CHAPTER FOURTY-FOUR TABATHA

CHAPTER FOURTY-FOUR

TABATHA

I lay in my bed as I look up at the ceiling. Jackie sits on the edge of it. Dash has been gone for three weeks, and it still hurts as bad as it did the moment I found out he left us. I don't eat much, but I sleep often. He's always in my dreams. Always smiling. Telling me that he loves me. He holds me while we bask in the sun on a beach. Or sitting by a warm fire on a cold, winter night. But wherever he takes me in my dreams, it's always just the two of us. I cry, and he tells me it'll be okay. That he is with me every day. That he truly never left me. And when I wake up, all alone, I find myself staring at his side of the bed and I cry my eyes out. I've closed myself off from the world. Jackie comes over daily, but it's gotten to the point where we don't even talk. She grabs my mail out of my mailbox and brings it in for me. I might have moved in with Dash, but I wasn't on the deed and he didn't have a will. His parents put the house up for sale shortly after the funeral, and I bought it. There was never a doubt in my mind that I wanted to stay here. Where we had planned to build a life. It has a different feel to it now, but he's still here with me.

Jackie sits on the end of the bed and just stares off into space for about thirty minutes then she leaves. At first, she would tell me that it was going to be okay—at times she even brought Jake or Blake with her—but after a couple of weeks, she gave up on me. I don't blame her; I'm a lost cause. And I'm actually thankful that she doesn't try to cheer me up. She doesn't understand how I feel, and it's hard for me to put it into words.

I close my eyes as I feel the bile taste in my mouth. It's been happening often lately. But what do you expect your body to do when you starve it? I've never understood what someone goes through when they say they have depression. Until now. It breaks you down to the point you feel crippled. My body has turned against me, and I don't even fight it. I can't even get out of bed. I keep the shades pulled tight to block out the sunlight. I prefer the darkness.

The bile rises and I sit up quickly, throwing a hand over my mouth. Jackie spins around to look at me wide-eyed. "Tabatha?" She reaches out for me, but I throw the covers off and run to my bathroom. My body finds the strength I didn't even know it had to move.

I fall to my knees and what little I had to eat yesterday comes up. Her soft hand rubs my back as I cough and spit out what my body has rejected. And when I finish, I lay down on the cold tile floor, once again unable to move. My body gives up on me again. Just those few seconds of vomiting left me utterly useless. She places a cold washrag on my forehead and lays down next to me. I look over at her as my eyes sting from the tears.

"I'm sorry for being such a shitty friend," I softly say. She's done nothing but be here for me, and I have taken that for granted.

"Stop," she says as a tear runs down her face. "I love you."

"I love you, too."

We lay there side by side on my bathroom floor like two kids afraid of what is to come. Because Dash taught me that you're never guaranteed tomorrow. And yesterday is never enough.