It took everything I had to look down.
It took every willpower not to break into pieces at the tears glistening like starlight on her cheeks and the twisted stress of her face. She’d lost weight. Her cheekbones were sharp in the night, her chin dainty, her eyelashes dark, and her entire beauty dauntless and devoted.
She twitched in her dream as if she fought against demons. She curled deeper into my side as sadness made her tremble.
Fuck.
My useless, decrepit body jolted as a bolt of pure love electrocuted me.
I loved this woman.
I loved her more than myself, my wealth, my animals, anything.
I’d loved her before, but now? Now, I couldn’t comprehend the depth that’d carved me out and filled me with eternal, ever after, and every unconditional love imaginable.
I love her.
Fuck, I love her.
I couldn’t stop staring.
I ignored the heaviness of my eyelids.
I shoved away the need to fall into a healing sleep instead of a caged coma.
I couldn’t leave her again…not until I thanked her.
Turned out, her strength was a savage thing. Her courage was so strong, it’d been fed into me with every drip of the IV and every whispered promise in my ear. She’d loaned me her fortitude, and I could never repay her.
She’d been the only reason I’d woken. The only purpose I had left on this planet that didn’t make me sink in sin.
“Ele—” My voice was a switchblade cutting into my unused throat.
I wanted to cough, to swallow and lubricate but those muscles didn’t work either. Water trickled from my eyes from exertion.
I clung to awareness but struggled to stay with her.
No! I have to talk to her. Please!
A flutter of feathers made me blink away the haze and focus on Eleanor’s gorgeously long chocolate hair. Most of it had strewn above her on the pillow, but tendrils tangled on her shoulders where she lay tucked on her side against me. Her fists had locked under her chin and her forehead nuzzled against my ribcage.
My mosquito net had been tucked back to make room for the wires creeping over me and needles puncturing within me, allowing two tiny parrots to nest wherever the hell they wanted.
And they’d chosen Eleanor’s hair as their bed.
Pika popped up first, his head cocking and tiny body bristling as if unbelieving that he’d heard my scratched whisper. Skittles appeared next, her delicate head with its sprigs of black feathers smaller than Pika’s tangerine brightness.
The muscles in my face remembered how to work, and I smiled.
I smiled so fucking hard it threatened to send me back under again.
“Pik—” I winced and swallowed. “Pika. Skit…tles.”
It happened faster than I could comprehend.
One second, the two caiques assessed me with sleepy, suspicious stares, and the next, the room filled with squawks and squeaks, blurs of emerald feathers, and the scratch of their talons against my face.
Pika couldn’t control himself.
He rolled down my cheek only to fly onto my head and somersault down my forehead and bite my nose. He trilled and cooed; he sang and muttered. Skittles sat by my ear and bumped her head against my cheek, giving gentle feather kisses with the occasional happy chatter and nip.
But Pika…he was a ball of zesty zeal. Bursting with happiness and unable to ignore the need to fly.
He swooped around the room, screeching his head off. He bashed into the lamp and made it rock on its stand. He looped in the air and spun to the bed. The spew of cackles and calls made my ears ache with noise.
Eleanor suddenly bolted up beside me. She scrambled to her knees, brushing glossy hair from her face and gawking at Pika as he performed cartwheels and caterwauls.
“Oh, God. He’s lost it. He’s cracked.” She stood on the mattress, her bare feet sinking into the white sheets as she tried to grab the chaotic caique from the sky. “Pika, it’s fine. You’re okay. You just had a dream or nightmare or…I don’t know what’s going on with you. But please, come here.” Her voice cracked as if she feared his mental capacity had broken. “Pika, stop. It’s okay. You’re not alone. I promised I’d take care of you and Skittles. Even if Sully—”
“Sully. Sully. SULLY!” Pika screamed and dive-bombed her hair. “Lazy, Sully. Hungry, Sully. Now, now, now!”
If I could laugh, I would have.
My heart had never felt so warm or so content.
Eleanor suddenly froze.
The bed rocked as she spun in place.
Her hair flung out behind her, cloaking her shoulders just as her gorgeous grey gaze locked on mine.
She gasped.
She choked.
She plummeted to her knees beside me.
And for an endless second, she just stared. Her hands clamped over her mouth and tears gushed from her eyes. But she didn’t reach for me. She didn’t leap onto my unmovable form or tackle me with a kiss.
Goosebumps covered me as fear did its best to make me doubt.