Dernier

He hates everything about this place. He hates the way that his shoes squeak so excruciatingly loudly with every step he takes and the way that everyone is so damn quiet in the halls. He despises the sterile smell, the imminently faint echoes of sobs, the way the secretaries at Visitor Check-In recognize his face and let him through without a word. More than all of this, however, he hates not being with her.

It’s been a year since the initial diagnosis and three months since the doctor – an old man like himself with wiry gray hair that contrasted with his dark skin - told him sadly that he would never take his wife home, and yet the truth still hasn’t sunken in. He walks into the room and sees his bride, lying peacefully beneath stark white, sterilized sheets. She is older and frailer now than she was when he first married her, but he still believes that she is the most beautiful thing that he could ever lay eyes on. “Good morning,” he whispers gently, unable to tell if she is sleeping and afraid to wake her – the doctors say she needs her rest. She opens her eyes – dark brown like the rest of her body – and smiles at him. He sits beside her and puts his hand on hers. He still hasn’t grown accustomed to holding the tubing and wires along with her, but he doesn’t mind anymore. “How are you?”

“The same,” she tells him faintly, and he smiles sadly. She is always tired, always weak, always so close to slipping through his fingers. He brushes her cheek with his hand; avoiding the chemo cap she is so self-conscious about. He has tried to tell her that she doesn’t need hair to be beautiful. She always brushes him off, but he always reassures her. He’s afraid of waking up one morning and realizing that he didn’t say something he should have.

“My angel,” he whispers, kissing her gently. This is always how it is – sweet, soft nothings that, in the end, all amount to one something so great that he believes it is the only thing worth living for. He doesn’t quite know what he’ll do when she’s gone. He thinks that maybe he’ll wander the hospital corridors like a living ghost, or perhaps spend all of his time lying in the bed they’ve shared for so many decades. “I miss you.”

“I miss you, too.” He looks into her eyes and begins to fight back tears. The doctors estimate that she has a week left, maybe two. She tells him not to cry, and so he squeezes his eyelids and forces everything back. “I love you.”

“I love you, too”

“Would you be angry if I said that I was tired?” She asks, looking unsure of what he will say.

“Of course not,” he responds.

“But you just got here…”

“It’s been an hour, honey,” he whispers, and she nods. She settles down into her pillows – countless pillows, all so white and flat and clean – and looks up at him.

“Don’t let go of my hand while I sleep,” she begs him. “Will you promise?”

“I promise.”

“Don’t let go of me.”

“’Til death do we part, and then some,” he tells her, and the faintest traces of a smile appear on her face as she allows her eyes to close. “’Til death do we part….”