A light blazes from outside my eyelids, but I don’t realize what’s going on until I hear a crack. My heart leaps as I sit up, a hand immediately going to my chest and shallow breaths trying desperately to enter and escape my mouth. I feel the erratic thrum underneath my fingertips right as another flash gives the white room a slightly purple hue, a booming chorus of thunder immediately following it.

I jump, landing back on the mattress with a thump. Images flicker through my head, ones that have been buried ever since I moved into this new house.

The first is a man and woman looking down at someone with enough anger to kill. The second is a boy wandering alone as the rain pounds him down to the ground and a stripe paints one corner of the sky a brilliant white. The third is that same boy huddling under a tree with a crack in its side. It teeters slightly downward as the wind howls catastrophically around him, sending leaves spiraling into the air.

But the fourth is the one that scares me the most and makes me breathe even faster. It’s of the boy standing in the shadow of an early morning hallway, clothes completely soaked through and figure hunched forward as shivers shake his body. The same people who left him out there in the first place aren’t there to greet him, so the small wooden table in the kitchen is the only thing his eyes can latch onto. All I can think about is how alone he is with no one to love him, no one to dry him off in the warmest towel they can find, no one with a drink that won’t completely scorch his throat but will bring his insides back to life, no one- “MS?”

I hear a rustle from behind me, and when I turn, I see my boyfriend Zephyr using his arm to wipe away the sleepiness from his eyes, his indigo hair a mess but his full attention on me.

“Hi.” I try and tune out my fear by responding, but it’s a mistake when the next sound that lets itself loose into the world is like a whip smacking against someone’s defenseless back. I cry and sink onto the mattress, burying myself in the covers. Zephyr ducks in as well, but I can’t make out anything from the blur of tears clouding my vision.

“What’s wrong?” Zephyr asks, extending out one of his hands for me to grab and squeeze. I take it, albeit hesitantly, but the warmth of his long fingers comforts me a little bit before my panic escalates again, droplets sliding down my face. I open my mouth, but no words come out. It’s like the air sucked them all away without my permission, and as soon as they reenter my brain, they get buried beneath the weight of all the pictures taking up space in my mind.

“MS?” I can hear the concern in Zephyr’s voice, his eyebrows narrowing and his eyes getting even smaller as his free hand reaches to run through my hair. The gleam of the two studs bordering one furrowed brow meet my attention, along with the thought of how my black locks must feel against his fingers. They must be soft and fluffy, the shampoo and conditioner cutting through the oil and leaving something smooth behind.

Now the strength to speak comes, but I still find myself stuttering. “I-I d-don’t l-like t-thunderstorms.”

There’s a pause for a moment as Zephyr absorbs this, and rather than inquire right away, we stay like this for a while without interrupting the silence. Just as I feel the strings of sleep tugging me back, there’s another loud crash of thunder. My body immediately tenses up into a ball, and my knees crash against Zephyr’s as another rack of wails leaves my body. It makes me feel five instead of sixteen.

I can feel when Zephyr’s limbs meet mine, a mirror image resting against me. His leg slowly rubs up and down against my own, and although it’s comforting, I’m far too lost in my tears to even notice it. I’m back in that world with the boy and the dark sky, sheets of rain drenching everything and rusting the heart that’s one step away from cracking.

Why can’t his parents just give him the love he so desperately deserves? Why can’t they spare him a little piece of kindness? Why can’t- “Do you wanna tell me why?” Zephyr whispers, his breath resting on my cheek after he’s done talking. His bare toes brush my sock-covered ones. I want to tell him. I want to tell him so badly that I almost can’t let go of the words that’ll form the phrases I need to be rid of. But my brain grips onto them tight enough to burn. If they become free of the images, then they’ll leave my head and enter reality. That’s when they’re a real experience out for him to read like a museum exhibit.

Without that, they’ll always be just a fairy tale, a story that keeps me sated while my body thrashes around in nightmare limbo. A protest rises up from the rational side of my brain, and that’s when I find myself getting out from underneath the covers, breathing in cleaner air and bringing Zephyr with me. I’m not sure if he’s scared of what’s going on with me, but that patient and tender expression he’s wearing is the proof I need to know that he’s listening.

The only sound coming from outside the pattering of rain, the memories unspool from my tongue.

“You remember my parents, don’t you?” Zephyr’s features immediately morph into anger, but he doesn’t say anything.

“They would do something whenever I got in trouble besides smacking my butt or yelling at me.” Relief that I’m not stuttering makes it easy to keep going.

“Whenever there was a thunderstorm, they would lock me out of the house.” 

Now Zephyr’s eyes widen. “And leave you outside to fend for yourself?” I nod. “Assholes,” he growls. Just hearing that word reminds me of a different moment, one where a boy runs from a house screaming and covered in bruises. Another boy meets him outside a gas station, and each and every single red, blue, and black spot is kissed with a different obscenity towards the attackers tied to each color. It makes me tear up.

“I was always so alone,” I whimper. “It was just me and the elements fighting. I would always cower and try to find some tree to hide under even though I knew they were never safe, but my fear and the vicious water running down my body were enough to tell me I didn’t stand a chance. When it was over, I would go inside and pass out on the kitchen floor in a puddle of water. Mom and Dad were never happy about that, either.”

“You never told anyone?” Zephyr inquires.

“How could I?” I shout, a streak burning outside with enough ferocity to blind. “They were my parents! It didn’t matter that there was no one around where we lived or that I was always being asked by teachers during the fall why I was gone. They were the only guardians I had, and I thought the pain would be over with someday.”

I pause, remembering a few of the cuts that mark my body. “But it never ended.”

This time when the thunder sounds, I bite my lip and don’t flinch. I stare right into Zephyr’s charcoal eyes that seem as limitless as a pool and shut down every single instinct telling me to hide. Instead, I focus on him, on the way his ruffled hair makes him even cuter in my eyes, on the way his golden skin shines a little bit in the darkness, on the way his shoulders are broad enough for me to hop on since I’m so light, on the way his hand feels as it travels down my neck and makes its way to my waist- Zephyr leans forward, moves his fingers to my hair, and kisses me.

Or I could focus on the way his lips feel against mine instead. My eyelids close as my hand travels to rest against Zephyr’s back, feeling the muscles flex underneath my touch. I forget about the rain, the pain of the past, and that I was crying and miserable. Now I can remember the way Zephyr and I fit perfectly together like two pieces in a puzzle, the way his eyebrow piercing makes a soft press on my forehead, and the way he smells like a forest after a campfire has soaked through the veins of the leaves.

When we separate, I find the corners of my mouth twitching up in a smile. Zephyr does the same, the gentle pink of his splotchy cheeks lifting.

“But now you’ve got me.” His grin grows wider as he fiddles with the strands of hair near my neck.

“I’m never going to hurt you, MS. I promise that I’ll keep you safe no matter what.”

I bring my nose forward to nudge his. “Thank you.”

The final memory that comes to my mind as the two of us lie down on our pillows and go back to sleep makes me give Zephyr one last slow kiss. It’s of a younger boy entering the shop behind a row of gas pumps and heading towards the display of Little snacks. His shoulder bumps against one of an older guy. They both apologize, get a good look at each other, and start a conversation, carrying it all the way outside before the older one drives away and the youngest feels his heart beat a little faster as he makes his way home on foot. That’s where the pain started to end, and I know I’ll cherish the peace and kindness Zephyr has brought into my life until we pass on. It doesn’t matter what the storm of life decides to blow into our lives; we’ll hold on and find a way to survive together.