svyat is also a part of our family. He loves and protects my mother, and I can't ask for more.
The same year, 2018
We packed things in boxes and couldn't wait until we moved to Kyiv, where our flat with Denys was already waiting for us, given to us by his parents.
I adore them.
"How much more? " Denys sighed tiredly. The weather was terribly hot today.
I turned and looked at the closet, which was completely filled with my things.
"A lot," I smiled and put my hands on my hips, starting to count the boxes.
"I'm tired." It was Sebastian.
"Don't whine."
"I'm going to bring lemonade, who wants?" "Me," Denys raised his hand.
"Let's have a foam party here and order sushi, "I said sarcastically. "No lemonades, we don't have time for anything anyway."
"Dude, good luck with her," Sebastian held out his hand to Denys, and he shook it.
"How fun. Let’s see who laughs last or who will sleep on the ground today," I winked at Denys.
"It's just a joke, my love," he stood up and kissed me on the cheek.
"By the time we finally move to Kyiv, studying will have already begun."
"And where did you learn to be so… " Sebastian pursed his lips, because he knew that if he said something wrong, the slipper would fly right into his face. "Nice ", he smiled gracefully.
"From Mother Teresa."
"This is noticeable."
"So, you take these two boxes, and you Seb - these two," I pointed to the boxes lying on the ground. "And I will take these."
"Ami, they are very heavy for you, it’s better to give them to me," Denys began to say, but he knew that it was almost impossible to convince me of something.
So I picked up the boxes and started going down. Although I don't remember what happened next, because I never reached the first floor.
At some point, I felt a terrible pain in my heart, one step, another, and I'm already lying on the ground unconscious. A broken arm, terrible bruises but if only those were the only problems.
***
Three months have passed since then. We never moved to Kyiv, but I didn't leave the hospital either.
"She is second in line for a donor heart, but you have to realise that the chances are very small."
Now I didn't have to eavesdrop on everything, like then, eight years ago, but I would rather not hear anything.
Coronary heart disease. Usually, this disease is characteristic of people over forty years old, but I am lucky. In the first months, doctors tried to cure me with some new medicine, my mother offered to take me abroad, but the situation only worsened.
"Acute heart failure. "
I didn't want to see anyone, I started having a terrible depression, and Denys was the only one I needed at that time.
Sebastian always looked like the walking dead. He has already lost his father and simply cannot bear it if he loses me.
This only made it more painful for me. Not that I was afraid of death, I just didn't want to leave them alone. I knew that if my heart for transplantation wouldn’t be found in a short period of time, then I simply had no chance of survival.
"Promise me that you'll live for me, promise that you'll be happy," I said to Denys, when he held my hand, he spent all his time by my side, only going home to change clothes. We postponed our studies for a year.
In a year, only one of us will live in that flat in Kyiv and go to the university of our dreams.
He looked at me with tearful eyes, now he no longer looked like that dream boy, his face had lost weight, there were constant bruises under his eyes, but still he remained the most beautiful in the world.
"I will always live only for you."
I turned my head to the side and cried quietly. I couldn't take everything that was happening.
They tried to smile, did everything to help me, but the efforts were in vain.
"I talked to my parents, they found the perfect hospital for Amelia in Israel," I heard Denys's voice.
"In her condition, it’s too dangerous to transfer her somewhere. "
"Is it not dangerous to sit back and watch her die?" Denys shouted.
I knew that he was just a little bit short of killing the doctor and taking me out of the country himself.
And I continued to lay, looking at the wall. Now, indeed, everyone has ceased to exist for me. Amelia was gone. That girl who is not afraid of anything was gone in an instant. Instead, another Amelia appeared, who fell asleep thinking that this was her last day and was afraid not to open her eyes in the morning.
"You have to eat something, sunshine." Denys tried to feed me again.
I was losing weight like crazy, but there was nothing I could do about it. Although I realised that I needed to stay strong and healthy but I couldn’t force myself.
"I brought a laptop, shall we watch a movie? " I was silent. I closed my eyes and was silent.
"Then I'll read you your favourite book, okay? "
I continued to be silent, but Denys didn’t stop. He read me a book as if it were some kind of spell that would help me get back on my feet. I was afraid to look into his eyes, because in them, I saw only pain, they were no longer blue, they became like glass, they hid so many untold secrets behind them
It's a pity that I didn't learn one of them before everything happened.
A week later, the news came that a heart donor had been found that was a perfect match for me. I asked the doctor to repeat his words, but I couldn’t believe it for a long time.
"Today we will conduct an operation, you will return to normal life," he said for probably the tenth time, and I sat as if enchanted.
I couldn’t believe it. Then, when I had time to say goodbye to everyone, bury myself in my thoughts and accept the fact that all my plans will never come true, you say that an ideal donor with an ideal heart was found.
That was a miracle.
On that, the happiest day for me, I was alone. There was no mum, no Sebastian, no Denys. They ignored my text messages, and I didn't understand what was going on.
On that happiest day of my life, I would rather die than allow what was about to happen.
November eleventh, 2018
That day, the sky cried, and so did I.
My second birthday, my best memory and my worst horror. Denys was nowhere to be found, nor was Sebastian. My mother held my hand while I cried, and Svyat sat in the corner of the room and didn’t know what to do.
"Why aren't they here? " I asked.
"I don't know, sweetheart." My mother cried as well, in her eyes I saw even stronger pain than ever.
In half an hour, the operation will begin, and who knows if it will be successful, and even if it is, the first day will be decisive for me.
The nurse came into the room and smiled. My heart was beating wildly, my hands were shaking, and my mouth was silently praying.
"Everything will be fine," my mother shouted when they finally took me out of the room.
To say that I was afraid is an understatement. The road to the operating room seemed like an eternity. I closed my eyes, for me, it will only take a few seconds, no matter how long the operation will be.
The anaesthesiologist started counting from ten to one, and with each number my eyelids got heavier.
I didn't dream anything, I didn't feel anything, there was just darkness, complete darkness. And then a light, so bright that it blinded my eyes, it beckoned me and scared me at the same time.
"Amelia," someone touched my shoulder.
The eyes hurt terribly, and the whole body too, is it all over yet?
I was connected to a thousand tubes that kept me alive, but I didn't feel alive.
"Amelia, can you see us?" asked the doctor.
I opened my eyes, nodded and closed them again, there was an endotracheal tube from the ventilator in my mouth, in short, without it, I would have died.
Although, as I found out later, the doctors saved my life, my heart stopped for a moment and I almost died.
It would be better not to be saved.
I finally opened my eyes, everything was floating, but I saw the one with whom all my thoughts were occupied.
Denys.
"How do you feel?" asked a voice definitely not similar to Denys. He sat down next to me and took my hand, now I could see his face.
It was Sebastian. But not at all like himself. His eyes were red, his cheeks were wet with tears, his hands were shaking, and his lips were pursed. And I could see bruises and cuts on his face. Was he fighting?
"I know you will hate us, but now you need to come to your senses and calm down, the heart was perfect, there could not be a better donor in the world, and if you are an obedient girl, you'll be released from the hospital soon," he held my hand, but I freed it.
I gestured for a notebook and a pen to be given to me. I can't speak, but I still know how to write.
Sebastian immediately understood what I wanted and gave me what I asked for.
"Where's Denys?" I wrote
It may be crooked, but as for a person who was on the verge of life and death - it's just perfect.
Sebastian lowered his head, I looked at my mother looking for hope in her eyes, she also lowered her head.
"Did he dump me?"
My hands were shaking, tears were already pouring from my eyes, if I don't get an answer now, I'm going to stick this pen in Sebastian's hands and disconnect myself out of these breathing tubes.
Again no answer.
"Go away."
Sebastian looked at me in confusion, but I turned my head to the side.
"Please..." he whispered.
"Out, everyone!"
I wrote and threw the notebook and pen at them with all my might. I wanted to scream, and I wanted to tear out this damned heart. Where did this ideal donor come from for me? Who asked him to die?
Several days passed, I was on the mend. If I may say so. Even though I was disconnected from the breathing tubes, I didn't want to eat anything or see anyone. As soon as someone from family or friends stepped on my doorstep, I would give them a murderous look and they would go home. "Why did he leave me?" I thought, and all the time I held on to the ring on my finger.
This is probably some kind of joke. I'm sure Denys would never do such a thing in his life, he loved me more than anyone else in the whole world. Maybe he was preparing a surprise and didn't tell anyone about it.
I didn't know, but I promised myself to wait.
And I waited.
One week, another. I fell asleep with tears in my eyes and pain in my heart, woke up and looked at the door all day hoping that he would enter.
But he never entered. Not then, not ever again.
"By the end of this year, you will be completely back to normal, and next year you will be in the first year in university, as you dreamed," mum smiled and helped pack things into boxes.
"Where are you?"
"Text me."
"I love you."
"Denys, you are my life."
Every day I wrote thousands of text messages to Denys starting from
"I love you, you are my universe, you are all that I have" and ending with
"go to hell, I hate you, how could you abandon a sick girl?"
I clutched the phone in my hands, if it wasn't so expensive I would have thrown it at the wall. But I think it will be cheaper to hit the wall with my head.
I said goodbye to all the staff, during those months they became my second family.
"Don't forget us," said my nurse, when she hugged me for the last time.
"Never," I smiled.
Mom started treating me like I was a brand new glass vase that could shatter at any second. Although to some extent I was like that. I didn't know how to deal with this situation, but I believed that I would find Denys and be able to talk to him.
"Shall we go to Denys? " I asked when we were already driving home.
Mom pretended not to hear me and continued driving.
And I hoped that it was all a joke and Denys was waiting for me at home with a surprise.
But he was not on the first floor, nor in my room, not even in the attic.
I lay down on the bed and started crying again, I lost count how many times today. But my heart didn't hurt, my soul hurt, my lungs hurt, everything but my heart hurt. It fought desperately for my life as I continued to curse whoever had given it to me.
"Honey," my mother sat down next to me.
I knew what she was going to tell me, but I absolutely refused to listen to her words.
"How did it happen?" with heavy and burning tears in my eyes, I gradually lost the ability to breathe.
"Accident," she whispered. "He was called at night and told some information about you, he was running to tell you, it was raining heavily and…" she took a deep breath. "He collided with another car, the injuries were fatal. He tried so hard, Ami, for you to live. He stayed awake at night, contacted friends from other countries, looked for the best doctors abroad. "
I gasped for air. I forgot how to breathe, how to speak, how to see and realise. All the pain I went through in a few months was nothing compared to what I felt then. Somewhere deep in my soul, I knew that Denys's heart was beating inside me, but I refused to believe it.
When I realised one more thing, I thought I would lose my mind or shoot myself at the same moment.
"Funeral. I wasn't even at the funeral," I shouted at the top of my lungs, my mother looked at me with frightened eyes, but her look would never reflect my inner pain. "You lied to me, hid the truth, and I wasn't even at the funeral".
"You needed rest."
"Rest? " I was ready to destroy everything in my path.
"We protected you."
They were protecting me from what? From my love? From the truth that was about to fall on me and trample my life once and for all.
"Leave me alone," I said quietly.
If I could put all the pain that was destroying me from the inside into two words, then I did. My mother didn't try to calm me anymore, and I didn't know what to do with this truth that destroyed me forever.
I stopped feeling the ends of my fingers, I stopped orienting myself in space, my head was spinning, I felt like I was on a never-ending roller coaster.
And then I felt something under my body. Something very thin and light. I ran my hand over the bed and saw that.
A letter. I quickly wiped my tears and started reading. It was the moment that I should have died again...
"One day, the sun stopped shining for me. It was exactly three minutes and fifty seconds while the doctors brought you back to consciousness. Your beautiful green eyes did not look at me, and your always warm hands were cold. At that moment, I realised that I never want this to happen again in my life.
To say that I loved you means to abandon all our beautiful days spent together. I belonged to you from the first day of my birth, my heart always beat for you, and my lungs breathed because I knew that tomorrow I would see you. No love song in the world has yet described my feelings for you, it’s something higher than simple love, it’s something created in heaven and instilled in our souls. No writer in the world has yet managed to find the words with which I would confess my feelings to you. I love you, and I don't know how to imagine my life without you. I am writing this letter without even knowing if you will ever read it. I would do anything so that you could live. You don't deserve this pain, we don't deserve it. If I could die and give you my heart, I certainly would. I promise I will do everything to help you."
My heart broke into thousands of pieces that were scattered all over the world, and even if I wanted to put them together, I would definitely cut my hand because of their sharpness.
My head was spinning l, my chest tightened, it seemed that if I could, I would throw out all my internal organs right on the bed.
I touched my heart… his heart , I felt it beating…
I took a chair and threw it at the window, it broke, but that didn’t stop me. I threw and broke everything in my path, I cried, I screamed, I tried to tear out my hair, I tried to tear out my soul, not to feel it, not to feel anything.
He gave me his heart.
One hit on the wall.
His heart.
Second.
Blood poured down my hands, the pain was unbearable, but it didn’t overshadow the inner one, which was now tearing me to pieces.
"Ami," someone's arms wrapped around my waist. "Amelia," my mom's crying was unbearable.
I sunk into the ground and quietly looked at the wall. There were no more tears on my face, only eyes full of pain that no longer wanted to see the light. I touched my heart again. I didn’t want to live with it. I have rather killed myself, but I would never have lived with what didn’t belong to me.