Oh, God, it hurts. It fucking hurts so much!

I close my eyes again, rubbing my palms over my face, begging the image go away. I can’t do this right now. I can’t stand this pain. I just want it to go away. Just like before, when I open my eyes, she’s still there. My legs give out and I drop, my knees slamming into the wood. My arms hang uselessly at my sides as I slump my ass back on my feet and stare at the vision in front of me. I watch as her chest rises and falls with every breath she takes, I watch as a small gust of wind blowing though the porch plays with a piece of her hair, lifting it off of her cheek and swirling it around before it drops back down like a feather. Her lips twitch and she sighs softly in her sleep. The sound guts me and my useless arms finally move, wrapping themselves around my waist as I rock back and forth.

“I can’t do this, I can’t do this. I want you to be real,” I whisper as I finally let the tears I’ve held back slip down my cheeks.

I see movement behind her eyelids and then her eyes flutter open. I wonder if I’m making this happen by sheer will alone. I need to see her eyes. I don’t want to see her fucking eyes that have been haunting me through the night. I can’t tell what’s real and what isn’t. I feel the cold, hard wood beneath my knees, I feel the wetness on my cheeks and I hear birds chirping and cars driving by. I know those are real. I can feel and hear that they are real. What’s happening in front of me can’t be real. She’s dead. She’s gone. She can’t be waking up on my front porch, her green eyes locking onto mine as she quickly pushes herself up into a sitting position.

“DJ.”

She breathes my name and it tortures me. Her voice sounds real, but I know it isn’t. I close my eyes and shake my head back and forth, trying to make it all stop.

“Open your eyes,” her voice commands softly.

My head keeps shaking back and forth. I won’t do it. I can’t do it. It’s too much, too hard. Goddammit, it’s too hard!

I hear something sliding against the wood and I squeeze my eyes closed tighter when I feel the warmth of her body right in front of me.

“Drake, please. Open your eyes and look at me,” she pleads with a sob.

I feel her warm hands press against either side of my face and it throws me. Warm, not cold like a fucking ghost or whatever the hell this is.

“I can’t, I can’t…you can’t be real,” I mumble even as my face turns into her palm and I nuzzle her skin with my nose and breathe her in.

In the next second her lips are against mine, warm and soft and so fucking real. I taste tears on her lips and I wonder if ghosts have the ability to cry and then realize I don’t fucking care. I don’t care if my mind is completely gone and I’m so fucked up in the head that I’m imagining this. I’ll stay a fucked up mess the rest of my life if I can have her lips on mine and it can feel this real.

Over and over she smacks her lips against mine and I finally open my eyes.

“I’m real, I love you, I’m so sorry,” she repeats in between kisses.

Even though I don’t want to, I move back from her lips, just enough to really look at her. Her hands stay on my cheeks and she holds my head in place, staring into my eyes. I see the flecks of gold in her eyes and the tiny black ring around the green. I see every freckle on her nose and I feel her breath floating against my mouth.

My arms move on their own until my hands are cupping her head. I tilt her face up and turn it slightly from side to side, looking at her chin, her cheeks and her lips. I see a horrible purple bruise under her left eye that I know I wouldn’t imagine if she were a dream and suddenly, everything she went through last night and survived makes me equal parts horrified and grateful.

“Oh, my God,” I whisper, sliding one hand down the side of her face, the warmth of her skin telling me that this is not a dream, it’s not some fucking illusion. It’s real. She’s real.

I trace my fingertips over her eyebrow, her nose, her flushed cheek and her lips. I touch each part of her that I can’t stop staring at.

She moves her hands away from my face and presses them to the top of mine, pushing my palms more firmly against her cheeks.

“Do you feel that?” she whispers. “I’m real. I’m right here and I’m okay.”

A strange mixture of a sob and a laugh flies out of my mouth and I quickly lean forward and kiss her. I laugh and cry against her lips and she moves closer, crawling onto my lap and wrapping her legs around my waist. I feel the weight of her on my lap, the strength of her thighs squeezing around my hips and the warmth of her body so close to mine and I finally let go of the last of my doubt.

“I thought I lost you. How is this happening?” I ask her as I rest my forehead against hers and her thumbs gently rub back and forth over the top of my hands that are still pressed against her cheeks.

“I’m so sorry, DJ. You have no idea how sorry I am that I put you through this,” she cries softly.

“Shhhh, it’s okay, baby. Please don’t cry. Just let me keep touching you to make sure you’re real,” I tell her softly, trying not to cry like a fucking baby right along with her.

I run one hand through her hair over and over, letting the soft strands tangle with my fingers. I run my palm against her cheek again, careful of the bruise, down her neck, over her collarbone and rest it against her heart. I feel it beating strongly and I finally let my own start beating again right along with it.

DJ easily lifts me up into his arms and carries me into the house and up to his bedroom. I’ve apologized to him so many times, but it will never be enough. The anguish and torture I witnessed on his face out on his front porch almost killed me. I did that to him. This strong, amazing man…I brought him to his knees and it hurts everything inside of me.