The Wish List

The Puzzle

"Life isn't about finding pieces of a puzzle. It's about creating and putting those exceptional pieces together."

~Glenn ven Dekken

I was stirred awake by a loud clap of thunder a little after two in the morning.

As a child, I had been terrified of them. I had always been lucky enough to have Jason or Dad come in and try to calm me down. But now. . . now it was just me in this big house. Sienna usually went home to her family after working hours, and Steph had been in her little room at the hospital, miles away from me, but feeling the exact same way.

Of course I had bared through it back at my dorm at NYU, but I had nearly moved all my stuff back here, at least for the winter. My roommates hadn't said a lot, they had only given me the same sympathetic looks that everyone else in this shitty town had. We'd never really been close, and I'd broken up with my ex boyfriend months ago, so he was on to his newest victim. 

"Warm milk and a cookie makes everything better." Sienna had always said to the three of us as kids. Now, at twenty, it seemed incredibly childish, but I wasn't here to impress anyone but myself.

I crept out of my room in my old Ariel slippers, careful that I didn't wake Ty in the guest room. I was halfway down the stairs when a loud clap of thunder sent me flying down the rest of the stairs, my heart nearly jumping out of my chest.

"Dammit." I hissed when I ran into the wall outside the kitchen.

Could I be any more of a klutz?

"I hate you, Mother Nature." I grumbled, grabbing the gallon of milk out of the fridge and setting it on the counter as I quietly took a pot from the dish rack and set it on the stove.

I let my eyes fall on the drawings and pictures on the fridge, a sad smile making it's way on to my face when I saw the picture Steph had drawn for my birthday last year.

She had been incredible at drawing, even when she was little. So it wasn't a surprise that she was able to draw a picture of the two of us in the hospital room. It was ten times better then the stick figures I had been drawing since I was a kid and hadn't improved on since. Knowing she was gone, the picture meant a lot more than just another paper stuck to the fridge. It was a memento, a gift, a piece of her that I could hold on to forever. 

"Couldn't sleep?" I jumped at the voice, my heart kicking starting again. I shook my head, somewhat relieved to find Ty standing a few feet in front of me, leaning against the side of the fridge.

"Not a huge fan of storms." I answered with a quiet laugh that lingered in the air for a few minutes. I spun around and took the milk off the stove before it could boil over, pouring it into my Minnie Mouse cup. I turned to grab the cookies from the fridge, sighing when I realized I was too short to reach them.

"Here." Ty chuckled, grabbing the cookies with ease and holding them out to me. I took a couple from the container and thanked him, watching as he took one for himself before setting the box back on top of the fridge.

"You mind?" He questioned, nodding toward the cookie.

"Of course not." I slipped by him and sat at the kitchen table, my eyes on the cup of warm milk in front of me.

"I know I already thanked you, Alyssa. But I wanted to again. And probably a hundred more times after this. Thanks for letting me stay here tonight, especially with a storm like that outside." He smiled, "But I think I'll head back to my box tomorrow." I shook my head and spoke before I knew what I was doing.