He touches me as if I’m going to break, drying me off with careful hands.  He kneels in front of me, rubbing one leg then the other with the bath towel.  Working his way up until he’s standing again, I’m thoroughly dried when he slips the hockey jersey over my head. 

Looking at my face, he seems to wince.  Gingerly he touches the swelling bruise on my cheek, cursing under his breath.  “You know,” he begins softly, “I’ve forgiven Dawson hundreds of shitty things he’s said or done over the course of our friendship.  But this . . . I can’t forgive him for.”

“I don’t want to talk about it anymore,” I say, and he kisses my forehead gently.  “Let’s go sit on the couch, okay?”

“I thought you wanted to go to bed,” he reminds me as he leans down to blow out the candles. 

“I’m feeling better and I just want to sit with you,” I tell him, walking out to the living room.  He sits on the couch and pulls me close as we stretch out together, my head pillowed on his chest. 

His heartbeat is strong and steady beneath my ear, his warmth comforting.  My world is askew, turned upside down, and it seems like everything I know to be true . . . isn’t.  Except for him. 

Taking his hand in mine, I notice how he tries not flinch as I move to lace my fingers with his.  His knuckles are raw and swollen and I bring them to my lips, mimicking his own earlier actions by spreading tiny kisses over them. 

“I was stupid,” I say, and before he can ask what I mean, I continue.  “I tried too hard to get everybody to be friends with everybody else.”

“That’s not stupidity, honey,” he says, his quiet chuckle rumbling beneath my ear.  “That’s optimism.  That’s faith in the . . . in the human spirit, that’s what that is.”

“I thought that I could put the two of you back together, the best of friends again, through sheer force of will.  I thought that he and I could maybe recapture something of the friendship we used to have,” I confess.  “How ridiculous is that?”

“Not ridiculous.  Hopeful.”

“You’re biased.”

“Not biased.  Truthful.”

“Oh, shut up,” I say, laughing.

“Seriously, Jo,” he says after a moment, stroking my hair.  “That hopefulness, that optimism and whatever other synonym I can come up with . . . that’s a big part of what I love about you.  I mean, yeah, it’s buried beneath a metric ton of sarcasm and cynicism . . . and a few other isms . . . but it’s there.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere.”

“You be quiet, I’m getting there,” he says, poking me in the ribs and causing me to giggle.  I’m giggling on what is probably one of the worst nights of my life, because I love him so much.

“By all means, please continue,” I say, gesturing for him to get on with it.

“Joey, I love how you care so much about your friends.  We’re all better people for it.” 

It’s exactly what I need to hear.  He’s exactly what I need.  His belief in what he‘s saying touches me. “So you’re my friend, huh?”

“Hopefully, your very bestest friend.  Cause you and I, we do things I hope you’re not doin’ with your other friends,” he laughs, planting a kiss on the top of my head.

“You are my best friend,” I tell him.  “I don’t have anything I wouldn’t share with you.  Which includes my thoughts and feelings in written form.”

I can’t see his face but I know he’s puzzled.  “What are you talking about?  Written form?”

“You know what, get up.  Go outside and go to the car.  There’s a box in the back just for you.  Bring it back.”

“Man, it’s cold out there.  And you’re nice and warm,” he complains jokingly while we sit up.  “I’ll be right back.”

He’s back inside in moments, carrying a shabbily wrapped box.  I hate wrapping.  He sits it down on the table then plops down next to me.  “Okay.  Mission accomplished.”

I heave an exasperated sigh.  “You’re supposed to open it.”

“Ohh!  Is that what I’m supposed to do?” 

I roll my eyes and he laughs.  The smile isn’t quite reaching his eyes but it’s getting there.  He doesn’t look nearly as angry.

Tearing open the box like any typical five-year-old boy, he pulls out a Flowbee.  “Oh, how I love you.  Let me count the ways.”

“That’s the gag gift,” I explain.  We’d been watching tv late one night when we’d been sucked into an infomercial detailing the wonder that is the Flowbee.  It’s basically a vacuum that sucks your hair up into it and cuts it all one length.  We’d been mesmerized. 

“Doesn’t mean I’m not going to use it,” he warns.  Reaching into the box again, he pulls out a plain, spiral bound notebook. 

It’s cover is torn and there are pages with dog-ears, because it’s been tossed about and manhandled quite a bit.  He sits and stares at it as if it’s made of gold and encrusted with diamonds.

“This is your journal.”

“Yup,” I nod. 

“The one you wrote in every evening while I caught dinner.”

“That’s the one,” I smile, bumping his shoulder with mine.

He looks at me and I know I couldn‘t have given him anything better. “You nearly died of embarrassment when you thought I’d read it that one night.”

“Well, at that point you had yet to see me naked.  I’ve experienced far more embarrassing things in your presence since we came back.”

“That’s true enough,” he teases gently, opening the notebook and flipping through it, reading a line here, a line there.

Taking a deep breath, I hold up my bejeweled wrist.  “You bought me this because it’s a tangible reminder of the beginning of our relationship, those three beautiful months where we ran away together.”

“Yeah,” he agrees, waiting for me to continue.

“I’m giving you this for basically the same reason.  I want you to have this, so you can see our trip through my eyes.  So you can read what I was thinking and feeling about you, about us.  I want you to have this so you can always go back and see how I fell in love with you a little more each day,” I tell him.  He takes my chin in his hand and kisses me gently.

“This is the best gift anyone’s ever given me,” he says, resting his head against mine. 

We stretch out on the couch again and I read to him from the journal I faithfully kept over the summer.  This night started out so well, it was so beautiful.  I’ll be damned if I’ll have that ruined for either of us.