Never Let Go

Chapter 1: New Arrival

"I used to do this a lot with my brother." She said as she gazes up at the stars.

She looks beautiful under the moonlight with the stars twinkling in her eyes. She lays quietly, while pain from her memories mix in with her beauty.

"Have you ever seen The Lion King?" She asks.

"Yeah. A long time ago." I smile.

"Me and my brother would look up at the stars, and we'd always think about that scene with Mufasa and Simba." She shows a weak smile. "The great kings of the past look down on us from those stars."

She turns her head and looks at me with her glossy eyes.

"After we watched it we believed that lions were in space and lived on the stars." She shows a big, beautiful smile, which I rarely see, but when I do see it, it's infectious.

I love to see her smile, and her giggle is like music to my ears. I laugh with her, but her smile quickly fades, and she stares back up at the stars.

I think back to that day a lot.

God, I miss her.

****

My 5am alarm rings, waking me up from my sleep. I turn it off and look to my left. Katie is as far away from me as possible with her back turned to me. I sigh and rub my face, taking a couple minutes to wake up.

After showering and getting changed for work, I make my way down to the kitchen. Katie is up, making herself a breakfast smoothie. Neither of us look at each other or speak.

I make myself a coffee and sit in silence while I drink it. Katie picks up her smoothie and leaves the kitchen. I sigh and take one last sip of coffee, leaving half of it in the mug. I hate his feeling and bad atmosphere, so I snatch my jacket from the coat hanger and leave for work.

****

I walk through reception and Stacey smiles at me from behind the desk.

"Good morning, Michael."

"Morning, Stacey." I smile.

I walk up to the desk and pick up a pen to sign myself in.

"How was your weekend?" She asks.

It was the first weekend I've had off in a while, and considering me and Katie got into another argument, it wasn't great...

"Uh, fine. It was nice to finally have some time to relax." I show a little smile and meet her eyes. "How was your weekend?"

"It was good. Me and Jeff hired a babysitter, and we finally had a date night." She smiles.

"That's nice."

"Sorry, I remember you saying you had plans with Katie's family? How did that go?"

Not well...

"Uh, yeah, it was fine." I smile. "I'm only doing the morning shift, so I'll see you at lunch."

"Ok." She smiles.

I leave reception and walk through the long hallways of the building, making my way to the canteen. The empty room is filled with smells of bacon and sausages cooking. I check my watch and see it's not quite time yet for the patients to be up.

I walk into the kitchen, and the cooks turn their heads to say good morning.

"You're in very early today, Michael!" Fay raises her eyebrows.