February 2021
The year is young and he is ambitious with reckless abandon: Ashlae and Shay gives him a pair of trousers as a gift. They promise it'll all of the seams are body contouring and that it will change his life. I'm only able to get him a card that sings some song released when we weren't even born. We feel young and ethereal. His gift is still being shipped from South Korea. He asks me what it is, knowing I won't tell him. It's a surprise and he'll have to wait and see. I don't believe in breaking tradition.
Roman calls and asks why none of his kids are home and we put him on a video call. He's an adorable lunch box cake that he blows out in Micah's honor and has a little bit of a cry about his son growing up and what it was like to know him for twenty years. Micah tries his best not to cry as well.
"You're allowed to cry," I tell him in bed that night. The party finished sometime around midnight. Ashlae and Shay crashing on the couch in the living room. "You're the birthday boy. It's a requirement. You're supposed to be melancholic and elated and having a category eight existential crisis."
"I just can't find anything to be sad about," he admits. And I think it's because he's having a hard time opening up to me. I would know. "This is one of my best birthday memories."
"Do you wish your mom was here with us?"
"Yes, kind of. I wish things could have been different. But I'm grateful she didn't have to suffer more than anything. I don't want to be selfish and wish she was still alive and living with the aftermath of what happened. It's not fair to her," he says and ends up crying like we said he would and I'm comforted by how everything has come full circle. He hides his face in my shoulder and I play with his hair and wonder if it really is anything like his mum's. What did she look like?
The sunlight breaks through the curtains and Micah groans into my neck. There's no motivation to get out of bed and start the day.
"I don't want to get up," he says.
"We've got class," I insist. "And you've got an exam."
"I'll email my lecturer. Say I'm sick or something," Micah says.
I run my fingers through his straw-coloured hair. I'm still thinking about what his mother looks like. If he looks anything like her after all. He leans into me like a puppy for head scratches. I'm endeared by him. "What are we going to tell our kids then?"
"Our kids?" His eyes are shinning and I have to remind him it's just a joke. That I didn't mean anything by it. Time travel makes me want to throw up and I wish I never said it to him like that in the moment.
He touches the hollow of his mouth to my collarbone and I know I won't be able to say no to him when he slides underneath the blankets.
Amber sleeps in the other corner of the room and I'm convinced she's well aware of what's happening and has chosen to faint ignorance. I bite into my forearm to keep myself from saying anything. My hand in his hair and I'm so scared it'll pull it from his skull.
We take a healthy nap afterward and is awoken by his alarm two hours later. I'm upset about having to leave my bed. He skips a shower and throws on last night's clothes. Has burnt toast for breakfast in his way out of the door. And I think: none of this can be good for you. "I'll text you when I've finished."
"Okay. Enjoy," I say.
He has time for one more lingering kiss that takes like multiseeded bread and Rama fat spread. I lean into him. "I don't want to leave."