This fluorescent light again. At this point, I am quite convinced that there will be fluorescent lights in hell, and it will be beaming in your eyes the moment you open them. The familiar sound of the heart monitor is beeping to a rhythm. Slowly, recollections of that gruesome episode comes back to me, hurtling my body to an upright position.
"Taylor! Violet!" I yell out to the room.
A familiar scent greets me in a cradle, a chest that I instantly recognize against my cheek.
"Taylor," I cry softly.
"Jasmine, I'm here. And I'll never leave again. No matter how much you push me away. No matter what you say or do. I'll never leave you again." The sound of his voice is so therapeutic that it sends alleviation through me.
"I don't want you to ever leave," I tell him, affirming that losing him was another pain I've learned was intolerable to me.
"Wait, let me text Violet." He does so with one hand, the other arm still wrapped around me.
Something I am absolutely sure of is this: a hand is not just a hand, and a chest is not just a chest.
Tim's hands revolted me, made me felt disgusted when it was in contact with my body, his chest heartless and cold, like stone. Taylor's hands pacifies my soul, calming the most delirious nerves, his chest warm and welcoming, assuring a harbor of safety.
Tim. The memories of his attempt on me sends a flush of shame to my spirit, but not as shameful as the thought of wanting to kill myself if he had actually succeeded.
I start to sob silently, suddenly feeling beastly. "Taylor, you saw everything. I am so...embarrassed," I say, making a nauseous sound.
"Listen to me. You are not a reflection of his sickening actions. You are pure and deserving of so much more." He pulls me in once again, rubbing my back, while stroking my cheek.
How could I ever have doubted his feelings for me? A man who saw nothing but the worst of me, yet only translated the best of me. But what happened to Tim? And what about Daisy? My eyes grow wide, stricken with uneasiness.
Taylor hands me a cup of water, sitting on the bed beside me. I have never seen him this scruffy, even more so than when I had seen him the last time I woke in the hospital. He looks exhausted. Oh no, how long have I been out this time?
"Taylor what day is it?" I ask worriedly.
He smiles back at me, and I've never been more delighted to see his dimple, the grimace now gone. "Don't worry, you were out for only two days. Luckily, the wound didn't run deep and you just needed a few stitches."
I suddenly notice the pain on my right waist, moving my hand there and finding myself bandaged up. Taylor's scowl is back, so I try my best to dismiss the injury. "Can you tell me what happened?"
He lets out a sigh and pulls a chair next to me, situating himself in it. "Well, starting at the beginning, I was at the airport, waiting for my delayed flight to Atlanta."
I remember rushing to catch him at his condo, when in reality he would have been gone.
"Out of nowhere, Violet ran up to me and demanded to know why I was at the airport." He strokes his jaw, avoiding my gaze.
"After I explained to her, she slapped me." She did what? My little sister had certainly gotten quite physical with her behavior lately. I'm going to need to address this temper of hers.
I touch his face as if the blow somehow resonated until now. He mirrors my gesture, caressing my face from the temple down to my jaw. Trying not to flinch, the soreness is now becoming apparent.
"I deserved it, Jasmine. She was right and I couldn't seem to get anything right. I thought that leaving would release you of the dilemma, not realizing that it could hurt you more, that I would be another person who had walked away from you."
"I made you do it, Taylor. It was my fault. I kept telling you to go." My stubbornness had driven him out of town. Literally.
He takes me back to my favorite spot on him, and I can feel his chest inhaling, exhaling. "It's not your fault. It's the way the universe works. And I can't complain because through all the twists and turns, it has somehow brought us together." It is so like him to counter everything with reasoning.
We slowly pull away, as I am eager to hear the rest of the story.
"So then Violet freaked out, rightfully so, that you have been left all alone with my 'breakup' box, so she called it, and we immediately came straight to you." He suddenly pauses and shuts his eyes hard, and I can see him grinding his teeth together behind his lips. "If only we had come sooner."
"No, you came just in time. These wounds are just superficial. But if he would have—" my voice trails off, too disgusted to finish the sentence, noticing that the sheets are crumbled under Taylor's fist. I can't imagine how I ever shared a bed with someone like Tim.
"Well, I did enough damage to knock him out cold, at least until the police showed up. I really could have done more, maybe permanently crippling him in more places than one." His mind wanders off, somewhere violent and bloody I'm sure.
"So," I encourage him to continue. Tim can rot in hell for all I care, but Daisy, my poor baby.
"So Daisy," he answers with a wry expression, sending my blood pressure to a spike.
Daisy what? What happened to my baby. He won't look at me, staring straight ahead, staring past me, towards the door. "Well, you can see for yourself," he gestures with his chin, pointing behind me.
Wait, what? I slowly spin around to follow his view. Violet is standing in the opening of the sliding glass door, radiating with joy, as she holds a toddler girl in her arms—the little girl with sparkling, jade eyes, translucent white skin, dark-honeyed hair in pigtails, beaming with a smile that shows her tiny little front teeth, each side of her cheeks encrusted with a dimple.
Struggling to stand free, I am confined by the wires placed on me. "Jas, be careful, we're coming," Violet commands as she escorts the little girl to me.
Finally, my arms conceal my most precious gift, my blessing, my angel. "Daisy," I whimper into her cheeks, taking in the smell of my baby girl, fearing that I may wake from a dream, to find my arms depleted of this joy. Violet and Taylor secures us within their arms, assuring me that I will not wake up, because this is my reality.
The room is silent, yet the sound of exhilaration and lightheartedness echo throughout, mixed with sobs—lots of it. This feeling is surreal, yet, no dream could compare to its authenticity.
"Tay-Tay," her teensy voice calls out, as I watch her extend her hand towards Taylor. Jealousy instantly fills me, combined with a bit of amusement, as Taylor takes a hold of her.
"I can explain," he says to me with apologetic eyes, although I feel he is somewhat quite content with her behavior.
"You better, or you'll be the one lying here," I threaten.
"Wow, Jasmine Belrose. That is no way to speak in front of your daughter," he laughs at me annoyingly.
"It's kind of my fault, Jas," Violet scoots me over to share the bed that can fit both of us comfortably.
"You see, Tim was interrogated for a total of ten seconds before he screamed 'lawyer'. Apparently, his crime is pretty much set in stone, and to get leniency, if any at all, he needed to disclose Daisy's whereabouts immediately."
Leniency. Had he really used his daughter's safety as leverage for punishment of his crimes?
"They've been staying at a remote cabin in Tennessee," she progresses on. "He had a nanny there caring for Daisy. Her family was threatened with deportation by him, ensuring her silence."
Letting my mind process her story, I just could not believe I've ever had feelings for someone so treacherous. How senseless and naive I was to think that he would have ever changed.
"Anyways, he's going to jail for a very long time. And he was so upset that his parents had cut all ties and support of him, that he started to snitch on them for their years of tax evasions and corporate fraud of some sorts. They're really all going to get what they deserve."
An overwhelming sense of peace encompasses me, and for the first time in a long time, I feel as if I can breathe without restrictions, as if the air is now lighter and cleaner.
"Now as for this," Violet points up and down at the vision of Taylor's towering body, cuddling a tiny Daisy, "I had to leave for twelve hours to cover some things that were terribly neglected from my absent business trip, and this is what I came back to."
As much as I want to be mad, a piece of my heart is gleaming, seeing that Daisy had quickly grown fond of Taylor.
Violet jumps out of the bed to join them, tickling her niece as Daisy's giggles and pushes her hands away. Daisy has grown quite a bit, and I am twinged, knowing that it has been almost one year since I've last seen her.
Rays of the sun shine through the window behind them, and it is truly a divine spectacle, seeing my entire heart within reach.
Taylor releases Daisy to Violet, as he rejoins me on the bed. Coddling my head between his palms, he places a kiss in the middle of my forehead, as drifts of joyous tears fall from my eyes.
"Let's get out of here and not come back for a long time," he suggests, making me wish that we could teleport instantly away from here. But does it really matter where we are, as long as we are together?
It takes so much pain and tragedy for us to learn such a difficult lesson.
Through each of my grievances, I had thought I would never make it out alive, or that it would destroy me in an irreparable way. Yet, not only did I survive, I emerged stronger and with more confidence than ever before. I have chosen to let misery degrade me, yet, the people who love me can only see the strength I hold.
For so long, I envisioned a perfect family as such a generic definition, and here is my family now, perfectly exceptional.