Jessica glanced at the window beside her bed. It had snowed all night and light snowflakes sprinkled the sky before landing onto the grey pavement. She took in the white landscape for a few minutes, contemplated the fluffy and cold structures of water falling hazardously. Almost hypnotizing. She let her mind drift for a moment, projected herself, immeasurably lighter, falling.
A tiny speck amidst the thousands of others.
‘Snowflakes or human, it’s all the same in the end.’ She thought bitterly.
Both had this precarious destination awaiting them. Both ended their life on the brick hard asphalt. She cast a last lingering glance on the serene spectacle, and tugging her covers aside, got out of her bed before heading towards the bathroom for a quick shower.
She intended to be fast so that she could be finished before her girlfriend arrived in a few minutes.
Her girlfriend.
She had tried times and times to convince her to not visit her daily. Those hours could be used for other more useful things like working or relaxing. Jessica thought that she could definitely use some shopping as well, or go out more often with her friends. She seemed too stressed lately.
‘And it’s not like I would be going anywhere.’
Heaving a sigh, she set foot in the bathroom. Small and containing the bare minimum, it was white as the snow that covered the streets, immaculate, sanitary, impersonal. She let the tap water run and hot water soon spurt out.
Supporting her weight to the metal bar anchored in the wall, Jessica entered precautiously the bathtub. She then grabbed the little green sponge- one of the only thing that wasn’t white- and started to wash herself, positionning her oxygen thread so that it stayed protected from the water. Like every other times, her body slowly warmed up to the hot, soothing liquid and it calmed her instantly, erasing the tiredness, from each of her numb and aching muscle .
Fifteen minutes later she was back in her room and was back to her original place under the stretched pearl white sheets. Thousands of undesired thoughts filled her head, as she lied there, her eyes finding white walls everywhere she looked.
So lowering her head on the pillow, Jessica let her mind wander off, focusing off her body, peacefully, like a butterfly emerging from its chrysalis. She ignored her senses, the bip of the machine next to her bed. She just lied there, her mattress yielding to the useless and pale corpse of hers, that had landed onto it. And she stayed there, gazing at the not-as-depressive-white-as-the-one-of-the-walls’ ceiling.
It’s in this very position that her girlfriend found her when she entered the modest room.
hair spread on its surface, just like Sleeping Beauty the only difference being that the beauty here wasn’t exactly sleeping.
“Hey” she said, quickly going in before closing the door after her.
“Hey” She replied, her eyes still on the ceiling.
She didn’t need to look up to see that the dark-haired girl was still standing hesitantly at the door. All the attention she tried to invest elsewhere was vain. It was always back to the girl standing, in her now seemingly littler room. Every single cell of her body helplessly yearned for the other’s contact, despite her will to not show that she had missed her much, much more contrary to what she’d first thought, and it hadn’t been two days yet. She was screwed.
“Yuri ?”
“Yeah”
“I’m not contagious you know”
She turned her head and looked at the dark-haired girl whose face was presently shining with a huge smile.
“You’re not mad at me ?”
She was talking about the last time they met. Which was just the day before yesterday. The day when Jessica got upset at her. Again.
She didn’t really mean it, of course not. She was sick. Of this place, of her useless leg, of the meds, of fainting.
She was constantly, slowly running out of oxygen despite the translucent tube she could feel hanging out of her nose, constantly supplying her of the precious gaz. She was suffocating. The white walls were smothering her.
And yet Yuri, sweet Yuri at whom she had gotten all angry at, shouting at, was standing here again, right before her, stuttering apologies, her black hair falling soft on her shoulders, her loveable knees showing through the holes in her ripped jeans, a large sweat she had never seen before. Fingers fidgeting anxiously, head low and all tensed.
“It wasn’t you, Yuri. You did nothing wrong. I’m sorry, for shouting at you and getting angry at you.”
She could feel the girl’s curious eyes on her now. And suddenly she felt embarrassed.
“It’s just… I couldn’t help but feel envious, you know… The party… You…”
She sighed. She didn’t know it would be this difficult.
“When you told me about that party on the 23rd your friend invited you to, I-I became jealous.” Her eyes shifted to the frozen landscape again. Now it seemed kind of reassuring. All these snowflakes… Falling ? Sure. But falling together.
“You would be having fun, with your friends while I would be lying here, all useless and alone as ever before…”
Yuri started to feel upset, her head now directed towards the girl on the bed. Jessica was doing it again.
“You’re not useless Jess, you’re still the same selfless, amazing person that I met on that day, who accepted me as her girlfriend and who hasn’t ceased to amaze me since then. You are very brave and I could not imagine not having you here with me.”
She got closer to her. Jessica noticed that her eyes were sparkling, as brightly as the snow.
“And I love you very much.”
Yuri’s smile was her favourite. And right now it was the most efficient cure among all the ones they ever made her try.
“And that is why,” the dark-haired concluded excitedly, her tone a tiny bit louder, “you’re definitely coming with me to this party !”
She threw her arms around Jessica’s neck and nuzzled her nose in the crook of her neck, smiling goofily.
Jessica let a smile form itself on her face. She knew how lucky she was to have Yuri. She wouldn’t be there without her.
“Yuri ?”
“Mmh ?”
“Thank you”
“All I do, I do it for you Jess.”
A speck of dust 