love [luhv]: verb

“Hush,” she whispered, placing her finger softly over his lips that were rabid with dripping words of anger not two minutes before.

His eyes snapped up to meet hers, and rapidly softened with her gaze of compassion.

She went to the kitchen and came back with their First-Aid kit. Sitting down on the couch, she patted on the cushion beside her, beckoning him to join.

He didn’t want to allow her to help. Red fire still coursed through his veins at the events that had occurred. He didn’t want to let it go.

She saw that he wasn’t going to budge. She waited, hoping that he would change his mind, that he would come sit down.

Yet he still stood, staring at the blank place on that couch that she had made for him.

She quietly packed up the First Aid kit and set it down on the coffee table, standing slowly. She walked towards him, taking his hand into both of hers, massaging his tense palm with circular motions.

“Let me help you,” she pleaded.

His eyes were downcast, staring at their hands--jaw clenching and unclenching, working through the internal struggle. Finally, the tension dissolved in his palm as his head hung lower, wallowing in his perceived defeat.

It wasn’t even that he didn’t love her. It wasn’t that he didn’t care about her. It was that he wanted to do this by himself, this whole healing thing. It was his fault that he was injured, this he knew. She shouldn’t have to be involved.

Yet for some damn reason he knew that she genuinely wanted to help—that she wasn’t doing this out of obligation or because she wanted him to shut up, but because she loved him this much. He knew that she loved him enough to help him out of the messes he got himself into—like the fight with the neighbor, which produced the large, open wound that was now on his shoulder.

She led him to the couch and sat down beside him, once again opening the First Aid kit. Rolling up his sleeve carefully, the two of them winced, one with pain and one with compassion, as the wound was revealed. The skin was raw, red, and bleeding—the result of the fight.

“I think it just needs some antibiotic ointment or something,” he mumbled.

Her fingers ran over the wound cautiously, pulling out fuzz from the shirt that had lodged itself in the wound.

“Antiseptic wipes first,” she chided lovingly. “Haven’t you ever read the manual?”

A smile tugged at the corner of his lips. The manual. The First Aid Kit manual.

“Should have known that the answers for healing this bad boy would be in there,” he laughed.

She finished slowly dressing the wound, sealing in the ointment that she had used with a large Band Aid.

His eyes met hers once again, and suddenly he felt inadequate. She had once again helped him out of a self-created mess that he had made, asking nothing in return. What could he say to thank her for her actions? What could he do to show his gratitude for her love? His mouth opened and closed, incoherent words spewing out, never seeming to match up.

“Hush,” she whispered, once again placing her finger softly over his lips. “I know.”