Sitting up I turned to examine my breakfast of omelets and oatmeal. Her origami animal of choice for today was a crocodile.
“The way I see it, if you want the rainbow, you gotta put up with the rain.—Dolly Parton.”
“Translation—” She placed the laptop next to me. “I can do this for a while. Why? Because I want my book. My book is the rainbow and you’re the rain.”
I stared at her for a moment then lifted the paper crocodile. “Why this animal though?”
“My crocodile tears at your disdain for waking up.”
“Okay then.” So this was what it was like to live with a crazy person. Their craziness stopped phasing you at some point.
WEDNESDAY
“Oh my god!” She gasped as I leaned against my wall and stared at the door as she walked through with breakfast.
“Why did I wake up thirty minutes ago?” I asked as I lifted my cell phone and showed it to her. “I know, it’s because someone has been waking me up earlier and earlier, but today she came in at 8 a.m.”
She grinned. “I overslept.”
“Does that mean I can get back to doing that too?”
“Sure. Do I have my book?”
“Have you written—?”
“I’ve gotten the three chapters done already. And since you’re up we can eat downstairs as you read it.”
With that, she left and I got up off the bed again. I only made it a few feet before I heard the pots clamoring as they fell to the ground.
“I’m okay!” She hollered.
“I’m more worried about my pots,” I said as I walked downstairs.
“Your pots?” She looked over to me. “I’m the one who bought them! Mr. All-I-need-is-a- dozen-mugs-a-bowl-one-plate-and-a-frying-pan.”
“You don’t even cook. So why buy pots?”
“You can’t live in a house without pots!”
“You don’t live here.”
“Then write my book so I can go home to my house of pots!” She snatched the one in my hand from me and put it back into the kitchen cupboard.
“Where is this story you wrote?” I asked as I examined the breakfast she left on the kitchen counter. This time her animal of choice was a ram. I lifted it up. “Let me guess, because I’m stubborn?”
She gasped and placed her hand over her heart. “Malachi…you’re awake before eight, you’re eating downstairs, and to top it off you admit your own flaws…be still my beating heart.”
“‘I don't know how you persist in being so stubborn?’ ‘It's a superpower. I was bitten by a radioactive mule.’?Shannon Hale”.
When I looked back up at her she was grinning because she felt ever-so-clever.
“That’s inspirational?” I asked her.
“No need to inspire you too much. Besides, my spider sense was telling me you’d be awake by now so why not make you laugh?”
I clapped. “Nice cover.”
“Let me get my book before your change your mind.” She rushed to the couch behind me and I watched her go in amazement. She really was persistent and that in itself was inspiring.