A KINGDOM OF DEAD HEARTS

Tonight is the night.

Airin failed to concentrate on anything else that day. That was the only thought that filled her mind: Tonight is the night. I will see him again.

She had been at work again since last week after taking a month-long recuperative period. Recuperative period that was needed because she was gone for three months—just gone with no trace, no news.

Her apartment was tidy, her fridge was stocked, people she knew had said that she had showed no sign that she had planned to leave her apartment for months. So at least to other people, she was gone, and last month she was found by the edge of The Greens, the city forest. She was unconscious, dressed exactly like she did the night she disappeared.

Except she was not just gone.

She knew exactly where she had been and what she had done in those months that people here thought she was gone.

She had saved the universe. This universe.

All that had happened to her must remain a secret though. She had promised him she would keep her silence. And that was alright. It was for the good of the universe here.

She had said that she did not remember anything – to the doctors, the police, the psychiatrists, the psychologists, Dad, her workplace, her bestfriend Stella. It was a blatant lie, but she was fine with it. It was all for the better.

The thing was even if she did tell them what truly had happened to her, there was no way they would believe her anyway. They would think she was delusional, or had some sort of a massive psychotic breakdown.

What had happened to her was when the border between myths and reality blurred. She had seen with her own eyes, experienced with her whole senses, that myths, some of them at least, were true.

She glanced at her left wrist, at a scar of about 10cm that went lengthwise from the base of her hand. A physical proof engraved on her skin: A battle scar. It had become a reminder of her time, her battle there.

Nobody thought much about that scar though. They checked it, decided it was healed, then that was it. After some thorough medical checkups and lengthy psychological testing sessions they decided that she had some sort of dissociative amnesia moment—dissociative fugue triggered by the inability to process grieving trauma of losing a mother, that was the conclusion they reached—in other words, she had a sort of amnesia and wandered off because of the trauma of losing her mom.

She was fine with that diagnosis. People did look at her sometimes with a kind of sad, sympathetic glance, as if they were saying: That poor girl. She lost her mom and she went nuts. She must be so traumatized to just wander off like that …

But enough about her diagnosis. She decided to focus on what mattered the most to her now. How wonderful it was to be at work again! She aced all kinds of tests they required her to take, got a clean bill of health from the doctor, the psychologist as well as the psychiatrist, and she stood in front of her classroom again. To teach her young students. It was just the best feeling in the world.

When she looked at their face, the drawings they made, the songs they sang, the imaginative story they invented, the dance they did, she knew that what she had done when other people thought she was gone was worth it.

But tonight. Tonight was the night. He would come to her, and she had missed him so much.

He had told her that he loved her.

He had asked her if she really had to go.

She said yes, she had to go because her world was here in her own universe, a world she could not bear to let go. Her students, her friends, her Dad even.

His heart was broken, but he hid it well, he smiled and nodded. He let her go with a promise that he would come to her on this night. A night that he chose because today was her birthday.

Airin sighed, she did feel nervous. Would he be the same person she had come to know? She shook her head, trying to chase away all the intrusive thought.

She looked around in her tiny apartment. All was neat, clean, good. The origami crane, the one he folded and gave to her, was on the coffee table. He would love to know that she had kept it dust-free all these months.

Then she looked at herself in the mirror. She looked fine, she wore her maroon silk knee-length, tube-top dress, the only dress she had among the piles of jeans and shirts in her clothing cabinet. Her hair washed, dried, combed, and neatly side-braided. A pinkish lip balm/lip tint completed her look. She wanted to look pretty for him.

The mirror did not lie though. She had gotten thinner the past few months, her collar bones had poked out more, her jaws seemed to be more defined, her breasts did not fill up the tube top dress as tight as it used to, and her skin had gotten more pale.

For some reason, she was not worried. He would not mind at all. She was sure of that. She was not a goddess, but she was Airin, and no goddess could ever be like her. That was what he had told her.

Her silver necklace with glistening round jade pendant now got her full attention. Its beautiful green colour contrasted her pale skin. She smiled and caressed the pendant.

The jade pendant that she got from Mom, and Mom from her Mom, and so on. Generations of women in Mom’s side of the family had worn it before her. It had stayed with them as they withstood all kinds of storm, it had absorbed their emotions, tears, anger, disgust, joy … all. All those wrapped up in one little unassuming pendant. Such a gentle object, yet powerful enough to take down evil.

Loud gurgling sound was heard from outside, along with a gentle shake of her apartment. It got louder and louder.

Another metro train had just passed by outside by her apartment.

Her breath got faster as she thought of something else: The one thing she wanted to tell him. Tonight. She had to tell him her answer to his question – the one he asked right before they parted ways last time. She had had enough time to think about it, and she had thought about it carefully. Her whole body tingled just thinking about it, and missing him had been hard on her.

To be honest, the answer had always been there in her heart. Always. But she had gotten so good, so expert, at secondguessing herself that the answer was blurred by her own insecurities.

These months without him had given her a chance to miss him, to think things through in silence, to find her courage …

All that had happened between him and her was nothing short of strange, otherworldly, but spectacular nevertheless. He left his marks in her life that she could not, and would not want to, do away with. Those eyes of him, those magical windows to the wounds behind the gaze, would always captivate her.

Her breathing became faster and her hands trembled in excitement when she she smelled it. The smell of forest. Fresh leaves. Wet soil. Damp, just-after-the-rain smell of forest. The temperature in her apartment seemed to drop by a couple degrees.

He is here.

Then there was a knock at her apartment door.

She caught her breath. She had missed him so, so much. She walked fast to the door, took a deep breath, and opened it.

He stood there. Strong-yet-vulnerable, shy-yet-curious, wounded-yet-longing for healing. Bashful and handsome in his million little shreds of past hurt.

His blue eyes widened, and his smile was sheepish, as always. “I have missed you, Airin,” was all he said before Airin stepped forward, lunged forward was more like it, and embraced him tight. When her body touched his, she remembered again how tall he was that she had to tiptoe just a tad from the floor to reach his shoulder.

“And I have missed you, Xander …” she whispered as she circled her arms around his broad shoulders, closed her eyes tight, then ran her fingers along his neck and hair. His arms tightened in a circle around her shoulder and waist, pulling her so close to him she could hear his heartbeat, a proof that he was a human with a heart too, like her. He bowed his head and rested it on her right shoulder. She could feel his exhaustion just from that.

And she saw the black cloth bandage that wrapped his right palm leaving his fingers out. “Your wound … has not healed yet?” she asked with a mixture of worry and curiosity.

Xander stared at her with such serenity then shook his head. “I do not think it will ever heal …”

“Xander?” something about that wound that made her sad now. Deep sadness that was more than just worry. She could not explain why.

“It is alright. I can withstand this wound,” he said while the same hand with bandage tightened his embrace of her body. She sighed and decided to believe him.

She closed her eyes, then opened her eyes wide and stared beyond Xander’s shoulders, and saw outside her apartment door the forest with trees that grew in perfect circle. Beautiful and enchanted. There was a straight path from her apartment door to a source of light in the middle of the forest. The well was there. Xander’s portal to come to her. But she did not care much about it now. She had seen it all before.

She closed her eyes again and her heartbeats moved in harmony with his.

They were quiet for some time, just enjoying the fact that at that moment, they were together again.

“How have you been?” he finally asked right to her ear – he sounded curious, warm, and he cared to know.

She looked up, stared into his eyes as their forehead touched each other. She answered in a whisper,“I am alright. It has been strange to be back here again, but I am … working again.”

“Those children must have missed you,” he caressed her cheek.

“They do. And I have missed them too.” She took a deep breath, looked up to his eyes, and smiled. “All that we have done has not gone to waste, Xander. Those young ones are so inspired, so full of creativity, so alive …”

Xander nodded. His eyes darted across her apartment for a bit, seemingly trying to remember this place. Then he looked at Airin with renewed seriousness. “Do you have the answer for me as you promised before you left me last time?”

Airin nodded a couple solid nods. She had the answer indeed, and she had no doubt about it. Her palms cupped Xander’s jaws and brought his face even closer to her as she whispered, “The answer is yes.”

Xander exhaled in such a clear relief, as if he had been holding his breath for some time in nervousness of waiting for her answer, as if her answer had decided his fate and course of life from now on.

He breathed faster, whispered a hoarse thank you, clasped her hand, and brought it to his lips. He kissed it gently and his lips lingered there. The warmth of rugged Xander startled her at first, but she welcomed it like a bulb of flower buried deep in frozen soil and now searched for the sunlight.

His lips slowly moved up and found her lips. She did not move as her hands tightened around Xander, and kisses came like rolling waves.

“Airin … I …” Xander whispered, and Airin did not let him finish his words, and let the words be swallowed by her lips.

She was in Xander’s private world, a world noone he ever let enter, and him in hers, reigniting memories of corporeal pleasure in every inch of her body. They existed, entangled in their own world–a dizzying world of quiet air and gasping breaths, of yearning touch and blazing desire, of halted whisper and hushed moan, of love that was fought for, and found.

For them, this night came at the tail of various events that had started some time ago. A new chapter of their life began tonight—a chapter that would be filled with a long journey of healing, of learning what love was and how to love.

They had been through a lot before tonight, and theirs was a story that had traversed two universes, two worlds, and brought two wounded hearts to be one wholesome one.

Their story was that of war, of fighting to survive and to keep hope alive, no matter how small it started as.

This was the story of what had happened in their lives before tonight …