you're never going to believe this shit
Danica pauses a moment and runs her fingers along the pictures. She is sad she lost her son but it is no longer unbearable to be reminded of him, to look at him. Her time with him was short, and the loss devastating but there is a calm in her head now. She would never be so nonchalant about it, it still hurts her and she still thinks of him everyday. He would be gearing off to head to a college. She often wondered how he would have been growing up; how she would have been as a mother. Would they have stayed together or would they have broken up anyways? How would their personalities work for raising a child together? What would be his favorite food? His favorite color?Animal? Would he have a certain genre of music he preferred? Would his hair have been curly like hers? He already had the blonde hair and blue eyes from his father.

Would Arthur have loved her through all of it? Would they have been the small percentage of people who were high school sweethearts and beat all the statistics? Would he still look at her the way he once did? To this day she remembered how he looked at her; although slight and hard to see as he hid it well. There were a few times she felt like she was the most important person in the world and her confidence was due to him. Without AJ they didn’t keep it together, would they really have been able to keep it together with AJ around or was it just the easiest way out?

If she could go back and do it all over again, she wouldn’t. She couldn’t change anything and to relive losing a son all over again would be torturous. However she thought fondly of Arthur, she had time to heal and think of the good times. To remember the good times. Even as she treated him like shit, he was still there for her. If he had not been there would be no friendship now. There would be no respect for him, or loyalty or love. They were only friends and perhaps that’s all they would ever be anymore but she knew she needed him in her life or there would be no way she would make it. She wasn’t helpless and she had settled her unstableness and come into her own. She wasn’t dependent on him like a sick person looking to be healed. She was her own person and he was his own person.

She closed the book. Not because she couldn’t go on, not because it was unbearable but because she wanted to see him. She didn’t need to seek out comfort; she wasn’t hurting; but rather just wanted to be in his presence. She lifted the glass to her lips again and finished off the glass of wine she had poured for herself. Pushign the album away she got to her feet. Grabbing the bottle by the neck she walked over to the fridge and put the wine away. She walked back into the living room and grabbed her phone off the coffee table and shot Arthur a text to order some pizza and ready the beer she was on her way.

It wasn’t intrusive, if he was really busy he would freely tell her he couldn’t. However it was who they were, they no longer asked for permission to be in each others lives but rather announced they were going to be shortly. She tossed her phone onto the couch and headed for her bedroom. She changed out of her shorts and shirt into a pair of jeans and a quarter sleeve button up, red and black flannel shirt. Her hair was too far-gone to fix it so she grabbed the closes elastic and threw her hair into a messy bun.

Getting her shoes, coat and keys she opted for walking to his place. They didn’t live far from each other. It wasn’t one of the coldest nights Boston had recently seen so the short walk over would prove rather refreshing versus it feeling like a chore. If it got too late out she could simply crash on his couch or take a taxi home. She knew the path to his place like the palm of her hand. She knew short cuts and the regular people who would be out and about at this time. Turning down an alley between two red brick apartment complexes she could see his apartment building from the entrance. The walls of the brick buildings were littered with black fire escapes. The alley had dumpsters in random locations along the length of the entire alleyway. She was almost there when some seedy guy came from behind a dumpster. He grabbed her arm and speared to be pointing something at her from under his jacket. Her eyes wide as she looked from the man’s face to the object she couldn’t see. “Give me everything you have and I might not kill you.” The smart thing to do would be to give him everything she had but rather her eyes narrowed. She felt insulted so she kneed him, thrusting him back enough. Her arm grabbed his concealed arm and twisted it so his back was to her, She pushed him forward into a wall. He turned and came back at her, obvious there was no weapon at this point. He swung, she swooped her head out of the way, her hand catching his fist before she cocked her arm back before connecting her fist into his face. He stumbled back into a dumpster before he scampered to his feet and ran down the alley in the other direction.

She watched him run before she turned and ran towards Arthur’s apartment building, She got in and rode the elevator to his floor. Her hands slid into her pockets as she walked his hallway. Her head lowered as she replayed what just happened in her head. Finally standing at his door she removed a hand from her pocket and knocked on his door. The door opened shortly after and she smiled up at him. “You’re never going to believe what the fuck just happened.” She laughed at the end of her sentence and walked in, the door closing behind her.