highly treatable. There are many good medications that keep people stable. The issue is Ash goes off of them. I think he hates that it dulls his synesthesia, and his art, and that’s such an important part of who he is. Can you imagine taking medicine that made you twitchy and unable to dance? That’s what he’s been dealing with.”
“So then he’ll never stay on the meds?”
“Well, again, Miller says that there are so many things they can try, but Ash, I don’t know. I guess he doesn’t want to. Part of me feels like he thinks he doesn’t deserve to get better.”
“Why?”
I threaded my fingers through my hair. Because he blames himself for his sister’s death. He blames himself for destroying his parent’s lives. He blames himself for destroying his family.
“I don’t know,” I said.
“Your career is just starting to take off. Do you think this is a good time to have to deal with all this?”
“So what should I do? Abandon him?”
“No, but you’re not married to him. You can be there for him, but I don’t want you to get caught up in him. What if this is just the beginning? Do you want to make sure he’s on his meds, make sure he gets sleep, or that he eats enough? That’s a lot for someone who should be enjoying the prime of her life.”
“I don’t want to be his friend, Jordan. I love him . . . so much.” The gravity of the choice I would have to make finally became clear to me and I couldn’t fight the tears. I was so tired of crying already.
“You haven’t even really been with other guys. Maybe you are putting a lot of weight on this because you lost your virginity to him.”
Jordan’s comment peeved me. He was going back to that older brother thing, talking to me like I was some high schooler who would just fawn over someone because he kissed her.
“Don’t you put that virginity bullshit on this. This has nothing to do with it. I lost it to him because I love him, not the other way around. And the fact that I lost it later does not make me naive or cloud my decisions. That’s just a tiny piece of what we share.”
“I’m sorry,” Jordan replied sympathetically.
“I just I can’t leave him when he needs me the most. I don’t want to.”
“I love your fierce loyalty, but sometimes you can be loyal to a fault.”
“I have to give him a chance. I know he didn’t tell me precisely because he was scared I would leave.”
“I’m just saying, this is his second time being hospitalized. This is really serious.”
“Jordan, he took a stabbing for me. So now that things are hard, I am supposed to walk away? He saved my life.”
“So now you owe him yours?”
“I know. I know what it looks like. I should just move on. Find someone else who doesn’t have the baggage. But that’s not love. Love is accepting someone, flaws and all.”
As those words came out, I knew I had made my decision. I wasn’t leaving Ash. I was going to help him through this.
BIRD
THE WAITING GAME. It might be the most socially acceptable form of mental torture. Waiting to hear back about a casting call. Waiting for a much needed check to clear.
Waiting for your boyfriend to be sane again.
The excitement of the impending show should have distracted me. It should have made the time pass quickly. But it didn’t ease the tension that sat heavy in every cell of my body as I waited to be reunited with Ash. As promised, Miller stayed in touch, but Ash was not himself yet, he told me. It would take weeks. The ECT made his short term memory foggy, it frustrated him, and he was still coming down off the mania. He was still not my Ash. I respected the fact that Miller was family and he thought I should wait to see Ash, but that didn’t mean it was easy. I wanted to tell Miller to shove it, and tell Ash I didn’t care if he was embarrassed for me to see him in that state. That’s what I wanted to do, but I knew they were right.
It had only been a week, but with each day that passed since I last saw Ash, I only grew more heartsick.
“Come on, Bird!” Jordan snapped as I missed a step. He knew where my mind was, but that didn’t lower his