OBLIVION [SEQUEL TO SATELLITE HEART: BARLEY LIGHTFOOT x READER]

chapter fifteen

Barley felt like he was asleep, watching on a screen above his head as his life pieced back together. He saw flashes of you, fast in front of him, pausing only to play out like a film. A perfect film, with enough sadness and happiness to balance it out. You'd once told Barley that your life felt like a really intense love story fit for a novel, because you were fairly sure there were few people that could share the same story as you and him. 

And now your life was literally playing out before him ---

You, driving Guinevere after he picked you up from work, sodas in the cup holders of the van, starry sky above you, the mix tape he made you blaring on the speakers. Your hand found his and you clutched it tightly, so tightly, the love letter he had written to go along with it pushing against your palm. You were falling in love so quickly and easily."Oh my gosh, Bar. Are you kidding me? You really made this for me? I don't even know what to say right now. I'm so happy."  ---

You, sitting on the edge of his hospital bed with your arms locked tightly around him as both of your lives fell apart for the first time. It was all crashing down. He just wanted to hold you to give you some kind of solace, but he wasn't sure that was the best thing. If he held you now, then you'd expect it during this entire thing, and then he'd be gone, and no one would be there to hold you while you went through that. And so he was terrified and he was giving you a way out now before things got too hard, but part of him knew that you weren't going to take it.

"Barley, I swear---"

"I know. I know. Can you look at me?"

"No."

"Please? I have something to say, and I want you to look at me while I say it."

"I just want to say that I don't expect you to stick around during all of this. Don't feel pressured to. We've barely been dating a month... I've barely known you for like, three... just do whatever is right for you."

"Please... shut up. I'm not leaving you. I can't leave you. You don't understand..." ---

You, holding him as he got sick in the much-too-bright hospital bathroom. The lights hurt his eyes and the medicine hurt his body. It was so hard to even sit up, but that was okay, because you were there and you were holding him so tightly to you."You're a freaking idiot, Barley. You're so freaking stupid. I'm in love with you, you jerk. I love you more than anything." ---

You, standing over him with swirls of green moving in circles around your wrists. Your eyes on his, your cheeks wet with tears. You were so desperate to avoid saying goodbye. "I know. I know it isn't working. But it's okay, I'm gonna make you better. I'm not letting you go anywhere." ---

You, looking so similar to a princess as you were dressed in pearly white and a veil that covered your gold-dusted hair, holding his hands tightly to keep from shaking as you recited the vows you wrote. They sounded like poetry to him. You were such a wonderful writer. He'd read hundreds of love letters from you, and this one was his favorite one. He wanted to hear every word again and again."I'm so positive that your eyes are made of something other-worldly, or maybe stardust. I think about that when you look at me and tell me that you love me. The whole world fades when you do that. I think about that when you hold me and we look at the stars, because you and the stars look so similar to me." ---

You, laughing and looking like literal sunshine with your head tipped back and he spun you around in a slow half-circle, grinning as his family cheered. "I'm in love with you, and I will tell you that every single day until I physically can't anymore. I can't imagine loving anyone as much as I love you, Bar. It's just you and me now." ---

You, stepping into your new apartment for the first time with him, adding the picture print of you and him kissing at the altar and the picture print of him looking at you, gorgeous in your wedding dress, right next to the photo prints from the creek all those years ago. You taped them above your shared bed. "Every time we take a picture together, we'll add it do this wall. We won't need to repaint or anything, because the pictures will cover the whole freaking room pretty soon."

You, twisting in the mirror, trying to catch a glimpse of a new curve in your stomach. "Do you think it'll come out positive yet? I mean, do I look pregnant?"

"How am I supposed to answer that?" 

"Well, I don't know. I hope you say yes and I hope that the test is positive so we can have a baby already." ---

You, clutching the pregnancy test in your hand tight, your shut eyes only picturing the plus sign against the darkness of your eyelids as you kept your forehead pressed against Barley's, your hand pressed to the back of his neck. There were no words for this moment, just his crying mixed with yours, your cheerful laughs, and his lips pressing against yours again and again as the snow fell softly outside ---

Your life was playing out before him and it was intertwining with his, making everything gold and bright and warm and real and his again.

"I love you," he wanted to say to you, to these memories, to the baby, to the life he loved so much and never ever ever wanted to give up. But he couldn't find his lips, no matter how desperately he wished he could to tell you these things. "I love you and I am so sorry." 

But he was pretty sure you weren't anywhere nearby to hear him, anyway.