Prologue
If you’re reading this, I’ve finally let you have the page. I wanted to give you a clean one, but I keep finding something wrong with it. This is the best I’ve managed.
Liora,
I̶ k̶n̶e̶w̶ I̶ l̶o̶v̶e̶d̶ y̶o̶u̶ t̶h̶e̶ m̶o̶m̶e̶n̶t̶ I̶ s̶a̶w̶ y̶o̶u̶.̶
That’s a lie. I woke up chained to your ceiling and tried to work out how to get away from you. You told me I talked too much for someone who’d nearly bled out. I remember being offended, mostly because you were right.
I don’t know when it changed. I wish I did. I’d like to be able to give you that, an exact moment, something that I could point to and say 'there that's when'. But I kept watching the door after you left. Then you came back wet and tired with things you’d carried all that way... for me, and I started trying to make you stay a little longer.
I don’t think I ever thanked you properly for that. Not just the stitches. Coming back.
I̶ d̶o̶n̶‘̶t̶ k̶n̶o̶w̶ w̶h̶a̶t̶ I̶’̶d̶ d̶o̶ w̶i̶t̶h̶o̶u̶t̶ y̶o̶u̶.̶
But I do know. I spent six weeks doing it. I got through the days and I worked like a zombie. I knew you were alive, and I told myself that had to be enough. Some nights I was so tired I thought I’d sleep, then I’d turn over and reach for you. There wasn’t anybody there.
I wanted to hear you say my name. Even angrily... At least then I’d have been close enough for you to say it.
When you crossed the river, I thought you might knock me down before you kissed me. You called me thinner. Terrible. An absolute bastard. I could barely answer you. You had your hands on my face, and I was trying not to hold you so tightly that you’d notice mine were shaking too.
I should’ve told you then. Without making you drag it out of me.
I love you, Liora.
Do you remember putting my grandfather’s token on? You had to loosen the cord. We were hiding under a rock, and you told me I didn’t have to give it to you. Then you tucked it under that torn poncho, and I wanted to ask you to take it out again so I could keep looking at it.
I’d hidden it in my clothes since I was fourteen. I gave it to you because I wanted you to have something of mine that I hadn’t been ordered to carry.
I̶f̶ t̶h̶i̶n̶g̶s̶ h̶a̶d̶ b̶e̶e̶n̶ d̶i̶f̶f̶e̶r̶e̶n̶t̶,̶
No. I want the you I have now. With your pack and your work and the way you put your cold feet against me as though I’ve agreed to it. I have, by the way. You can keep doing that.
I still want that beach. I want to be there when you see the sea for the first time. I keep picturing you walking down to it before I’ve put the bags down, then turning around because I’m taking too long. I want you to turn around and find me coming after you. No six weeks. Just me, carrying too much, trying to catch up.
There’s more. I’ve already filled another page, and if I start fixing this one again, you’ll never get either of them.
Keep this, even with the bits I’ve crossed out. When I ask for it back, tell me no.
Yours,
Bram
interesting