Daylily

The muscles in my chest were so tight I could barely breathe as I walked through the house. Every step I took caused my heart to gain strength. I felt like if it beat any harder it would crack every bone in my rib cage. Everything inside of me felt so depleted, like I had been buried alive for the last few days and just dug up this morning.

My body ached as I pulled the front door open and forced myself onto the porch. The feeling of the painted wooden boards under my bare feet sent shivers through every nerve in my body. I feel like I hadn’t been outside in days. I had forgotten what the warm kiss of sunshine felt like. I had forgotten that the world around me was continuing to turn as I stayed inside of the house.

I felt my eyes start to wander through the street as I dropped my body onto the front steps. Every house looked the same, untouched by the last twenty years. All of the colors painted onto the homes held the same saturation, all of the bushes were trimmed the same, and all of the cars were the same color. I thought of closing my eyes and begging the universe to put me back to when everything in life was easy. Before my dad’s diagnosis, before Sidney was drafted, before we kissed, before we had any idea that what we had was going to be torn away.

Thoughts started to fill my head as I pulled my knees closer to my torso and rested my chin against my folded arms. I used to sit here on the steps, my hockey stick and skates next to me, waiting to see my best friend round the corner. When he would appear, his arm would stick up in the air and send me a huge wave. We normally met halfway, did our secret handshake, and then headed off to the rink.

The feeling of frozen fingers and toes rushed through me like someone had set my extremities down in ice. I could remember all of the days we ran back to my house and snuggled up with a blanket and hot cocoa in my living room. My dad would set up a space heater near us, put on whatever movie we decided, and give us huge mugs filled to the brim with the warm sugary liquid. I could still see him turn to me, whipped cream covering his top lip, and ask, ‘You think I’ll look good with a playoff beard?’

I would always say no.

Tears were rushing down my face as I thought back to those days. The simplicity and nostalgia of everything was enough to suffocate me. I wanted to sit on the couch without a care in the world. I wanted to be able to turn around and see my dad leaning against the door frame, watching the movie we had on.

Whenever I would convince them to put on Beauty and the Beast, I would always hear my dad softly sing the songs to himself. He always told me he hated that movie, but I knew deep down he enjoyed it.

The ache in my heart was like the plunge of a scalding hot knife.

“Livy,” the sound of my nickname cleared the memories in my head. Chaos started to ensue as I blinked myself back into the present. My chest was knotted in pain from the pound of my heart. A ring started in my ears that got louder and louder with every passing second. I felt like I was in a fog, like someone had exhaled smoke into my eyes.

I tried to blink the haze away. I tried to focus on my surroundings, but all I could do was let myself get consumed by the chaos in my brain and the fire that was running through my veins.

I felt like I was imploding.

“Liv,” the shock of his voice roughly threw me back into reality. When I looked up into his eyes, my body felt like it had finally made impact with the cement after a fifteen story drop. Every inch of me hurt as I straightened my back and looked at him again, my eyes searching over every single pore on his face.

They were all the same.

My lips parted as I carefully moved my hand up to his cheek. It felt like an electric shock as I rested my palm against his cheek and ran my thumb over a few tears that had fallen from his eye. I felt like I was dreaming.

“Hey Sid,” I whispered, my voice cracking as I pushed another tear from his skin.

The brunette looked up at me, his huge hazel eyes holding mine. I felt like I was staring at a projection from my memory. I felt like I was hallucinating. Through all of the years we hadn’t spoken, all of the years we had avoided seeing each other, nothing had changed about his eyes. They were the same bright, playful, hazel pools I would always stare into.

Sidney stood up, his chest rising and falling in a rhythm that would be seen after a lengthy cardio workout. He turned from me for a moment, his hand running through his hair and over his face. He looked like he was about to scream, like he was about to explode.

“I’m so sorry, Livy.” The brunette turned back to me, his eyes glassy. “I don’t know what else to say.”

I nodded. I knew what he was talking about. I knew what he was sorry about. I knew what his words were stemming from. Sidney wasn’t talking about losing my father. He wasn’t talking about the ache in my bones and the pound in my head. He wasn’t talking about my empty chest or tear soaked face.

He was talking about us.

“Sidney… Please,” I whispered as I carefully stood up, my legs shaking under the weight of my torso. I wanted to reach out to him, I wanted to feel the electric shock to my system when my skin touched his. I wanted to remind myself that the man standing across from me was real.

I needed to make sure this was all real.

“I should have been here for you,” Sidney turned to me, the whites of his eyes a light shade of pink as he took me in, standing there in a large tee shirt and pajama shorts. His tongue ran over his bottom lip as he looked away, pain washing over his face. “I let you and your dad down.”

Tears started to fall from my eyes as I took a small step toward him. My teeth started to pull at the skin on the inside of my cheek as I put my hand down on his forearm and looked up at him. I shook my head when he looked at me, pleading with him to stop talking, to stop beating himself up over whatever had happened. I knew how much this news hurt him, I knew he thought of my dad as his own just like my dad thought of Sidney as his own son.

“Sid, please.” I begged, lightly pressing my fingertips against his skin.

Without another word, Sidney took a step into me and wrapped his heavy arms around me. As my face collided with his chest, my eyes fluttered shut. I could feel my mind slowing down as I felt him press his fingertips into me and grab onto chunks of my tee shirt.

The brunette held onto me like I was his last lifeline. Every few minutes I would feel him shake against me, an indication of a silent sob rushing through his body. I wanted to give him reassuring words. I wanted to tell him that everything would be okay, but I couldn’t find the right words. Nothing I could say would help this hurt. It was deep. It was otherworldly. It was an ache that couldn’t be cured with medical attention, words, or even time.

It was a constant, from now until the day we died.

I stood with my arms wrapped around Sidney for what felt like hours. The ache in my muscles didn’t phase me. The thoughts rushing through my head didn’t sway my actions. As long as he needed me there, as long as his fingers held onto the fibers of my tee shirt, I would be standing here, my arms draped around him, holding him as close to me as I could.

“We were supposed to grab our first lunch of the summer tomorrow.” Sidney pulled his face from my hair and looked down at me, his bright green eyes flooded with tears. “I just talked to him on Thursday, everything seemed fine. He said he was doing fine.”

I nodded, the ache in my body amplifying as I thought about my father’s bright smiling face. He knew he was sick. He knew he was dying, but he kept living his life anyway. He refused to let the pain inside of him control his outlook on life. I had talked to him on Monday. He told me about his lunch date with Sidney in a week. He wanted to tell him in person. He had written down a list of things to tell him, to make sure he knew if anything happened to him before their next lunch date.

“He was going to tell you.” I swallowed hard as Sidney slowly pulled away from me and placed his shaking hands against my cheeks. “He stopped treatment a few weeks ago,” my voice sounded foreign as my brain started to disassociate from the world around me. “I came home the day my mom told me. I’ve been here ever since.”

I felt like I was losing consciousness.

“He had a list of things to talk to you about, he was excited to see you.” I ended in a whisper as I blinked a round of tears from my eyes. The small beads of water rushed down my cheeks collecting at the tip of my chin. I felt them pool and drip off onto my bare feet.

Sidney shook his head a little as he stared at me. Instead of speaking, he kept staring at me, staring right into my eyes like he was reading the list of things that my dad had written down for him. He looked like he was realizing what the world meant.

Neither of us spoke. Our eyes would just hold the others, searching them over and over again. I tried to find something new with him, something that I could use against the feelings that were going to rear their ugly head when the dust started to settle. I wanted to hate him for an ego or a new terrible trait. I wanted to find something about him that went against everything I had originally loved him for. Everything he was that made me fall in love with him.

He was the same. He may have turned into Sidney Crosby, but he was the same exact boy from my childhood.

He was still my best friend.

My lips started to quiver as the thought sounded off in my head like skipping record. It was nearly ten years since we saw each other face to face. Ten years since I heard him whisper my name. Ten years since I had the tangible evidence that he was real, that my childhood was real, that there was someone on the planet that could make me feel like I was flying and being engulfed in flames at the same time.

“You’re still my best friend,” I cried, my vision blurring as tears swelled on the surface of my eyes. “I still care about you so much,” I tilted my head down and stared at our feet. “I never hated you. I always cared about you, I cared about you so much, Sidney.”

I was shaking as Sidney pulled me against him and set a soft kiss to my forehead. He held his lips against my skin until I started speaking again.

“I can’t lose you again, Sidney.” I was hysterical as I thought about the man in front of me disappearing for another ten years. “I can’t do this without you.”

The brunette’s breathing faltered for a moment before he nodded and pressed the side of his face into my hair. His heart was racing as he started to rub circles against my back. Every muscle in my body started to melt as I leaned into him, my face pressing into his shoulder. I could feel him shaking against me. I could feel the regret and sorrow ripping through him like an earthquake.

“I’m not going anywhere, Livy.” Sidney pressed a kiss into my hair and inhaled sharply, “I’m here now. I’m not letting go again.”