Kiss To Forget (Blairwood University #2) - Anna B. Doe Page 0,93
here. What I do know is that I’m tired.
I’m tired of waiting. Tired of the smell of death clinging to all of us. Tired of watching Jade hide her tears in front of Mom. Tired of having to watch Mom struggle for her every breath. Tired of waiting for the inevitable to happen.
Yasmin shakes her head. Closing the distance between us, she wraps her arms around my neck and presses her lips to my pulse point. “There is nowhere else I want to be.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
NIXON
“Are you sure you don’t want to go and spend spring break with your mom instead?” I ask Yasmin a few days later as we clean the dishes after dinner.
We barely leave the house these days, instead opting to spend every single awake moment with Mom, huddled in her room. Still, I was pretty sure that it’s time for spring break.
Today Mom’s been mostly sleeping, but she did wake up for a little bit. A smile crossed her face when she saw Yasmin sitting next to me. Jade brought UNO cards so we played a little, talking about stupid nonsense just to make Mom happy. After Mom fell back asleep, Yasmin excused herself to go and prepare lunch. Since both Jade and I are terrible in the kitchen, Yasmin has taken it upon herself to make something to eat every day, forcing us to sit at the table, threatening bodily harm if we didn’t listen.
“I texted her, and she’s fine with me not coming. We’ll have more opportunities.”
But what if you won’t?
I thought I’d have more time with my mom too, and look at us now. I’ve barely grown up, and she’s dying. I thought we’d have years. Years of family moments, birthdays, barbecues, and beaches. I thought she’d see me graduate from college and maybe even enter the draft. That she’d be at my wedding one day and see her first grandchild born. But all of those moments are slipping away right through our fingers.
I know I’m reflecting my situation on her, and she doesn’t need that shit in her life. Just because my mom is dying doesn’t mean everybody’s in the same boat.
But aren’t we all in it? From the day we’re born we start dying. There are no certainties on how much time any one of us has on this planet, so shouldn’t we make the most of it?
Yasmin’s hand covers mine on the counter. Slowly, I lift my eyes to meet hers. “I want to be here, Nixon. But if that’s not what you want…”
With my free hand, I push a strand of her hair behind her ear. “I want you here.”
It’s the goddamn truth. While I wouldn’t have asked her to come, now that she’s here, I don’t want her to leave.
“Then I’ll stay. For as long as you want me, I’ll stay.”
We finish cleaning up, and once we’re done, we go back to Mom’s room. I take the armchair that’s placed next to the bed, Yasmin sitting on my lap.
We turn on the TV, the soft glow from the screen the only light illuminating the room.
We don’t say anything, just sit there with one of my hands holding Mom’s, the other curled around Yasmin’s middle. She’s leaning her head against my shoulder, her arms wrapped around me tightly while Jade lies next to Mom on the bed.
For the next couple of days, we do the same on repeat. We get up, Yasmin forces us to eat something, and then we’re back in the room. Every time Mom wakes up, we talk with her, sharing memories and funny stories from our childhood; we play cards, ribbing whoever’s the current loser, which somehow turns out to be me in most of the cases. Sometimes Jade reads out loud from Mom’s favorite book, Little Women, or we watch Dirty Dancing on repeat. But the moment she falls back to sleep, the quiet zeroes in on us. The uncertainty of what the next day, the next hour, will bring, and the darkness swallowing us whole until the only thing left is an emptiness that knows no bounds.
The room is clouded in darkness when I startle awake from one of my dreams, one of my nightmares. Blinking a few times, I look around. I’m not sure when I fell asleep or how long I was out, but something must have woken me.
My back aches as I try to sit straight, the familiar weight of Yasmin’s sleeping body pressing into me.