“Your heart is so big, it’s gonna blow up out of your fucking chest,” she jokes. “Come on. Let’s get you out of here before you have an anxiety attack.”
She pays the bill and, as we head out, she links her arm in mine.
“I give you so much shit for the things you do for him. But I’m so happy I get to witness a love so strong up close.”
Elijah and I are the messiest fucking love there ever was, and I want to correct her. To assure her that love isn’t supposed to be like this.
“Don’t,” she says. “I know what you want to say, and I don’t need you to. What you two have doesn’t look like anything I want. But…I don’t know. No one’s ever loved me the way you care about him.”
Through it all.
When we pull up, there’s still no sign of my car or him.
“What do we do now?” I ask.
“You don’t want to call the cops,” she says as we climb the stairs.
I shake my head, firm on that. We don’t need to involve them.
“So, we just wait,” she finishes.
“Okay, then.” I unlock my front door and let us in.
“Looks like it’s about to be one long ass night. I’m gonna run down the road and grab some wine.” She points as she stares at me. “If he comes while I’m gone, you better call me.”
I shoot her a thumbs up as I kick my shoes off and open my laptop, hoping to get some writing done while she’s out. The door clicks shut as I start writing words I never thought I’d be able to confess.
I’m an addict.
My drug of choice is love.
But I’ve settled for physical pain, MDMA, and emotional abuse.
There is no rehab for me.
I stop typing when I hear slow, heavy steps walking up the stairs.
My breath catches in my chest when they stop just outside my door.
Surprise doesn’t bother to register when I open it and see Elijah hunched over my top step, his head hanging below his shoulders.
But who am I kidding? I’d know him anywhere.
All I feel is relief.
“Everyone’s worried, you know,” I tell him, trying to sound gruff and unaffected, even though I want to cry.
He doesn’t react, doesn’t say a word as he picks himself up like he weighs more than the world.
A grunt rumbles from his chest and a bottle of whiskey is held by its neck in one hand. The other hand reaches up toward my face as he nears. His thumb strokes my cheek as I eye the amber liquid sloshing around the half-empty bottle.
“What are you doing?” I whisper, closing my eyes.
Don’t I know I see him better with my eyes closed? The version of him that I fell in love with. Not this man in front of me, spiraling out of control, holding onto me with the tightest of grips like a life vest, masking it with a gentle caress of my cheek.
“I can’t,” I say, my mantra in this twisted love of ours, and step back. “I’m calling your mom.”
My eyes are open as I rush deeper inside my apartment. He’s hot on my heels and yanks my phone from my grip.
“Please,” he says.
One word. One word against the back of my neck as the bottle hits the floor and he takes me into his arms, holding me so tight, it hurts.
“Elijah…”
“Please just…let me.”
Let him hold you.
And the moment he lets go, oh how hard you’ll fall.
I stand there and let him.
And when he lets me go, I grab my phone and rush to the bathroom. All while he bangs on the door, I wait for his mom to answer. When she finally does, I ignore my tears and calmly explain that her son is here.
By the time I hang up, he’s gone.
My apartment door is wide open, and my car keys sit on the top step. I reach down to grab them and look out the window.
There’s no sign of him.
I’m stuck wondering if this is the last time I’ll ever see him again.
Alive, anyway.
44
THE END
Someone’s banging on my front door again.
At first, I think I’m dreaming. And in my dream, someone is shooting a gun aimed square at my chest.
“Teófila!”
“Dad?” I whisper, groggy. The banging continues and I jump out of bed to unlock my front door.
His eyes are bloodshot as he regards me. “Get dressed, mija. They found Elijah in a motel room. He overdosed.”
I hadn’t dreamt up the gun aimed at my chest.
These words are the bullets and I collapse to the floor.
I HYPERVENTILATE in the car and my mom sits in the back with me, rubbing my shoulders as she whispers, “It’s going to be okay,” over and over.
But we don’t know that.
By the time we get to the hospital, there are cameras and paparazzi waiting outside.
My dad curses as he nearly hits one and yells in Spanish, calling him a pendejo. I want to laugh but I can’t find the sound I’ve made all my life inside of me.
I can only find cries and inhales that make me think I can’t get enough air into my lungs.
“You two go ahead,” he tells me, and I open the door without thinking, pushing through the crowd.
They call my name. They say it wrong.
I ignore them all until I feel someone reach out and pull me.
“Miss Morales,” George says. “It’s really fucking good to see you.”
I start crying all over again as he leads us inside.
“What are they saying?” I ask when I can find my voice.
“They administered the Narcan when they found him. The doctor said he’s in a coma and all we can do now is wait.”
He leads us through the hospital and I’m so grateful. I don’t know that I’d be able to maneuver through it all right now.
“I…I want to see him.”
We get inside the elevator and George pushes the number six.
“His parents are with him. I believe you’ll have to get their permission first.”
When we step out of the elevator, I’m hit with the chaos of the floor. So many people loitering around one room. And just like I knew before, I know where he is now.
I see Elijah’s mom pacing outside his room. When she looks up and notices us, she rushes over, arms outstretched.
“I want to see him,” I whisper in her ear as we embrace.
We hadn’t spoken in the month since Elijah stole my car and hadn’t seen each other since I was eighteen, but things like this make time irrelevant.
“Of course, of course,” she says.
She hugs my mom for a moment before taking my hand and leading me into his room.
I don’t know what to expect, but he looks so lifeless that I immediately cry at the sight of the tube in his mouth and the beeping monitor beside him.
“When he wakes up, we have to help him,” I sob. “We have to.” My words are nearly incoherent as I beg his mother.
“You have to let my son be and do whatever he feels he needs to. And if he comes back, it’ll have to be on his own.”
My head is shaking as she speaks.
“We can’t force him into recovery,” she says.
I know there’s honesty in what she’s saying, but I can’t live in this broken space.
“He isn’t my son anymore,” she tells me, her hands framing my face. “He only looks like him.”
“No,” I whisper, even though I’ve seen it with my own eyes.
“He isn’t the boy I raised or the one you grew up with. Something else has got a hold of him. And it’s stronger than you or I. So now we have to let go and let him decide his own strength.”
I am broken as I stare at him lying in that bed.
And only he can fix it.
He is the break.
He is the glue.
ELIJAH’S MOM manages to calm me down, but I don’t leave his side, resting my head on him as he sleeps, wondering when he’ll wake up again
.
Sometimes I watch animal documentaries. And I swear I’m the only one who notices the way most animals in the pack will watch their hunted get eaten and do nothing.
People are like that, too.
And in Elijah’s life, it’s even worse.
They didn’t just witness his march toward his end; they ushered him there. And by the time it was time to set him right, he’d already fallen for the taste of his demise.
In the morning, my mom comes in, telling me Miley’s worried and that she loves me.
I turn my phone on and ignore the voicemails and texts.
And then I open an app I haven’t used in such a long time, snapping a picture and uploading it without thought.
A picture of our joined hands up to our matching tattoos with a heart as the caption.
My time on the road with Elijah had granted me more followers than I knew what to do with. And while I hadn’t posted since our breakup, the number was still outrageous.
The comments start pouring in and it’s more than I can handle.
I now know what I look like in the media.
Like the girl who gave up on the boy she was supposed to love.
Like a heartless bitch.
Like I pushed him away and moved on.
Like he meant nothing to me.
Death threats and vile comments…it comes crashing around me like the loudest goddamn wake up call.
You believed in him and he burned your world to the ground for it.
I want to shake myself, to call myself stupid, to tell myself that I was never strong enough and that I should’ve cut too deep.
And I wish I could take back that night at the beach and insist he drive me home.
But I know better than anyone that there is no outrunning or outsmarting destiny. And if that night hadn’t been the catalyst for Elijah’s demise, there would be another monster waiting just around the bend.
We are all masses of moments.
He just has to survive this one.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?”
I look up to see Elijah’s dad standing in the doorway, seething.
“Who gave you permission to post that? We’ve got a whole fucking team doing damage control out there and you ruin it with one goddamn post.”
“Ay. You might want to watch your fucking mouth,” I hear my dad say from outside the room.
Elijah’s dad looks back at mine and takes a deep breath before continuing to speak. By now, all four parents involved are pushing their way into the room.
“I’m allowed to post what I see fit. If you want to enable his drug problem by hiding it…”
“He doesn’t have a drug problem. He just parties a little too hard,” he responds.
Is this man on drugs his damn self?
“You must not know that I spent six months on the road with him. Not only did I witness his drug problem, I developed one myself.”
My mom gasps, covering her mouth with her hands as my dad’s fists clench and his eyes water.
“So, this is your fault?” Elijah’s dad asks me.
He must be deaf, too.
“Do you even know what happened to your son?” I reply.
“What are you talking about? What happened?” He turns to look at Florence before looking back at me.
“That night with the cops?”
He sucks his teeth. “Man, that wasn’t nothin’. Nothin’ happened to that boy. He just got a little roughed up for trespassing. If I’m not mistaken, you were there, too. Seems like we’ve got ourselves a pattern here.”
“My daught…” my dad starts, but I interrupt him because that tone of voice tells me he’s close to losing his temper.
“You let him think he was only worthy if he became something you could acknowledge. You perpetuated his pain. And then, when he needed you, when he truly needed you, instead of finally giving him your heart and your ear, you gave him a world he wasn’t ready for,” I say.
I don’t know everything. But the things I do know about their relationship, I learned from the boy whose hand I am currently holding.
But, of course, his dad tells me that I don’t know what I’m talking about.
“He fired me because I wouldn’t let him come back to that shit hole of a place and suck on his mama’s teet. He’s a mama’s boy! Always has been.”
Florence is about to lose it. But I beat her to the punch.
“Where the fuck were you?!” I roar. “Who the fuck are you to say anything about the way he was raised?!”
My mom tries to tell me to settle down, but it’s too late.
“It wasn’t my job to make sure he was clean…”
“Then whose was it?! Because I’ve got a hallway full of people looking at me like it was mine!” I shout.
This is the end of the calm. The end of the Teófila everyone knows.
This is the storm.
The doctors come rushing in and Elijah’s mom has his dad removed and banned from the room.
I can see George pacing outside and my mom laying her head on my dad’s shoulder.
Outside of this place, life goes on.
But inside, I’m unmoved.
45
STARVE YOUR FEARS
Hospitals aren’t built for comfort. They’re built to aid in transitions.
To life, to recovery, and to death.
Today, I pray for recovery as the third day dawns.
They removed his tube, sure that he could breathe on his own. I listen for each inhale and subsequent exhale, in case they’re wrong.
I’m listening when one falters.
My heart stops just as his eyes open.
“Hi,” I whisper. “Hi there, my love.”
His dry lips spread into a quick smile as he tries to speak.
“I’ll get the doctor,” I tell him as I move to stand.
But he reaches for my arm. A slight shake of his head is all it takes for me to sit back down.
“Wh…” he starts, and I can tell it’s hard for him.
I reach over for the water bottle I kept beside me and pour some into his open mouth. “Better?” I ask.
He nods before trying to speak again. “Why do you love me?” He asks the question like the earth will open up and answer him. Like he’s asking the universe.
Like I have so many times before.
“I can’t explain it,” I tell him.
“Please…try to.” His eyes are squeezed shut as he whispers, his voice hoarse. “I need it.”
“You think you’re unlovable because you aren’t perfect?”
“I’m a fuck-up.” He takes a breath. “And I keep fucking you up in the process.”
“I’m fine,” I assure him. But some lies have ways of sounding like what they are. And this is one of them.
“You can’t fix me,” he says, the words slow.
These words will haunt me.
“I’m not your hero anymore. I can’t tell you when I will be again.” He swallows as he breaks my heart. “Or that I ever will be again.”
I nod in understanding, but I don’t know what happens next.
“How did you save yourself?” Elijah asks.
And I think back to all the times I wanted to hurt myself; the times I hated myself. The times he saved me and didn’t even know it.
But in the end, I was the one with the power.
“Starve your fears,” I tell him.
And then I get up and walk out of the hospital room.
46
TROUBLED TIMES
I don’t know why I’m here, or what I hope to get from this place.
But six years later, the sign is still here. Almost as if she’d been waiting all this time.
The front door opens, and she doesn’t look surprised to see me.
“Teófila,” she starts, and I blink a few times, unsure what to make of this interaction. “What brings you here?”
“I…I don’t know what to do,” I say.
He
r nod is quick, and her face is understanding, a fraction of a smile gracing her lips. “You’re in your troubled times.”
She steps aside to let me in, and I feel like…an addict searching for her newest fix.
“He almost died,” I tell her as we settle into the same seats we did the first time around. Only the circumstances are so different, it’s nearly comical.
“You realized what it would take to keep him,” she says.
What…
“What do you mean?” I ask her.
“How many versions of yourself have lived and died to keep him?”
“I don’t…please just tell me how to save him.”
“There’s no magical know that’s going to make any of this easier. I don’t know, Teófila.”
“Can’t you check your cards or a crystal ball?” I ask, desperation making me shrill.
“Tarot cards aren’t going to dictate your future. They’re going to help guide your intuition, so you land on the right path. But that doesn’t mean he’ll always follow his. And that also doesn’t mean you have to force him to.”
I take a moment to really hear her and it’s a revelation. A confirmation.
The universe sets us on paths. And sometimes our compasses point us in directions we never thought we’d go. Toward destinations we never bothered to explore.
“I was never meant to save him,” I whisper.
Jennifer shakes her head, still smiling in that way of hers. “You’ll die trying.”
“And if he dies?”
“You couldn’t have saved him,” she answers with a small shrug, as if it’s all inconsequential.
“But…he’s my soulmate,” I whisper. Nothing feels as certain as that.
Jennifer places her hands on my shoulders and leans in. “Then you have nothing to worry about.”
47
HEALING PATH
I never thought I’d call this place home. Even after a week here, I wonder if this was the right move.
New York City always seemed too big a place for little old me.
But, at twenty-five years old, I knew it was now or never.
I landed a job at a magazine as a contributor and have been published eleven times. I’ve been contacted to compile my short stories into a book, something I never thought was possible.
Teófila’s Guide to Saving the Sun Page 21
