Page 97 of The Way I Am Now
“I don’t want to leave her by herself,” I tell her instead of answering, because the answer isNo, I’m not fucking okay. “It’s gonna be fine.”
“Okay,” she says, not convinced.
Back in Eden’s room, she hasn’t moved; she’s just staring at the floor. I reach for her lamp and set it back on her desk because it hurts to look at her like this too. I set the Band-Aids and ointment and washcloth on her desk and reach my hands down to help her up, but she doesn’t even look at me.
“Eden?” I sit next to her on the floor. “Can you hear me?”
“What happened?” she asks again, finally looking at me.
“You were just dreaming, okay?”
“No, I wasn’t—this was different.”
“Let’s get you up. Hold on to me, all right? Arms around my neck.”
She lets me help her up off the floor and set her on the bed. “I’m just gonna clean these real quick,” I tell her, reaching for the washcloth and pressing it against her knee.
“Oh my God, Josh.” She touches my neck, presses her hand against my chest. “I scratched you. I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay,” I tell her as I apply a row of Band-Aids to one knee. “That was fucking stupid of me to try to wake you up like that. It’s my fault, I’m sorry.”
“I thought you were him—I didn’t know.”
“No, I know.” I bring the washcloth to her other knee, and she draws in a sharp breath. “Does that hurt?” I ask her.
She takes the washcloth from me, folds it over to the clean side, and brings it to my neck, dabbing at it gently, her hands shaking so badly. “I’m so sorry.”
“I’m fine,” I tell her as I finish putting Band-Aids on her other knee. “I promise.”
I get up and put my shirt on. She’s already freaked out about the scratches; she doesn’t need to see the bruises, too. “Do you want to keep the light on still?”
She shakes her head and gets back into bed.
I turn the lamp off, avoiding the broken glass.
Lying back down next to her, I feel uneasy. Afraid. Not of her, exactly, but of the things haunting her. She lays her head down in the spot she always lays her head down in and drapes her arm across me the way she always does. But everything feels different.
“I love you,” she says. “Josh?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you,” she repeats.
“I love you too.”
“Are you mad?”
“Of course not,” I tell her. I’m a lot of things right now, but mad—at her, anyway—isn’t one of them. “Eden, does that happen a lot? Having nightmares like that, I mean.”
“Sometimes,” she answers. “It hasn’t been this bad in a long time, though. I know I scared you. I’m sorry.”
“Will you stop apologizing?” But then I worry I might sound too harsh. “Really, you don’t have anything to be sorry about.”
“Okay, I’ll stop,” she whispers. She touches my chest in the spot where she scratched me and kisses my shirt—it stings as the fabric rubs against my open skin.
“Eden, can I ask you something else?”
“Mm-hmm,” she mumbles.
