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Under the pink hue of the 7 PM sunset, you lightly exhale in a futile attempt to calm yourself.
Today. His birthday. His twenty-first birthday.
A mutual friend has informed you of his room number in the hospital.
The moment you heard about this news, you understood the reason behind his abrupt leaving.
But does that justify the pain — your pain?
Did he feel pain? Is he capable of feeling pain?
Looking down at the Klein blue roses you’ve brought for this hospital visit, you hold your breath, turn towards the door, and knock.
“Come in.”
Slowly turning the handle, you quietly step inside.
You aren’t sure what you’re afraid of seeing.
Wounds? Bandages? His stormy eyes?
And yet you see all three.
Shock splashes across his face. He stares at you with both disbelief and… is that confusion? Remorse? And perhaps — even if it’s only a little bit — longing?
But as quickly as those emotions appear on his face, he masks them in a split second. Trying to sit up, he whispers, as if afraid that you’ll run away, “Hi.”
You try to decide if you should walk towards him, “Hi, birthday boy.”
The same name you’ve called him every year on his birthday since you’ve been together.
He visibly flinches, clearly struck by the tenderness in your voice and the guilt bubbling in his system. As he sees your beautiful fingers holding out the blue roses you’ve brought for him, he simply can’t take it anymore.
“No, please stop, I don’t deserve—”
When those words come out of his lips, you quickly shake your head and interrupt him. “Hey, hey, it’s your birthday. Everyone deserves to feel special and loved on their birthdays.”
You smile at him.
It’s the smile that does things to him. He knows it. The moment he sees you he knows that he has signed up for something both painful and beautiful that will definitely leave him with scratches but he doesn’t mind, heaven knows he doesn’t mind at all. He is able to endure hours of physical pain just to see your smile for a few seconds.
Even if your smile doesn’t mean the same as before.
Even if he stops lying to himself that he has lost you for good.
God, you’re even more beautiful than he remembers before he left.
And now, half sitting on his bed, all he feels is love yet all he deserves is guilt. Pain. Brutal words. Hatred from you towards him.
Perhaps it’s better to die on that mission than to face your love afterwards.
Somehow you manage to give him the roses and not touch his fingers, afraid of sparks that may no longer exist.
Somehow you manage to retreat in several steps, leaving some space between you two.
Clutching his chest, staring at his hands now holding the roses in Klein blue, he whispers, “I, goodness, um, thank you so much.” He gives in to the desire to cherish your beauty as he looks up at you, “It’s good to see you.”
There’s so much he leaves unsaid.
I miss you so much it’s killing me.
I didn’t want to hurt you.
I’m so, so sorry.
You see a small smile dancing on his lips. It’s a vulnerable and genuine expression of gratefulness and — yes, now you’re sure — longing.
How could you still be mad at him when you see him covered in bandages yet still giving you butterflies?
Trying to cover your blush, you look into his eyes and say, “I don’t really know what to buy for you this time. Because,” you start fidgeting, regretting this sentence you’ve started. “Well, you know.”
A pained sigh leaves your lips and he can’t help but flinch again. You’re hurting, you’re still hurting — it’s all his fault. And he has more pieces of evidence than the years he has been alive.
But you continue talking, now avoiding his unreadable gaze fixed on your lips, “So I want to ask you, what is a gift that I can give you? What is something that you really, really want?”
He ponders the question.
Again and again, the voice in his head mumbles, Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
After a tangible silence engulfs the room, he settles on, “Please know that I still love you.”
Wait, birthday wishes aren’t supposed to work like this, right?
Whatever this wish is, whatever it means — this is far from what you’ve expected from him.
Before you left your house, you’ve even considered the wildest scenarios — maybe he will ask you to take him to a newly discovered coffee shop, maybe he wants you to share your secret playlists with him, maybe he’ll want you to sing a song or write a poem for him.
You really really thought that he would ask for a thing. An actual thing.
Not this. Far, far, far from this.
You meet his eyes.
The way he looks at you — like you’re an angel and he’s a mortal, relishing the light you bring yet not being able to hold your hands because he’s afraid that he’ll break you, contaminate you, reveal the darkness behind his slender figure.
But you don’t mind.
Hearing these words, the affection within them, his feelings, sentiments, leave you with a dizzying feeling of unworldly melancholy.
“Remember that time when I told you how I’m really bad at moving conversations forward?”
You nod.
“This is what I mean. I can’t move conversations forward.”
You avert your eyes.
“No, please, look at me.”
You start fidgeting your hands and turn back to his distressed yet beautiful face. Dark circles, slightly chapped lips, somewhat messy hair. And the Klein blue roses in his hands. The way he holds them. Like how he once held you against his scarred body.
The way a tortured artist looks at their muse. Their savior. Their lover.
“Say something, please. Did I cross boundaries that I shouldn’t have crossed? Did my words sound fake? Am I hurting you again? Can I—”
You stop him right there.
“Draco.”
Third base is calling out his name.
This act holds a solemn intimacy that only exists when you whisper his name under the golden pink sunset.
He holds his shirt in front of his heart in a fist, breathing heavily, as a slight trace of tears glow in his eyes.
Seeing him like this, in this disheveled state of being, showing vulnerability, just for you — you knees go weak.
You settle on, “I want to trust you.”
You know his brilliant mind knows exactly what you didn’t say.
But I can’t.
Now it’s his turn to look away, facing the sunset by the window, “I want you to trust me, too.”
Sighing, he continues, “I know I don’t deserve your love but a part of me was so desperately clinging to the hope that you came to see me because you still, um,” he turns back to hold your gaze, “perhaps, maybe, I really hoped that, there is still a possibility of,” his arms points towards his heart and yours and the space in between, “us.”
Us.
You let the word sink in.
Slowly, he says, “But all of this is so fucking confusing. Why am I so good at hurting you when all I want to do is love you forever?”
You try not to be so affected by the confession just now in which he says he wants to love you forever.
“You’re not hurting me right now, Draco,” you softly whisper, not daring to break the fragility of openness in the air.
Blushing, he looks down, “Oh.”
Another period of silence.
But his voice cracks when he asks, “Then why are you standing so far away from me?”
This time, a teardrop falls free from his eyes, down his flushed cheeks, onto a blue rose petal.
He looks at your eyes like he’s looking into your soul, searching for answers, explanations, thoughts, anything, that could possibly explain this situation you’ve found yourselves in, and why you are so, so distant.
“I—”
You don’t know how to answer him.
Of course he takes your hesitation as rejection. But unlike every time in the past when his feelings surface, this time he doesn’t mask them.
His words come out as a plea, “You know that I really, really love you, right?”
Maybe it’s the way how the sunset casts a pink glow on his long eyelashes, or maybe it’s the way your heart aches for him, for his pain, for his real, real emotions.
And his love for you.
And your trust for him.
“I know,” you attempt a small smile despite the intensifying urge to cry.
He stares at you for a moment and relaxes, a few more teardrops falling onto the roses as he speaks, “Then you have given me the best birthday present I could ever possibly ask for.”
You can no longer stand so far away from him — in big steps you cross the space in between and hold his face, tenderly, and he just lets you hold him, gently looking up at you.
In this particular moment, under this particular sunset, feeling this particular breeze of fresh air with a light fragrance of roses, your heart beats faster, faster, faster, as an inner peace settles within your soul.
“I missed you, birthday boy.”
Keeping eye contact but also afraid of doing something wrong, he shivers as his arms gently circle your waist.
Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
Give me another chance. Let me love you. Take me back.
The chanting in his mind grows louder and louder with each passing second.
You hear him.
You feel his heartbeat.
You slowly bend down and press a tender, soft kiss on his lips.
Instinctively, his arms hold onto your waist tighter, protectively, though here in his arms you know there is nothing that could hurt you, and nothing that you need to be protected from.