Their Days of Nights

41 : Upgrade

Kimberly

In a matter of seconds, this neighborhood is dark. I instantly look up, and the night sky reveals more. It's also cloudless, clear, and still. It's like the summer is peeking around at this time because it wants its spot back.

Benjie is already lying down, with his face up, watching the stars above us.

"Would you lie with me and just forget the world?" he recites the lyrics with a smile on his face that I'm able to see thanks to the light from his phone.

I crouch down, sit beside him, stretch my legs parallel to his, and lay my whole body back on the checkered mat. I blink a few times as my vision adjusts.

When he called me early this morning after work, I thought we're just going to visit this place. But he thoughtfully planned this thing.

I've never seen the sky like this since those nights when I was a kid. He knows how much I want to feel this carefree again, under this blanket of a pitch-black sky and twinkling stars, that I can and can't name. He knows the kind of comfort this gives me, and how rare this happens. He knows me so well.

"Have you done this before?" I quietly ask.

"Uh...what?"

"Lying on this roof and watching the night sky."

He moves closer to me. "I did," he whispers. "Once. And very quickly," he adds with a sigh. "It didn't feel right at that time. This is your thing."

A meteor strikes through somewhere in our far right. It creates a trail of a yellowish streak of light against the black sky.

"I don't think I need to upgrade my wish anymore," I say, still whispering and not looking away from the stars.

"They're a pretty sight, nonetheless."

"Yes, they are. Thank you for bringing me here."

He holds my hand. "Anytime, KP," he whispers directly to my ear.

"Benjie?"

"Hmm?"

"Why are we whispering?"

"Maybe we don't want the stars to hear us, so they won't get jealous."

It's also blissfully quiet here. And we don't say anything for a while. The world around us seems to be asleep, except for us.

But I hear him sigh every now and then like he has something he wants to say, but he doesn't know where to start. Or maybe I'm projecting what I'm experiencing right now.

I let go of his hand and start fidgeting with the hem of my hoodie jacket. I don't move anything else, and I'm still watching the stars above.

"I never really said it before, but I want to say it now," I say. "I'm in love with you."

I feel him shifts his body sideways as he faces me.

"I've always been," I continue. "Ever since I started to feel alive when I'm with you. When you first saw me for who I am, I feel like the most me that I can be. You're the first person who made me love myself first."

He inclined his head now with support from his arm and hand, and he's looking down straight at me. He smiles when I catch his eyes.

I look away again and go on rambling. "But this is more than just the somersaults I feel when you smile at me, or when you say those things or the blush I get when you're near. You're a part of me in the same way that I allow myself to be a part of you too. Now that you're here, things are fine, even if they're not. But if you're okay, then I'm okay. And if you're not, then I fall apart as well."