Chapter Thirty-Five #6
There’s a fire under my skin at the sound of his distress, burning me up from the inside with helplessness.
If there were a person in the room with us that I could point at and wrestle to the ground to stop his agony, I would have them in a headlock so fast they wouldn’t know what hit them.
But this isn’t the kind of thing that can be tackled into submission. Brute strength has no use here.
Never mind that my brain caught onto Luke’s desire to have never come back—or that if he hadn’t, he never would have met me…
That’s irrelevant right now in the face of his grief.
My soul recognizes the pit of despair he’s in as a match to my own so many years ago when I was ready to leave this world behind.
It brings an unexpected well of tears to my eyes as I feel his agony.
But it also lights a fire in my soul with a desire to make it better, no matter the cost.
“So, let’s go,” I say suddenly. I’m not exactly sure where it comes from. The words seem to leave my mouth as if they were pulled from me against my will, the idea unformed but somehow right, popping into my brain like it was planted there by some outside force.
Luke sniffs, turning to look at me over his shoulder. “What?”
“Let’s go,” I repeat, more firmly this time, as the idea takes root with an urgency I can’t explain. “Why don’t we take a trip and go there?”
“To New York?” He huffs in disbelief. “You hate cities, remember?”
“But I don’t hate you,” I reason earnestly, brushing my thumb over his cheek. Quite the opposite, in fact, I think. “We should go. I want to go. I’d love to meet your friends…to see what your life is like when you’re not here.”
Luke shakes his head, dejected. “I can’t.”
“Why not?”
“I can’t afford it, for one. I can’t afford to take the time off work, and I don’t have any vacation days.”
“I’ll pay for it.” I insist. “You don’t need to pay for anything. And you can call in sick at work. No one will know the difference.”
“But….” Luke starts, blinking rapidly with bewilderment. “I can’t just leave.”
“Why not? It’ll be like a vacation. What have you got going on that’s so important you can’t skip town for at least a week?”
Luke stares at me silently as if he’s trying to determine if I’ve been abducted by aliens and replaced with a shape-shifting lizard person in the form of his boyfriend.
“Are you serious?” he asks cautiously. “You really want to go?”
I smile, my eyes searching Luke’s face in the dark. It’s hard to miss the vulnerability behind his eyes, the dare to hope for something he didn’t think was possible before this moment.
In the back of my mind, I know I’m actively driving the final nail in the coffin of certainty that our paths will soon diverge. This will only prove to me how incompatible we are, killing any last hope of us ever staying together, but if there’s a chance to make him happy now, I have to take it.
“I want to see your world,” I say softly. Luke lets out a blubbery laugh, and it’s easy to hear the quiet relief in it.
It’s noticeable how this spontaneous suggestion instantly brightens his mood. The storm cloud over his head totally evaporates, revealing a new man with how sunny and refreshed he is as he goes on to plan out our upcoming trip. It’s the freest I’ve seen him in days.
He talks for almost an hour with unrepressed joy as we curl back up in each other’s arms under the covers.
He tells me exactly what he wants us to do while we’re there.
We’ll go to the Met and see some shows on Broadway.
He’s got friends who can get us in to see Hamilton and Hadestown during the week for the matinees because she owes him a favor.
Then he gushes about his favorite place to get boba tea in Chinatown and the best bakery in Little Italy with this one apricot cheesecake that is to die for.
Then there’s all the street art in East Village and around the Lower East Side, not to mention the bars and clubs…
I listen contentedly as he lists everything of interest until it seems impossible we’ll be able to accomplish it all in only a week’s time.
It’s palpable how excited he is as he describes everything he needs me to see, almost like the idea of bringing me into his world is too important to get it wrong.
I feel a swell of pride for being able to give Luke back a bit of this happiness that he’s been missing.
Seeing the sadness disappear is the most beautiful thing in the world.
My body relaxes to the sound of his saccharine voice while his fingers play with my hair.
I can feel myself drifting in and out of consciousness, my thoughts losing clarity, and I feel myself being pulled deeper into oblivion.
I can tell when I start dreaming, still on the edge of wakefulness, but floating between realities as Luke’s colorful descriptions come to life.
His gentle caress and the warmth of our bodies being thoroughly entangled have such a soothing effect that there’s no point in fighting it.
And in the midst of this sinking deeper into the void of sleep, I dream I hear Luke whisper the words, “I love you,” against my ear as loud and clear as if they were really spoken, and it makes my skin tingle with euphoria. God, how I wish it were real.