//------------------------------//
// Longing... 
// Story: The Long Road: Longing 
// by pabrony 
//------------------------------//

A rapid shifting and bouncing of the mattress jarred me from my sleep around 2 am. In the darkness, I heard Twi mumbling something and crying. I clicked on the lamp on the nightstand and rolled over to see her grabbing at something that wasn't there.

Ugh, here we go again, I thought before going into my late night routine.

“Twi? Babe?” I whispered as I gently shook her. “Wake up.”

“No! Don't leave me, Sunny!” she cried out. “Please! I'll do anything. Just stay with me.”

“Twilight, you're dreaming,” I said a little louder. “C’mon, babe. Wake up.”

“No-oo-oo,” she cried. “I love you. Please don't go.”

“I'm not going anywhere.”

She paused a moment as her crying softened. “You...you're not?”

I noticed her eyes had begun fluttering open to adjust to the light in the bedroom. They still were filled with tears until I gently wiped them away.

“No, babe. I'm never leaving you,” I told her with a smile. “But I do think it's time for us to talk about what's going on in your head.”

“Now?”

“Yes, Twi,” I replied. “These nightmares that you've been having have been getting worse. Each night I've got to wake you up from said nightmare and I'm really getting concerned.”

“...”

I let out a sigh and caressed the left side of her face. “It's about the accident, isn't it?”

She slowly nodded in response before holding my hand against her cheek.

“Let's start small. Okay?”

Another slow nod.

“Tell me what you remember about that day after you left for work,” I said.

“I...can't.”

I tilted my head in confusion. “You can't remember or you can't tell me?”

“I can't tell you. It hurts too bad just thinking about it,” she whimpered.

“Would it make it easier if I told you about something that's been hurting me?” I asked.

“Does it involve me?” she replied.

“Actually, yes. It does,” I answered. “But not how you think.”

“Huh?”

“Remember your very first sleepover at my old apartment?”

“Yeah. How could I forget that after what happened?”

I felt my resolve start to buckle as I continued my story. “Well, when you found me with my arms cut, I was trying to make a major decision in my head.”

“What...what kind of decision?” she asked.

“I was trying to decide whether or not to finish the job,” I said as I looked away in shame.

“Finish the job?” she paused momentarily before my admission sunk in. “Sunny, were you thinking of committing suicide that night?!” she asked in shock.

I barely nodded in response.

“You're not just saying this to make me feel better are you?”

“No, babe. This is the honest truth.” I turned to look her in the eye once again. “I've been holding this in for too long. I should have told you before but every time I tried, I didn't know how to tell you.”

She reached up and wiped away a tear that I didn't know had escaped from my eye. “Oh, Sunny. Why in the world would you want to do that? Especially with our friends in the apartment with you?” she inquired softly.

“Well, remember when I told you that I was pretty messed up?”

“Mhmm.”

“That's what I meant. I just didn't want to admit that I was planning to end my life that night,” I said as I held back my tears.

“But why, Sunny?”

“It's because of how I was treating you,” I said. “I felt like a hypocrite. The way I treated you those first couple of weeks wasn't dissimilar from how the girls had treated me before the Battle of the Bands.

“I saw the hurt in your eyes daily,” I continued. “And I saw the reluctance to be around me before we went to bed.” I paused to wipe my face. “But when you surprised me in the bathroom, held my hands, and embraced me, the reluctance and anguish in your eyes disappeared. What I saw in its place was love. Not love of that of a sister but romantic love.

“After seeing how you were there for me in my darkest time, I knew that I would always be with you during your dark times,” I finished up my spiel with a hug from Twi.

We just sat in the bed embracing each other for about five minutes or so as a wave of relief began to wash over me. You finally did it.

“Sunny, I don't know what to say,” she said as we rested our chins on each other's shoulders.

“Just please open up about what is bothering you,” I said, pulling back. “If I know what has you so worried, maybe I can help you get through this. That's why I want you to start at the accident.”

She turned to sit on the edge of the bed, looked down at her lap, and began to fidget.

“What is it?” I asked, placing a hand on the small of her back.

“What I remember is...talking to Cadence on the phone,” she said.

“Okay. That's a start.”

“It...it’s not okay. I had called her so that she could try to calm me down on my way to work,” she whispered. “I had said some nasty things about you.”

My heart sunk at the sound of that while she stopped to regain her composure; what little she had to begin with.

“I called you so many names. It was mostly ‘bitch’ and ‘whore’, for the record,” she admitted. “Anyway, Cadence reminded me that if I ever became pregnant, I would probably be as moody as you. Hearing that distracted me just enough that I nearly ran a red light and dropped my phone in the process. 

“While I was retrieving my phone from the passenger side floorboard, I heard a loud screeching of tires. I sat up just in time to see a car surrounded by smoke caused by the other driver locking up the brakes. The next thing I remember was waking up in the hospital,” she said. “Please don't be mad at me.”

“Mad at you? Why? Because you called me a bitch while you vented to your sister-in-law?”

I saw her slowly nod in response.

I chuckled softly. “Twi, I probably would've done the exact same thing.”

“Really?” she asked as she looked over her shoulder.

“Mhmm,” I said as I pulled back against me and nuzzled the back of her neck. “You were mad and needed someone to talk to. All that pent-up anger needed some outlet. It's natural.”

She clasped my hands together around her waist. “Thanks, Sunny. I do feel better now.”

“But?”

“I don't know how to tell you about my nightmares.”

We sat together for a couple of minutes before an idea popped into my head. “I need my hands, babe,” I said, wiggling free.

“Why?”

I told her to take off her top and bra as I reached into my nightstand for my lavender lotion. After squeezing a small amount in my hand, I began rubbing Twi’s shoulders. “Because I'm hoping this massage will relax you enough to tell me about your nightmares.”

I felt her shoulders slump slightly as she began. “Okay…”

To be continued...