I Fell in Love with Hope - Lancali

can’t do much for him, but I can be another body, another soul, so
that he knows he isn’t alone.
The worst of the worst days comes when Neo was supposedly well
enough to go home for a few weeks. He returns through the E.R. His
face is bruised from forehead to chin, all down one side as if he’s
been shoved into something.
Both bones in his wrist are cracked down the middle, and he can’t
move his spine for the larger part of a month.
“Neo,” I whisper. “Have you told anyone?”
“It wasn’t him,” he says.
“Your wrist is broken, and your back–”
“It wasn’t him,” he snaps at me, reverting to his silence. “Just leave
me alone.”
I don’t leave. I just join him in silence. But the tear that rolls down his
face isn’t lost on me.
The worst days subside eventually. Neo finds the means to sit back
up when the weather warms. He doesn’t spit out his pills as
frequently. He starts to eat more. And it takes a few months, but Neo
finally considers writing again.
I am determined. I steal pens from Eric’s station and ask for
notebooks.
Eric obliges since I won’t stop bothering him. He returns with fiftycent
composition books made of cardboard and thin, lined sheets. I
toss them, loud enough for Neo to hear, into the cardboard box. As
we mulled over books, I make noise with it. My foot nudges the box. I
innocently pull it out from under the bed and let it slowly slide back.
Neo never misses my attempts to draw