Super Avenged: Only Human

A few nights later, I woke up when I heard the bedroom door slide across the carpet as Miya opened it. I groggily opened one eye halfway to see her tip-toe out of the room and close the door just as quietly behind her. I shoved myself upright with one hand, running my other hand down my face. I decided that if Miya didn’t come back within five minutes, I would go and check on her.

Her mom and her two older brothers, Jackson and Ross, both came to see her the day she came back home. She’d only had to stay in the hospital overnight. They’d discharged her from the hospital at nine o’clock the next morning. The three of them didn’t stay very long. Her mom still managed to hug her about fifty times, though. Miya didn’t talk much, and they didn’t insist on her talking about anything.

In fact, Miya didn’t talk much to me either. We exchanged a few words to each other every once in a while, but other than that Miya was completely silent. I let her have her silence. When she wanted to talk to me, she would let that be known, and I would be there to listen. Miya mostly spent her days translating her emotions into art. Over the past few days, she’d already painted several small pictures and drawn about fifteen sketches. She hadn’t been outside much yet, though, so she hadn’t taken many pictures.

I tried my best not to suffocate her. All I wanted to do was hold her in my arms and never let her go again, but I knew that wasn’t at all what she wanted. She seemed a little distant from me anyway. I decided that was probably just how she did while she recovered from pain. I had to physically stop myself from drawing her into my arms every time she got close enough for me to do so. I would let her get closer at her own pace.

Five minutes quickly went by. I slid out from beneath the covers and walked over to the bedroom door. As I pulled it open, I heard a small sniffle come from the direction of the couch. I strode quietly over to the couch and turned on the lamp sitting on the end table beside it. Its yellow light instantly illuminated Miya sitting in the center of the couch. She’d curled her knees against her chest, and tears glittered down the cheek I could see. She appeared to be shivering, which was perfectly understandable, since it was October. Miya insisted on keeping the apartment just a little bit cooler than the average house; she said it kept the paint firm so it wouldn’t be all watery.

I grabbed the blanket from the end of the couch and threw it across her body. She curled up into a tighter ball, turning her head as she tried to hide her tears from me. I didn’t say anything quite yet, instead going into the kitchen to make us both a cup of hot chocolate.

When I stepped out of the kitchen ten minutes later with two mugs of hot chocolate, I saw that Miya had pulled the blanket tighter around her. She stared straight ahead at the blank television; her cheeks bloomed scarlet where she’d wiped her tears away continuously. I sat down beside her and held out her cup of hot chocolate. She extracted an arm from beneath the blanket to accept it, taking a cautious sip so she wouldn’t burn her tongue.

“My strength was really waning towards the end there,” she said suddenly, her voice quiet. She took another sip of her drink, staring down into its chocolate brown depths rather than looking at me. A tear dripped off of her jaw to absorb into the blanket. “I began to question how long I could stay strong. Because I knew if you saw my strength, you would find more strength, too. I kept telling myself that the pain wouldn’t be permanent, and that it would eventually fade. But I couldn’t make myself believe it. The pain would fade, but then...well, he’d hit me again, and the pain would be back again. I tried to hide it from you, but I know I failed miserably.”

She took a shuddering breath, brushing her tears away. Still, she hadn’t looked at me, preferring to stare into her mug. She took another sip of the hot chocolate, and another tear dribbled from her jaw.

“Hope was hard to find there,” she continued after several minutes of silence. I took a drink of hot chocolate; it was the perfect temperature. “But I always knew you were out there, always searching for an inkling of a clue as to where I was. That gave me slight hope, but I always needed more than just that knowledge. I kept hoping that any minute you would come barging in like the hero I knew you were, kicking ass and taking names, but when you never did, it just diminished my hope more and more. And I must admit, I started to give up on you.”

I understood that. I had begun to give up on me, too.

“I stopped thinking that way, though. You were still out there, searching for me. I had faith in you that you would find me, too. I stopped anticipating anything happening. I stopped waiting for you to save me. My mindset became that if you saved me, then I’d be saved, but if you never came, I would accept that too. If the latter happened, it wasn’t because you didn’t love me, or that you’d given up. It would just mean that my kidnapper had been smart and covered his tracks, and it wasn’t your fault at all,” Miya continued. She downed the rest of her hot chocolate before leaning across me to put it on the end table. She stuck her arms back underneath the blanket and leaned against my side. I wrapped my arm around her, pressing my lips gently against the top of her head.

“So, what about you?” she asked, finally turning her head to look up at me. Our eyes met, and I suddenly realized that no matter what, our kid would probably have the bluest eyes anyone had ever seen.

“What do you mean?” I replied dumbly, frowning down at her.

“Ohhhh, I see,” Miya said, comprehension dawning on her face. I didn’t have a clue what she comprehended so suddenly. “You’ve become the clam type. I won’t badger you about it...”

“No, what did you mean?” I repeated.

“Well, don’t you have anything to say about what happened to you for the previous three weeks?” Miya asked, her eyes widening innocently. “Surely you didn’t just turn your emotions off.”

“Well...” I began. I struggled to summarize the despair I’d felt ever since she’d been kidnapped, but somehow managed to get it out. And it made sense, too, so that was a plus. By the time I was finished, Miya’s eyes began to cloud with tears again.

“Please, Miya, it’s nothing to cry over. I’m fine now, really,” I pleaded as a tear dripped out. I swept it away with my fingertips, feeling horrible that she’d just finished crying and I’d started up the old tear ducts again.

“Oh, Jimmy,” she murmured, pulling her arms out of her blanket and wrapping them tightly around my neck instead. She pressed a kiss to my cheek and lingered there for several moments before pulling away and burrowing her face into my shoulder. I wrapped my arms back around her, rubbing a hand consolingly up and down her back.

“Really, Miya, it’s okay,” I insisted. “Now that you’re back with me, everything’s alright again.”

Miya pulled away slightly, keeping her arms coiled around my neck. She stared into my eyes, her teeth sinking into her bottom lip.

“Oh, I believe you,” she answered with a nod. “It’s just...” Her lips began to tremble. “...I didn’t realize that you would be so lost without me. It sounds like you had a real rough time without me around. It’s so sweet, it makes me want to cry.”

“Um, babe, you are crying...” I pointed out.

“I know!” she agreed, wiping away her tears. “I just didn’t realize that you cared so much about me that being away from me for so long would cause you so much despair.”

“Of course I care about you,” I said, sweeping a stray lock of hair away from her face. “I love you, Miya.”

Miya leaned forward again, pressing her face into my shoulder. I could feel her warm tears beginning to dampen my shirt.

“A man wouldn’t understand,” she said after a minute or so. Her voice was muffled against the cloth of my t-shirt. “You see, I always knew you cared about me. What I didn’t know was the extent of that care. There are varying degrees of caring about someone. It can range anywhere from I’ll-lend-money-to-that-person caring to I’ll-take-a-bullet-for-that-person caring. And seeing how much despair my absence caused you proves to me just how much you care about me.” She pulled away again to look me in the eyes. “Does that make any sense?”

“A little,” I answered. “I understand what you mean.”

“It’s just that moment where someone realizes something that makes them so happy they can’t help but cry,” Miya continued, obviously trying her hardest to make me understand.

“I get it,” I said with a smile. Miya smiled back, the first smile I’d seen since we rescued her. And that’s when I knew everything between us would be absolute perfection for the rest of our lives.