Brave Alone

It says try again. I know. Your hand is shaking. It’s cold down here. We’re three floors underground. You read the faded instructions like the right words might appear. Level B, the yellow pillar, our car is twenty paces near. You fold the scan inside my coat, check my tablets, count the change. The doctor said the treatment stopped. You only asked which road we’d take. If you keep your hands busy, you don’t have to meet my eyes. But I don’t need a man of stone. I need you frightened by my side. You don’t have to lift this night. You don’t have to say you’re fine. Let your hands shake here in mine. Mine have been shaking all this time. Love is not the stronger one pulling both of us toward dawn. We can bend and still hold on. We don’t have to be brave alone. You made the young nurse laugh twice, asked what happens, wrote it down. You thanked the porter for the chair and told me not to wear that frown. But when the lift doors closed between us and the ward became a line, you gripped the rail with both hands and counted four breaths at a time. If you keep the room smiling, no one has to see you fall. But I don’t need you made of light. I need you, fear and all. You don’t have to lift this night. You don’t have to make it right. Let your four breaths lean on mine. Let the road wait where it lies. Love is not the steadier one pulling both of us toward dawn. We can break the pose we’re in. We don’t have to be brave alone. I heard you in the stairwell when you thought the door had closed. You said, “Please, not yet,” to no one. Then you washed your face and rose. I heard you ask the doctor, “If I’m frightened, can he stay?” You were trying to protect me. So were you. It kept us far away. Sit beside me on the concrete. Put the ticket in my hand. We are frightened. We are here. That is all the strength we have. I won’t ask you to lift this night. I won’t ask you to shine for me. When my four breaths lose their time— take the next one next to me. Love is not the stronger one. Love is staying when strength is gone. We may bend before the dawn, but neither heart will hide alone. No more stone and no more light, only your hand holding mine. Whatever the next scan shows, we don’t have to be brave alone. It took it. Come on. Where? Twenty paces. Not alone.