STRONGER (Runaway)

by Lexie Ray

  “Unfortunately?” I repeated. “I just have one toilet to clean. That’s pretty lucky, if you ask me.”

  “And my hair styling has been down to a new record time ever since I buzzed my hair,” Nate said. “You’re good at this glass-half-full stuff. A lot better than the no-hope Jasmine I first met.”

  I flushed in shame. Had that whole episode at the shore really been mere hours ago?

  “I’m really sorry you had to see me like that,” I said. “I was really at rock bottom and, well, you pretty much saved my life. I could organize that library and clean this place for the rest of your life and never be able to repay you.”

  “I’m just glad that you didn’t end up literally at the rock bottom of that cliff while you were at your rock bottom,” Nate said. “And don’t worry about anyone owing anyone anything. If you don’t want to, we never have to talk about what happened on that cliff ever again.”

  I nodded. That sounded good to me.

  “And here’s your room,” he said, opening another door.

  I gasped involuntarily. The same floor-to-ceiling windows were present, but the curtains concealing their view were a faintly gold metallic material—a little thicker than the ones in the other room. The bedspread matched the curtains, bringing a light elegance to the room. The bed itself was low to the ground, almost Eastern in its design. There was no headboard or footboard; rather, a welded metal artwork hung on the wall, giving the illusion of a headboard. In here, the wood floor had been covered by a thick carpet. I could imagine stepping out of bed on a cold morning and having the thick fibers caress my feet, warming them against the chill.

  “Will this suffice?” Nate asked, looking a little anxious.

  “Suffice? This will more than suffice. This is incredible.”

  Forgetting myself, I threw my arms around his neck. I didn’t know how else to thank him.

  “You’re more than welcome,” Nate said.

  I released his neck and fell into a fit of coughing. The adrenaline that had surged through my body after the cliff and meeting Nate, then coming back to the city, had long since deserted me. I was physically and emotionally spent.

  “You look like you need to lie down,” he observed.

  “Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked weakly. “I’m sick. I really do have HIV. The person you’re entrusting with your housework, your cooking, and sharing your living space with feels like she’s going to faint on her feet.”

  “Then that person better lie down,” Nate said calmly. He took me by the hand and led me to the bed, turning the covers down and helping me ease down into it. The mattress immediately formed itself around my body. I had never been so comfortable in a bed. It was probably the nicest one I’d ever laid in.

  “You know, I think I will lie down,” I joked lightly. My aching muscles felt instantly better even though a pervasive dull throb throughout my entire body continued.

  “Don’t get up until you feel better,” he said, looking down at me. “Tomorrow, I’ll take you to the doctor. The key thing about HIV is that you need to start a regimen of medication. Everything will be fine.”

  After Jeff and Brenda’s completely negative reaction to my HIV positive diagnosis, hearing someone tell me that everything was going to be fine made me feel a little dubious.

  I was willing to try to believe it, though.

  * * * *-

  I was so scared to be happy in those first few days. There had been so many other times when I had dared to be happy—when Mama first took me in and got me off the streets, when Jeff and Brenda had embraced me as family. But every time I got too comfortable or thought that my life was finally getting turned back around, something terrible happened. My feelings were betrayed, I was used and thrust back out onto the street, I was discarded like trash.

  To say I was tentative in those first few weeks would be an understatement.

  “You walk around on your tippy toes like something’s going to break,” Nate observed one day. He was lounging on the couch, a book splayed across his chest. He hadn’t picked it up in about fifteen minutes and was partially covered by a throw blanket.

  I’d been carrying a basket of laundry into the bedroom to fold and put away. Nate had sent me with his credit card to pick up whatever I needed in the way of clothing and toiletries. When I’d come back with a couple shirts, a value pack of panties, and a pair of jeans, he’d taken me out himself. Nate turned out to have an impeccable fashion sense. He had a specific aesthetic and it fit my own style perfectly. I now boasted two whole drawers in his dresser and half of a rack in the walk-in closet.

  “I don’t want to bother you while you’re working,” I said, propping the laundry basket on my hip.

  “Does it look like I’m working?” Nate asked, raising a dark eyebrow and putting his arms behind his head.

  I shrugged. “You could be concocting the next scenes in your mind at this very moment,” I offered.

  Nate rubbed his face. “Wrong,” he said, his voice muffled. “I’m sitting here, inactive, not thinking about scenes in my book, not even reading the work of other writers to get inspired for scenes in my book.”

  “Writer’s block?” I asked, naming his most-hated nemesis.

  “Writer’s block,” he confirmed, “and a hell of a headache.”

  “Your office is too dim,” I said automatically. “You need to open the curtains and get a desk lamp, at least. We’ll need to move all those books stacked against the window for better light.”

  Nate smiled at me, but its tightness told me that he was in pain. “You have all the solutions.”

  “And here’s one more,” I said saucily. “Let me get you some aspirin for that headache. I hate to see a man suffer needlessly.”

  “Don’t bother,” he said. “I’ve already taken something.”

  “Let me put this laundry away and I’ll fix some lunch,” I said over my shoulder. “You’re probably just hungry.”

  But once I’d gotten all the clothes put away, exhaustion overtook me. I eased down on the bed, closing my eyes, and tried to ride it out.

  It came in waves, which was normal, the doctor told me. Nate had taken me to his personal physician. Everyone there knew Nate’s name, which I chalked up to good service. I didn’t have health insurance—one thing Jeff and Brenda had overlooked when they were trying to get my life up to speed, I mused—and Nate covered the exorbitant cost of some of the drugs while his doctor gave me samples of the others. I had to get a medication organizer just to keep track of it all.

  “Rest when you feel like you need to,” the doctor said. “Take your medication on time. Call if you have any questions. Come back in a few months.”

  I was fully prepared to adhere to all of these instructions.

  I must have drifted to sleep. A cool hand on my forehead woke me up.

  “You have a fever,” Nate said softly. He brushed my bangs away from my face. The touch was comforting and I leaned into it without thinking.

  “What a pair we are,” I said tiredly. “You with your headache, me with my HIV.”

  Nate laughed and ruffled my hair. “You know, I have a better plan for lunch,” he said. “What do you like to order when you have Chinese?”

  I frowned. “I’ve never had Chinese.”

  Nate fell into a mock swoon, flopping on the bed and making me bounce in spite of the shock-absorbent mattress. I giggled.

  “Never had Chinese!” he exclaimed, propping himself up on one elbow and looking at me. His face looked genuinely shocked but the warmth in his gray eyes told me he was teasing. “You’ve told me a lot of surprising things about your life, Jasmine, but this really takes the cake. Prostitute? Fine. HIV positive? Okay. Never had Chinese food? Unacceptable. Absolutely unacceptable. If you do not allow me to order your sesame chicken, fried rice, and egg rolls immediately, you just can’t live here anymore.”

  I was howling with laughter after his staged tantrum, shoving him off his side and onto his back. Nate was l
ike a balm on my past. He could tease or cajole me about it and make me smile. How was that possible?

  “Order away, then,” I said, feeling inexplicably better than before. Maybe it was the power nap I’d taken, but I was pretty sure it was the man I was living with.

  * * * *

  A day in my life: Wake up at 5 a.m. Nate likes to work in the mornings. It’s one of his most productive times, he says, probably since he’s just had a full night’s sleep. Make coffee, add a dash of milk, take it to him in the office without saying much. Don’t want to distract him from the muses.

  Have own cup of coffee, bite of breakfast, take meds at 6 a.m. Shower and dress. Pick up newspaper debris, books, shoes, etc. Sweep and dust. Wipe countertops in kitchen. Clean bathroom. Clean bedroom. If it’s Monday, take inventory in refrigerator and cabinets, go to market to restock. Tuesdays, laundry. Wednesday, wash windows. Thursdays, vacuum rugs. Fridays, dust ceilings and walls with extendable duster. Lie down if pervasive exhaustion takes hold. Beg off chores if feverish.

  Check on Nate at noon. Ask what he wants for lunch, fix it, eat some, banish him from office. He takes shower. Clean and straighten office, continue to catalog and organize books. Frown at book-covered futon, wondering if Nate gets enough rest. Resist urge to look at book in progress on laptop.

  Nate decides whether the muses still favor him at 2 p.m. If so, make myself scarce reading one of many books, taking walk, planning dinner. If not, do something with Nate. If tired, nap. If sickly, accept comfort from Nate.

  Dinner at 6 p.m. Do something with Nate afterward, even if have been spending time with him since 2.

  Muses sometimes seize Nate about 8 p.m. Look in on him at 10 p.m. Recommend getting rest, as muses always return in morning. Take shower. Go to bed, wonder a little about light coming from office.

  * * * *

  “I don’t ache,” I told the doctor, sitting on the examination table. “I only get tired when regular people get tired. I haven’t had a fever in weeks. That’s good, right?”

  He was listening to my heart and lungs while I was prattling, probably not helping him.

  “If you’re feeling good, that’s always a good thing,” he said. “You’re taking your pills on time?”

  “Yes, I set an alarm,” I said.

  “Excellent,” the doctor said. “You’re genuinely committed to staying on top of this, Jasmine, and that’s a really good thing.”

  I flushed with his praise.

  “It seems your body has entered the asymptomatic latent phase,” he said, scribbling something on his tablet computer with a stylus.

  “What’s that?”

  “Well, you still have HIV,” he said. “That’s never going to change, unfortunately, unless we have some significant medical breakthroughs in the near future—and there’s always real hope there.”

  A cure for HIV? That really was something to hope for.

  “This new phase of the virus means that it is lying dormant in you,” the doctor continued. “You won’t really see any of the flu-like symptoms your were experiencing before. You’ll feel practically normal. With continued adherence to your treatment plan, the HIV will be nearly undetectable. I don’t want to give you false hope, though: It will always be a part of you. Not taking your medicine will make it rear its ugly head.”

  I nodded. When Nate had first taken me to the doctor, the man had drilled it into me: Take the medication. Do not fail to take the medication. Take the medication at the same time every day. Do not skip a day of medication. Take the medication.

  “Since you’re taking the medication on time, you also have the perks of some degrees of protection,” the doctor said. “You can live a long time in this phase if you treat it properly. The medication will help keep you from passing HIV to any sexual partners. You will feel normal.”

  Normal. That’s all I ever wanted.

  “Thank you,” I said sincerely. This doctor was no-nonsense, but he always steered me true.

  “I’ll see you in a few months for a blood test,” he said.

  Nate was waiting for me outside, doodling on a pad of paper he always carried in his pocket.

  “That doesn’t look like something the muses are responsible for,” I said, looking over his shoulder. It was a row of elaborate squiggly lines on the paper.

  “The muses are fickle today,” Nate said. “Let’s forget about them, too.”

  I hushed him, looking scandalized. “Don’t talk bad about the muses,” I said in a stage whisper. “They might hear.”

  “I mean, let’s spend all day having fun so I can clear my head to be more receptive to the muses tomorrow morning,” Nate said loudly. I laughed and hid my face as everyone in the office looked up at him.

  We walked to the parking garage and I waited while Nate unlocked the car.

  He paused and shook his head. “You know what? No. We’re leaving the car here.”

  I cocked my head at him. “Are you sure?”

  “Yes,” he confirmed. “Today we’re going to have a quintessentially New York day and do everything normal—walking and public transit included.”

  “Why do you ruin my life like this?” I teased as we walked arm and arm out to street level. “Today’s laundry day. I was so looking forward to pairing up all those socks of yours.”

  “Alas, it will have to keep until tomorrow,” Nate sighed dramatically. “Now. I need to know what it is you’ve never done in the city but want to do. This is essential information.”

  I shrugged. I’d lived in and around the city my whole life, but it wasn’t like I’d ever had the ability to really see it or do the typical New York things. Then, I laughed and unzipped my jacket. I’d unwittingly worn my “I love N.Y.” shirt.

  “It was meant to be,” Nate said somberly. “You will have a tourist day in New York. We’ll begin in Times Square.”

  We hopped aboard a bus to get to our first destination. I told Nate how my mother and I would ride the buses all night when we were between places to live. They felt like a second home to me.

  “Please excuse me,” Nate said, looking pained as he ripped his pad of paper from his pocket and began scribbling something down on the pages. “I must acknowledge the muses.”

  “Doing so will put you in their favor,” I remarked loftily. I leaned my face against the window, remembering what it was like to have Mom’s arm around my shoulder, being the only passengers on a quiet, well-lit bus, a metal cocoon to the dark, unfair world outside.

  We disembarked at Times Square. The sun darted in and out from behind the swiftly moving clouds above. It was springtime in the city, and it was wonderful. The crush of people in the area was incredible, vibrant, inspiring, and terrifying all at once. I heard four different languages as soon as I stepped off the bus. New York truly was a cultural center of the world.

  “My lady, may I present Times Square,” Nate said grandly, bowing and sweeping his arm out to indicate the scene.

  Marquees advertising everything from Broadway plays to footwear rose like monoliths into the sky. News headlines ticked by on the sides of buildings. Everyone wanted to be here, to see this spectacle, and I was a part of that.

  “Oh, they made ‘The Lion King’ into a play?” I wondered aloud, squinting up at a billboard that featured a stylized feline face.

  “Item number two on our schedule for today,” Nate announced. “See ‘The Lion King’ on Broadway. It’s a musical, of course.”

  “I didn’t mean we had to see it,” I protested as he dragged me across the square by the hand. “I just didn’t know they’d made it. I begged my mom to buy a tape of the Disney movie at a thrift shop one day. We didn’t have the money, but she did it anyway. I’ve probably seen it a hundred times.”

  “All the more reason,” Nate said over his shoulder. In no time, we were standing in front of a box office, purchasing tickets for the matinee.

  The theater was cool and dark, forcing me to zip my jacket again. I soaked in the surroundings while Nate j
otted some things in the notepad.

  “Look at that,” I murmured. “You think you’re going to take a break from the muses and they just won’t let you go.”

  “I think there’s one muse in particular that I can’t let go of,” he said softly, looking over at me. His gray eyes were warm, making me shiver and giving me butterflies. What was this feeling?

  I didn’t have any time to analyze all the fluttering in my belly because the lights went down and the curtains went up. A parade of elaborate animal puppets moved across the stage amid the signature opening African chanting. It was beautifully done. The tears running down my face were halfway in appreciation of the artistry of the show and halfway in remembrance of Mom. We watched that “Lion King” videotape so many times we both knew it by heart and regularly sang along. It was her voice I heard when each performer sang.

  When Mufasa died during the stampede, I wept just like I had as a child. I’d never been able to make it through that part with dry eyes. Nate noticed and put his arm around me.

  The arm stayed for the remainder of the show. I liked it that way.

  When the lights came up and we’d given no less than three standing ovations, he looked at me.

  “Where to next?”

  “What do you mean, next?” I asked. “This is all I could ever ask for.”

  “It’s hardly past noon,” he said, checking his phone. “The day is ours.”

  “I don’t even know what to do,” I said. “There’s so much I haven’t done.”

  “Let’s make a list so we can check it off,” Nate said. We sat back down in our seats as the rest of the theater patrons filed out. “We’ll call it the ‘What Jasmine Needs to Do in New York City’ list.”

  He opened his notepad and put pencil to paper, looking at me expectantly.

  “Well, you can mark off Times Square and a Broadway show,” I said a little uncertainly.

  “I’ll mark off Times Square in general, but not Times Square on New Year’s Eve,” Nate said, taking notes. “And I’ll mark off ‘The Lion King’ on Broadway but not Broadway shows in general. Next, we’re going to ‘Wicked.’ You should see as many Broadway shows as possible. And off-Broadway shows. And shows in general.”