Student Writing: NEVER GONNA GIVE YOU UP by Madeleine McDonald

What’s your favourite love song?

Her new pieces, made of—who knows!—plastic and carbon and steel, meant to replace the blood and bone she was born with, all wired into her flesh. She was an entirely new beast, a chimaera of man and machine. The weight of her steps down the street were different, lighter, yes, but heavier too, her limbs foreign and loaded. No, not since the accident had she felt herself, she was changed, that much was clear. And surely Jax couldn’t help but see that too. 
They had changed, the two of them, their own routes irreparably altered. She had moped around their apartment, a thundercloud of ill humour, meaning to say I love you, thank you for staying with me, thank you, thank you but all that came out of her mouth was a mess of bitterness that tasted like bile on her tongue, and left Jax crying.
She recognised her unpleasantness, undoubtedly. But her body wasn’t hers anymore, and all that cool, moulded flesh was marching her around; a puppet dangling from wired strings. What was she meant to do about it? Today, of all days, she should be able to fill that lacuna in her heart where affection was supposed to sit—but no, she couldn’t.
She was hellishly tired, fuzzy with it. She’d been sleeping on the couch, and there weren’t any curtains in their living room, she’d said it didn’t bother her, and Jax said there wasn’t any point buying any, since it was just temporary. Just until she could get control of herself and stop her false parts jerking around in the night. The motor-cognitive link took a while to adjust to, that’s what everyone said. Don’t underestimate how difficult it is. Give yourself time.
She didn’t want time, she wanted to be ready now, back to herself. And today—it was one of Jax’s stupid things—no, not stupid, don’t think that—all that history stuff, all the old holidays. Valentine’s Day. It was sweet in a way, but it was the last thing she felt like right now. She’d managed to slip out early to her new job—how she missed her old one—while Jax was still asleep, managed to find excuses to stay out, stay away, and the accident had turned her into a coward, too.
Too scared of putting off the inevitable, but now she was dragging her sorry behind home through the dusk, and she swore she’d put a smile on her face, because today couldn’t be the day it fell apart for them.
Down the street, yes, up the stairs, and then there’s just the door between her and it, her and them, together. She waited, but nothing was coming, so she twisted her keys in the lock, and stepped in with a guilty shuffle of feet.
And Jax, Jax was there, smiling stupidly. Her artificial heart skipped a beat as she muttered a hello, and maybe it didn’t even sound sullen. They stepped closer and for a second she thought that they were going to kiss her, and she froze up, like a newbie in her first race, caught by the rush. But they don’t kiss her and she’s not disappointed, not at all, even if it makes her chest ache. They grabbed her hand instead—her good one, the one that’s still her—and they were saying something, but all she caught through the humming static in her ears was; “Roof.”
Back out the door—she made Jax stop, so she could lock it, better safe than sorry, she didn’t listen and look where she is now—and then they went up, up, up the stairs, spilling out onto the roof. She noticed, then, the plastic bag in their hand, the logo, even as Jax lined cartons out along the roof edge. And she’s glad for the food, protein substitute and noodles in orange and ginger and soy, because she can focus on chewing, even if it all tastes like ash. Jax was quiet. They’d been quiet a lot, lately.
“Look at the city,” was all they said, and look she did.
This city doesn’t sleep, but it dozes, and it was coming awake with every new light that flickered like a winking eye. Hello, hello, I’m here, it was saying. She was here too, she wanted to reply, and maybe, for once, she was. Concrete under the fingers of her good hand and the candy floss layers of night falling around her. She looked over at Jax. And she got a little bit of that old spitfire courage back.
She wanted—needed—to tell Jax how she felt. She had to make them understand.
“Jax, I… gave up on you. On myself. On us. I let you down. I ran around trying to avoid… this. I’ve been so…distant, and I deserted you when we should have been working through this together. I needed you, but I couldn’t own up to it, decided I’d rather watch you cry than sort myself out. I never want to say goodbye to what we’ve got. I lied to you about what I was feeling, and I hurt you. Never again. Never.”
She swallowed, waited for the bullet. “I’m sorry. I love you.”

…

“Eve,” Jax said.

…

And this time, when Jax moved closer, they did kiss her.

​