Chapter 7 - Part 1

                                    

                                          
"Jess." 
Jessica shot up in the bed still sobbing, her lungs aching. "He... I couldn't..."
Myles held her by the arms, as the tears streamed down her face. He pulled her into his arms and soothed her. "It was just a dream." Gently, he rocked her while she continued to sob uncontrollably.
He eased her back to level his gaze with hers. "It's me, Jess. You're fine." He tucked her hair behind her ear.
She shook her head. "I'm not...fine... I'll never be...fine." She trembled as she hiccupped in between her tears. 
"Why?' he asked gently, brushing her cheek with a thumb.
She let out a shaky breath, still trying to fight through the cobwebs from the nightmare still clinging to her mind. "Dylan."
There was a mixture of understanding and sadness.
He hugged her to him tighter this time. This time he didn't tell her she would be fine, because he knew it never would be—just like he never would be fine again.
When her tears began to dry up, she sighed, still not wanting to lift her face to look at Myles. She didn't want to see his reaction to her meltdown. It had only been a dream, even though it had felt so real. At the time she had held so much hope, only for it to vanish—as Dylan had in the dream.
She wanted to stay where she was, in the protective embrace of a person who understood, to some extent, her pain and sadness. 
"You feeling better?" he eventually asked when he pulled back to study her.
She nodded, still feeling like she had parted the curtain and given him a front-row seat to her pain. Her only comfort was he had no idea the guilt she carried.
"I'm sorry," she mumbled, drawing back from him.
"Don't be sorry. You lost someone you loved. It's okay to feel, you have to feel something even if it hurts."
His soft-spoken words hit at something in her and she stared into his eyes before moving her gaze to the door to try build the walls back up.
A whisper of a memory of Dylan lingered in the doorway, and a moment later he was gone. It took her breath away.
"I feel like I'm adrift at sea and I can't save myself. There's nothing but the sea on the horizon, wave after wave." She sighed. "I feel like it's only a matter of time before I give up and let my head sink below the water."
He took her hand in his and held it tightly, like he could keep her from going under.
"I'm still in the moment when I found out. I can't move past it. I'm there. Somewhere in between denial and the realization that things will never be the same again..." Her eyes found his.
He swallowed. 
"How do you cope?" she asked softly. His eyes dimmed with sadness.
He shrugged. "Sometimes I do, but most days, I don't."
"I'm sorry. I just keep bringing it up." She pulled a hand through her hair. "Like I'm reopening the wound for you again and again, not giving you a chance to let it heal." She felt like she was doing everything wrong, including being a friend to him.
Why couldn't she just keep her shit together around him?
"I don't think it'll ever heal. Besides, I like talking about him. I can't live like he never existed."
The two brothers had been so close, closer than either of them had been with Karsyn.
"It'll be two years next week and there still isn't a day when I don't miss him." She swallowed, too emotionally drained to cry.