Doctor appointment + 6 hours

“Gab?” called Freya quietly. “Can I come in?” There was no response. She tiptoed quietly into Gab’s dark room. It was evening now. Gab had not spoken a word on the tram ride back to their apartment, nor had she emerged for dinner. Shockwave after shockwave echoed through her body with varying intensities; they jolted her mind with an unassimilable new reality every time she began to relax. It couldn’t be real.

Freya reached the bed where Gab lay facing out the window; Gab had not bothered to draw the curtains. City lights winked at them, a static scene seemingly unchanged by any such news that was enough to throw a single human being into a spiral of existential confusion. Then Freya laid a hand on Gab’s shoulder, and a muffled and unexpected sob half-escaped Gab before she could stop it. Having only half-escaped, it was more like a snort, and both girls laughed involuntarily. But having now unlocked a half-sob and a laugh, there was no going back; further sobs escaped.

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Freya slipped into bed next to Gab, as naturally and unobtrusively as a girl with three sisters knows how to do. But for Gab, such presence was entirely new. When was the last time she had been able to rest on another person? When was the last time someone had positioned themselves so close, so present, so willing to absorb her own tumult? What did it mean when another person felt so comfortable, so confident in themselves, that they could slip under the covers, wrap their arms around you, and share your grief without reservation? It was strange. Freya was mediating Gab’s grief.