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Sil woke up to the storm simmering under her skin.
The storm wasn’t uncommon– it surged too many times nowadays, and Sil didn’t know what she could do about it. She lay in her bed, staring up at the log beams of the ceiling with all the intensity of a starving wolf watching a potential meal. Her back ached, and her legs shifted restlessly under the sheets. She threw them off with a force that no blankets warranted, and she strode out of bed with the purpose of a mercenary on a mission.
Task one of the day: make breakfast.
Like most days, she failed it, and ended up tromping around her cabin in the woods with no final destination, brow creased in nameless frustration that she couldn’t seem to shake.
Task two: water the herbs.
She didn’t fail that one. Her herb garden supplied her silly little tea addiction. Lavender, rosemary, lemongrass, and spearmint. All sorts of herbs perfect for freshly-brewed cups. Sometimes, she found little satin pouches to bundle herbs into to give to her dear friends. Sometimes they needed tea. And sometimes, they needed the comfort that a hot drink could bring that she just wasn’t able to provide on some days.
Task three: stand barefoot in the grass and space out.
That was always her favorite part of the morning.
Standing in the sunlight, face tilted up towards the heavens, eyes squeezed tight like her life depended on it, Sil resided in the strange apex point somewhere between peace and tension. Her back still twinged like it always did on mornings where the clouds stalked the horizon. With an air of defeat, Sil realized that she’d probably be hurting even more by the time the rain rolled around. How lovely.
The crunch of footsteps against twigs made her eyes snap open, and she looked up just in time to see a figure walking into the clearing of her house. Ren. As always, his smile was tired and his steps were halting. She offered him her own version of a strained smile, and without speaking the two of them made their way into the house. Sil put on the kettle, and Ren took out the clay mugs and herbs.
Afternoon teas were a sacred ritual for them. Life had not been kind to either of them, and it took them far too long before they’d began seeking the solace of other living souls.
“No Kim today?” Sil asked quietly as she waited for the kettle to whistle, eyes glancing out the window as if to search for their missing friend.
“Nah. It’s a bad day,” was all Ren said, and Sil nodded like that explained everything.
“And for you?”
“Mm,” she didn’t have to look over to know that he was offering some sort of weak shrug, “missing them a lot today. Yesterday was better. I watered the garden without crying.”
Amidst the heavy words, Sil managed the tiniest tinge of pride. The fact that Ren had admitted to shedding a tear spoke volumes. “Good job about the garden. They’d all love it.”
“Hope so.”
They faded into silence after that, broken only when the tea began to softly whistle. Sil took it off of the fire, bringing it over to the mugs that Ren had already prepped by herbs stuffed in copper tea-steepers. She poured the water, hands only shaking slightly, and lifted it back on it’s rack with a quiet oof. Then they took their mugs, made their way to the hearth, and sat down.
Silence had never been awkward between them. Both Sil and Ren had seen enough in their lives to shape them into people who kept their words close like secrets. And, through the years of their friendship, they had both kicked the nasty habit of filling space with anxious chattering.
“How’re you today?” Ren asked quietly, hugging his mug of tea close to his chest. “Pain’s alright?”
“Eh,” Sil replied with a one-shouldered shrug. “It’s not the worst today, but it’s not gone. Never really goes away.”
Ren nodded after that, tracing the rim of his mug in silence. Only after a second he added tentatively, “And… the other kind of pain?”
Sil went quiet, pursing her lips together. Life had gotten easier in many ways as she had gotten older. It had become easier to take care of herself, easier to check in on her friends, easier to keep her house maintained– little things like that. There were things, though, that became harder the longer that passed.
For her, that was the topic of her parents.
It had been eleven years since Sil’s parents had died in a freak accident. Eleven years since bloodied hands had pressed two rings into her own palm, the two rings that now hung from Sil’s neck to this day. Between trying to keep herself alive and bouncing from place to place, she had never stopped to think longer than a few minutes about them. And she still didn’t want to.
It was unfortunate for her that her friends seemed determined to help each other work through stuff like that.
“It’s fine,” Sil muttered, taking a sip of her tea. “Things have been fine.” Nevermind the fact that she’d been having nightmares more lately, and that the bags under her eyes have steadily grown darker and deeper, like the dreams had carved them there themselves.
“ Fine, ” Ren mused, taking a long drink of his tea, as if trying to emphasize dramatic affect. “You know, fine is a funny word. I’ve found that people use it a lot when they’re trying to pretend they’re not.” He leaned forward, raising an eyebrow at her. “You look awful, Sil. Tell me the truth, what’s going on?”
Sil shifted in her seat and glared down at her mug, biting her lower lip in a bid not to immediately snap back with something. She waited for a second, then two, before shooting back, “How are you doing with everything with the kids?”
Ren flinched, just barely, but it was enough to make Sil regret her words. Ren’s kids were just as much of a painful topic for him as Sil’s parents were. Three precious lights, all snuffed out in a similar accident that took her parents years prior. While Sil had never met them, Ren told enough stories that there were times she found herself mourning them as if she’d known them herself.
She knew how low of a blow it was to throw them in his face as a way to avoid talking about her own loss, and she shifted back in her chair slightly, curling in on herself as if to try disappearing into the seat. Her words felt thick on her tongue as she mumbled, “Sorry. That was uncalled for.”
“Yeah. It was.” Ren’s voice was sharp, causing Sil to wince, and when she dared to look up, she saw that his expression was tight, like he was trying not to cry. Then his face smoothed out, and he looked up. As Sil looked back down, trying to avoid eye contact, she could’ve sworn she’d seen grief in his eyes, but not a mourning kind.
“Sil,” he said gently, making her scowl at her hands. “I miss them. A lot. They were everything. And some days, its hard to get out of bed because I hurt so much. But it’s gotten better because I’ve talked about it.”
She heard the sound of his mug being set on the coffee table. Sil kept her head down, still scowling, as she heard him move to the chair next to hers instead of across from her. For a moment, there was quiet, like Ren expected her to admit in that moment that yeah, she missed them, she missed them like crazy, but when Sil didn’t speak, he sighed quietly and continued.
“You and I both know that not talking isn’t a good thing,” he said, and sputtered when Sil snorted. “I’m serious! It never helped either of us with anything! What good has it really done other than enabled us to bottle everything up until we eventually explode?”
“Someone’s using therapy language,” Sil grumbled, not wanting to admit how right he was.
“There’s a reason why it works so well,” Ren snipped back, and Sil finally looked up, just in time to see him cross his arms and turn his nose up in mock offense. Something in her chest loosened at that. He wasn’t still mad.
“If it works so well, why haven’t you gone already?” She teased, even going as far as to reach out and bump his shoulder with her fist.
He let out a dramatic gasp and batted her fist away, sticking his tongue out at her, to which Sil did the exact same thing. For a moment, the two of them were just staring at each other, faces scrunched and sticking their tongues out at each other like petulant children, and then, almost in sync, the two of them burst out laughing. Laughing so hard that Sil’s stomach ached, and so hard that Ren nearly fell off of his chair, which only made the both of them laugh even harder.
And then everything changed.
Sil had been so caught up in the sheer ridiculousness they had found themselves in. Two fully grown adults, bickering and then sticking their tongues out like kids, like they didn’t have a care in the world. Ren was wheezing from laughing so hard, and Sil was clutching her side, head thrown back in laughter.
Then her laughter was broken by a hiccup. Then another.
And then her eyes began to sting, and her throat went thick, and her laughter started to peter out into odd choking sounds. Sil stopped laughing the second she realized that the careless laughter had slowly began to turn into crying.
She slapped a hand to her mouth, eyes going wide, but the damage had been done by then. Within moments, her chest was heaving and her eyes were burning, and to Sil’s mortification, sobs began to tear out of her like something had been knocked loose in her heart.
Ren stopped laughing the instant something sounded wrong, and in between the blurry vision of tears and how hard she was squeezing her eyes shut, she saw a look of panic on his face before she felt arms encircle her.
That’s probably when Sil completely broke.
She’d never been one for showing any emotions that could be classified as vulnerable. Growing up on her own without any sort of adult presence to protect and care for her had toughened her out. If fear didn’t become anger quickly, she could’ve gotten herself hurt or worse. If she had stopped for a moment to let herself grieve the loss of her parents, she could’ve easily gotten into dangers that would’ve been impossible to get out of.
In the days later, Sil would still be puzzling over how a moment of simply laughing with a friend turned into an entire breakdown, but eventually she’d come to appreciate it. Because it was sitting there, crying in her friends arms, that she finally let herself feel.
“I miss them,” she choked out, feeling so unbearably small that it almost made her cry even harder. “I miss them. ”
“I know,” she heard Ren whisper, hugging her even tighter. She couldn’t see his face from where she was, but his voice sounded just as sad and pained as she felt, that Sil wondered if he was subconsciously thinking of his kids.
“It’s not fair that they’re gone.”
“No, it’s not.”
“I want them back. ”
“I know.”
They stayed there, on the floor beside the hearth, Ren’s arms locked around her in an unflinching hug as Sil continued to cry for a good long while. By the end of it, the fire had died into embers, and she was left feeling utterly exhausted, her eyes red and puffy and her nose running.
She sniffed harshly, wiggling out of her friends arms with a broken sigh, hauling herself back onto her chair and bringing her knees to her chest. She glanced at her tea, knowing without even checking that it was long cold, and when she finally spoke, her voice was hoarse. “...thank you. For staying.”
Ren had returned to his seat as well, expression solemn as he picked his own mug back up. To Sil’s embarrassment, there was a dark splotch on his shoulder from her tears, and she bit back the urge to apologize for ruining his shirt when he spoke. “Of course,” his own voice quiet. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry about your parents.”
Sil wiped her nose with the edge of her sleeve, lower lip wobbling again as she fought off a final wave of tears. “Nah, don’t be. It’s been years, I can barely…” she trailed off as tears welled up in her eyes again, and she pressed a hand to her mouth, furiously fighting off another round of sobbing.
Ren just shook his head, his own eyes suspiciously glossy, and he gave her such a sad look that it almost tipped her over the edge of tears again. “Time doesn’t matter, Sil. You lost your parents. No matter how long it’s been, it’s still gonna hurt.” He gave her a weak smile, as if trying to bring light to the situation, before adding, “Especially since you haven’t touched the subject in years. That’s gonna cause a release eventually, and look what happened.”
Sil scoffed, having managed to get the rising tears under control, and she wiped her face with her un-snotted sleeve. “I hate that it did. Why can’t emotions just stay in their neat little boxes where they need to go?”
“Because emotions are rude and like to kick us in the butt,” Ren replied, nodding sagely. “It’s the unfortunate way of life.”
Sil promptly threw a pillow at him. It hit him square in the face, and as he was sputtering and flailing in a way that was clearly dignified and not at all in a way that made him look like a headless chicken, she sobered up and said in a hesitantly quiet voice: “Thank you. For coming over, I mean. And staying when I started crying like some fluffy, emotional idiot.”
“Emotions are healthy,” Ren shot back as he finally sat back up, pillow in his lap like it had always been there. His face scrunched. “Or so I’ve been told. I still am on the fence about the concept.”
“I’ll drink to that,” Sil agreed wearily, already reaching for her tea mug, indeed finding it cold. “More tea?”
“Absolutely.”
And just like that, things were back to normal again. Ren chatted aimlessly about whatever contraption he was working on at the moment while Sil quietly prepared the kettle with water and the steepers with fresh leaves, occasionally chiming in with ideas or observations, and once in a while piping up about her new gardening interest.
Life would never be peaceful for people like them. There were too many things constantly going on, too many fights to be won, and too many things to work through– but at the end of the day, it was moments like these that were their saving graces. Just two friends, drinking tea by the hearth, sharing stupid stories.
And if the emotions got the better of them, and life became a little too overwhelming to carry it on their own?
Well, that’s what friends were for, weren’t they?