After experiencing a life-altering tragedy, Emersyn feels as if her world has collapsed. Attempting to accept her new reality, Emersyn wonders how she can possibly keep going when it feels like her life ended months ago. Until she meets Haven, and s...
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Seconds turn to minutes. Minutes turn to hours. Hours to days.
In the blink of an eye and an eternity all wrapped into one, the days slowly and excruciatingly turn into a full week of life without Haven by my side.
The world does not wait on her. Despite feeling like my life has been on pause ever since Haven was first admitted into the hospital, I am forced to look around and face the fact that the earth is still spinning. Despite my pain, the world goes on. The earth never stops spinning, a lesson I have been forced to learn that is bittersweet, both wickedly cruel and yet hauntingly beautiful.
Tyler keeps me updated, though there isn't much for him to catch me up with. Haven's state simply hasn't changed in days. Eventually, even the Hartleys' return to their home. With Haven unconscious, I suppose there is not much to do when stuck in a hospital waiting room. Mrs. Hartley promises Haven will not be left alone. She says she'll find a way to get me visitation, that there has to be some sort of loophole around the family-only rule. Until then I just . . . wait. The waiting feels like a slow, torturous death.
Most evenings, I find myself hiding out in Haven's tree house. Her letter is never far out of my reach, and now it burns like a fire in my back pocket. I like feeling her near, and being here in this tree house is the only way I can find any semblance of her presence.
The sun was sinking when I first arrived. Its light is long gone now, replaced by a crescent moon and a navy sky speckled with glittering stars. I lay beneath them, with my head propped on a pillow Haven left here beneath the window. The wooden floorboards make my back ache, but I don't mind.
Alone with nothing more than the company of the moon and stars, I fall prey to my thoughts.
My mind is elsewhere, stuck in a hospital I left long ago. Watching the stars twinkle above, I think of Dad. I have been thinking of him more often than not lately. I suppose what Haven has gone through has been a reminder of sorts. Closing my eyes, I picture her in the final moment we shared. Opening them, I see my father in a similar room, an identical bed, suffering an eerily similar injury.
As the image of my father during his last precious moments here on earth comes to mind, I await tears that shockingly do not come. I am crying less, which is an odd thing to get used to. I am used to the tears. I am used to suffocating pain, feeling unable to breathe, an ache in my chest that never fades. I am not used to the feeling overtaking me now . . . peace.
When I left the house, Beau had stopped by. I wonder about my mother. This past week has been hard on her as well. I know she's remembering the same hell I have been reliving. In and out of the hospital, running on hope, succumbing to fear. I wonder if Beau senses this. I wonder if he is remembering his own loss. I wonder if they are somewhere together, finding comfort in their broken parts becoming whole simply by no longer having to be alone.
The thought does not ignite a fiery rage within me.
I was angry when I first learned of Haven's condition. At first, I had thought I was angry with her. Angry that she had kept something so big from me. Blindsided by her secret keeping. However, I now know my anger had been a mask. A big red band-aid protecting me from deeper unresolved feelings. Truly, I was not angry.
