Come What May

35. intertwined

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE

INTERTWINED

—

• saturday, may 22nd •

For the first time in a long, long time, I'm not having a nightmare.

Although, whether or not I'm having a nightmare, my dreams are always dark, figuratively and literally. Pure dark, pure silence, pure panic. Always.

Tonight, however, I'm dreaming of a garden. It's a good dream, faceless people and wisp-like voices floating through the air, bees and grass that sways with the wind, people on picnic blankets, but it's cut short before I can reach the people calling me to sit on the picnic blankets with them.

Groaning, I squint in the night, my hand thrashing around for my phone that's charging on the table next to me and the glasses next to the phone. I look down, the bright, blue light of the phone and the large 3:04 a.m. printed on the screen striking my eyes.

That, and the contact 'storm!!!!'.

"What?" I mumble into the phone, letting out an inhuman yawn immediately after. "Storm? Everythin' okay? You okay?"

Storm laughs quietly, it's filled with static, wind and... tires against roads? "Everything's good, Asif," they assure, I can envision the grin on their face that's probably just as effervescent as their smile during the day time.

"Then why on earth are you calling me?" I hiss, pulling the phone away from my ear to check the time. "At three in the morning! What is it?"

Again, Storm laughs, this time a heartier one. Less wind, more Storm. "Will you come on a drive with me?" They breathe into the phone, and only after their breath is fully released do I hear the soft music playing in the background. "Just around the city. The lights are pretty, and the weather's perfect. Well, perfect for me. It'll be slightly cold for you, so get a jacket."

I don't even have to think once before I answer. "Yes." Already stumbling out of bed and adjusting the glasses on my face, I make my way into the bathroom, hissing at the fluorescent white of the bulb. "Yes. Will you come here?" Yawning loudly, I sigh, squeezing out some toothpaste onto the toothbrush. "God, Storm. It's three in the morning."

"... Does that mean you won't be coming, or— ?"

"No!" I interrupt, toothbrush stuck in my mouth, but if Storm can understand me when I'm drunk, they can understand me now.

Humming in pitch with the song, though I doubt that Storm realises it, they say, "Okay", adding a small laugh after. "Okay, Asif. I'll be waiting downstairs, come down when you're ready. I'll see you."

With that, they end the call, and the last thing that I hear is the song switching from Hozier to Carly Rae Jepsen.

Everything about Storm is so unapologetically Storm, right from their spontaneous adventures to the middle of nowhere all the way down to their emotions that they're always so open about and so willing to share with other people.

They're so unique and so secure in themself that it makes me want to be around them all the time, drinking in their company at every second of the day, because God, is their nectar sweet.

Quickly, I wash my face, hopefully washing away some of the three a.m. tiredness from it in the process, and grab their jacket from my suitcase, the one that they gave me on that day at the beach. Not the one that they gave me on the airplane; that one's reserved for occasions that involve me having to dress decently.