by Lucian Bane
“Ben!” She gripped both sides of his chair and pressed her mouth to his ear. “I need to talk to you!”
A rush of adrenaline and fear hit his already flooded veins as he leaned away to get a look at her, or whatever could possibly cause this on-the-verge-of-tears tone.
Charlie was suddenly standing on his right and Ben stared up into his son’s eyes, meeting the war waging in his spirit full force. He could always read Charlie’s eyes that way. They were open and clear to him, and in that second, Ben saw he’d been scared of this moment.
Charlie was a lot like Ben. He kept things inside and worked on them there. “You’ve been holding down the fort?” Ben asked with a stern brow.
He nodded with a hint of a smile, still holding tight to his manly posture. It pained Ben that he had to wear it for such a thing, but there was no question about it—he did. In fact, he may need to never let it go again. It was up to Ben to see that Charlie was able to.
He reached his arm up for a hug, and when his son lowered, he grabbed the back of his neck and pulled him to his forehead. “There’s no other man I’d trust more than I do you.” He shook him lightly then let him go. “How about we go inside and get me settled, then you can ask me the hundred questions I see burning up that clever brain of yours.”
Charlie grinned, seeming relieved as he headed inside. Ben turned to Cheryl on his left, taken aback by what he saw in her gaze. Aside from the beauty of her pouring love, there was a secret screaming to be free. Whatever it was had Ben burning to hear it.
****
Cheryl wheeled Ben into their bedroom then shut and locked the door behind her. She was nervous. So nervous. Sick with it. Fear, hope, regret. Sadness and anger. All swirled up into a boulder sized knot in her stomach.
Ben locked the wheels on the chair.
“Do you want to lay in the bed?” she asked, realizing the risks of him moving from the chair to the bed. She also realized he'd eventually have to, and why on earth had she not figured a plan for it?
“I can do it,” he said, like it was easy peasy, mundane even to be in a wheelchair.
The mile-long list of deteriorations the doctors promised would come sent her flying to the side of his chair.
“I got it,” he assured her softly, looking up at her.
The fear part of that knot inside stiffened her spine, followed by a spark of the anger. Did he plan on being a fool? Go on living like he wasn’t dangling from a cliff? Like they weren't? “You’ll let me help,” she said back.
He studied her a moment. She wasn’t one to order him to do anything and while she waited for the verdict, her heart walloped in her ears.
“I won’t be pushed out,” she explained, though it sounded like a warning.
He gave a small head shake. “I’m not pushing you out. I’m just getting out of the chair.”
His gentle tone and reassurance turned her fear and anger up a few degrees. Like he was handling a child, or a delicate-minded female instead of a wife about to lose her husband. Like he was the hero and she was in need of saving. That wasn’t the case, and he needed to see that. He needed her.
“I plan on being right by your side. And you need to get used to it,” she said with a calm severity.
He gave a small nod finally. “Okay, honey.”
It was permissive, a compromise. The honey meant he might not understand entirely but he understood enough.
Her heart went back to racing as he placed his hands on the chair’s armrests. She inched closer as he pushed himself up. If he fell and hit his head…. “We have to be smart about this,” she managed around her fear as he made steps toward the bed, his hands reaching out. Was he dizzy? “If you fall and hit your head," she tried to reason, "this will go bad a lot quicker than it already is, Ben.” Her shaking hands now shadowed his body as it made the slow, six-foot trek to his salvation. And hers.
Her hands flew out with a gasp when the right side of his body suddenly dropped six inches. “Ben!” She pushed his weight toward the bed, grunting when he leaned in the wrong direction.
She couldn’t stop her sob as she shoved him onto the bed and he rolled onto his back, his face covered in sweat. “Don't you dare do that again!” she cried, her voice breaking.
His eyes clenched shut with his forearms tightly to his chest, shooting panic through her. He was in agony. Oh God. “What!? Tell me, what’s wrong, what do I do?”
“Sit…up,” he barely got out.
She froze for a second then shoved her low heels off and scrambled onto the bed. Straddling her feet next to his body, she fought to work her hands between his arms and torso, feeling him locked up in pain, groaning with it. She wedged her hands in, then tugged him two shallow steps toward the headboard. “Charlie!” she yelled, gasping.
The door flew open a few seconds later.
“Help me!” she wept, fighting to move him.
“Move,” he hurried. She got out of his way and watched as her son got in the same position she’d been in. “Pillows,” he hurried.
Cheryl climbed on the bed and piled all of them together as Charlie hefted him in one pull into an upright position.
She covered her mouth at the horrific sounds of his agony. She was stupid. Their room wasn’t even properly fitted for somebody in his condition. They’d given her a list of necessary things they’d need, but they didn’t have the money for most of it. A secondhand hospital bed was supposed to come. That was the most important, and she managed getting it after selling her mothers’ ring.
By the time he was elevated, she was pacing next to the bed, fighting sobs. Charlie stood, staring at him then her in worry as Ben’s agony seethed out in horrible groans that made her sick. “What do we do?” Charlie whispered, worried.
She didn’t know what to do! She raced to the phone on her writing desk, throwing things everywhere in search of the doctor’s emergency contact number.
“Mom,” Charlie called.
She glanced back and threw the phone down at seeing his hand had come away from his body like he was trying to reach for something. Was it subsiding?
“Dad, make a fist if the pain is going down.”
His fingers slowly closed into a ball and Cheryl let out a breath in the form of a sob, hugging Charlie while staring at Ben. Oh God. Help them.
She sat next to him, watching his body and measuring his breaths. They were slowing, and hers followed a couple steps behind his.
“Thirsty,” he whispered.
“Water?”
He nodded.
“I’ll get it,” Charlie said, racing out.
He returned half a minute later and she took the water from him and opened it, eyeing Ben as he sat with his eyes closed. Seeing him in his white t-shirt and hunter green sweatpants with sneakers almost made it easy to forget everything wasn’t normal, and he was just sitting there, resting.
As she brought the water to his mouth, a flood of nursing duties rushed in her mind. Bathroom needs, particularly. How would she manage that when he wasn’t able to? “I have your water at your mouth. Don’t move, just try to drink.”
“Okay.” The word barely made it out as she put the opening of the bottle on his lower lip. He opened a little and she tilted it up slowly.
He drank and drank like he was dying of thirst.”
“I’ll get a straw so he doesn’t need to move,” Charlie said, as he hurried out. What a smart boy. Thank God he was there. He returned with the straw and another bottle of water and Ben finished off the first one, sighing in relief after.
“That better? What can I do for you? Do you want your legs a certain way? Are the pillows okay? Do you need more?”
“You…never kissed me.”
Her heart froze in her chest then clenched up so hard, she had to hold her breath.
“Call me if you need,” Charlie whispered, leaving and shutting the door behind him.
She stood next to Ben. “I’m sorry,” she finally said, her voice tight as she moved in to cor
rect that. She pressed her lips very carefully against his while trying to remember him ever asking for a kiss from her. Was he having regrets like her?
At feeling how soft his lips were, her whole being ached for him. To have him the way she’d always wanted him. She administered delicate kisses along his mouth and the thought suddenly hit her. Had he liked her initiating sex? Had he thought that was normal? Right? Had he felt rejected all these years when she’d stopped?
At feeling his lips smiling, she pulled back a little. “Am I…not doing it right?”
“That’s…impossible,” he barely mumbled, sounding exhausted and yet… content. His words made her tummy dance with hope and joy right before dread and sadness slithered in and poisoned it.
She carefully sat next to him, not wanting to disturb what seemed to be a tolerable position. “I missed you,” she whispered. It was as if the words needed saying, they just came out. She’d almost said I miss you. So many days she missed him while he was right there with her. Like she mourned the man she’d always wanted him to be. And now…now that he was dying…she realized he always had been exactly the man she wanted.
The horrible idea that she was supposed to initiate sex with him all these years sat in her lap like a horrible shame. What if he’d needed her to do that for some reason? A reason he couldn’t say? As his wife, his help mate, that would be her job to do, her privilege even. To be what he needed her to be. To love him as he was.
“What’s wrong?” he whispered. Her heart sucked in the soft and tender tone of his voice. She hated that it was under these circumstances, hated that she still craved and needed it, maybe worse than ever. “You going to tell me your big secret now?”
She wiped the tears from her face, steadying her shaky breaths before meeting his blue gaze. Just like Charlie’s. So perfect and clear like the sky. Except his were clouded with the remnants of agony and other things she didn’t want to think about.
Her big secret. She was suddenly yanking it eagerly down from her mental shelf. It was heavy. Cumbersome. Oddly shaped and miraculous. She turned it around and over, searching for the best angle, the most convincing one to present to him.
“Maybe you'll kill me first with anticipation,” he managed to joke.
She swallowed, gathering her strength and courage. She’d just say it. All at once. “I researched solutions for your…condition. And I found one.” Her mouth remained opened as she watched him watch her. He waited and she remembered that's how he was, not one to interrupt or try to guess. “You can get a head transplant,” she finished in a quick breath. “And I found a doctor that said he would perform it.” When he only continued to stare at her, she hurried on with more. “It’s been done with animals many times and it’s worked. Obviously, the US hasn’t done one with their ethics rules, if you can believe that, but I have all the information and I wrote the doctor and he wrote me back. He was ecstatic Ben. He wants to do this. He’s even ready to help find the money to get it done. And find a donor.”
“A donor,” he mumbled, his brows pinching as he kept the same, unreadable stare on her.
“Somebody who is terminal with a body disease but a good head.”
“You…want me to get somebody else’s head…and put on my body?”
She knew how that sounded. Sounded worse out loud, but she nodded. “I know what you’re thinking, I thought the same thing,” she assured. “How will it be you, but they do this memory transference. Turns out they can extract your memories from your body and put them into another person, the donor’s head in this case. And they use a-a memory wipe procedure, something to do with medication and a light, and… something else to wipe the brain you’d get. Then once the transplant is done, they reinsert your memories into the wiped brain. Yes, it’s risky, yes, it may not even work,” she said, wanting him to know she wasn’t blinded by delusional hope. “But every operation in the world has the same risks, and there would be intense physical therapy, and the recovery would take months and be filled with dangers. But…” She lowered her head as tears spilled over her cheeks. “I…I’m willing to do what it takes,” she said, unable to raise her voice past a whisper. “I don’t…” she slid both hands on her cheeks, wiping them. “I don’t want to live without you. Charlie doesn’t either and so, I was thinking…”
“Cheryl,” he whispered.
She snapped her eyes to his, her heart banging her chest. The agony on his forehead indicated he was hurting, and she wasn’t sure how or why.
“No,” he barely said. “I don’t…I don’t think…that’s the right thing to do.”
She stared at him, her chest buzzing with a strange numbness. “Why not?” She heard the words but didn’t feel herself speak them.
“I've... accepted my fate. Our fate. That’s the right thing, honey.”
She moved off the bed, feeling like he'd slapped her. She stared at him. Stared for many seconds. Then she needed space and air. “Okay,” she heard herself say as she paced like she chased after her own breath and sanity. “Accepted your fate,” she repeated, stalking back and forth next to the bed. “Our fate. Our fate,” she repeated, eyeing him as she detoured to the foot of the bed now. “You accepted our fate?” she double checked. Had she heard right? “I mean... that's not even possible, that's…that’s not for you to do. How can you accept our fate? I mean I get you accepting your fate, but our fate?”
She paused, clenching her eyes tight. “No…” She shook the confusion from her head. “No, you can't...accept your fate either,” she realized or remembered. “You think this is all your decision? You think we don’t get a say, that your head is-is just yours, your body is just yours?” she demanded, gesturing at him. “No, we are one, this family, you, me, Charlie, we’re a unit, a single team,” she said to him, reminded him. “And we don’t make big decisions alone, Ben, you know that,” she said, suddenly pointing an accusing finger at him. “That is a rule, a family rule. And you made it.”
“Shhhhhh,” he said softly, making her realize she was getting louder.
“That's a rule," she strained quieter, shaking like a leaf. “You don't get to say no by yourself.” She suddenly realized it and pain hit her as she stared in disbelief at him. “I mean…you'd rather die? Is...is our life that...little to you that you're not willing to do whatever it takes, whatever you can to be with us?” Shock and pain had her head shaking, unable to imagine such a thing. She was back to pacing, eyeing him and him eyeing her while fear bubbled like a vat of acid in her being. “Is this punishment, Ben? Are you disgusted with me, punishing me for not being a good wife?”
“Cheryl, what are you talking about?” he whispered. Finally, she got a reading on him. Confusion. Good. And hurt. That was good too. At least they were on the same page. “Why would I punish you, what do you mean disgusted with you? I love you more than my own life,” he strained, his own head barely shaking now. “What kind of a husband have I been that you don't know this?” he wondered, like he'd failed at doing the one thing he'd worked his hardest at.
His words caused a hurricane of desperation in her. She flew to him and lay her head in his lap, sobbing, “I know you love me, I know you do. I'm sorry, I'm sorry Ben. I should have loved you better, I should've never stopped having sex with you,” she confessed. “I was angry, I was stupid, I thought you didn't desire me!”
“What?” he whispered. His hand paused mid-stroke on her head with that shocked question. “Didn't desire you? I thought you were going through female issues. I vowed to never make you feel like sex was important to me, more than you were, that's why I never touched you.”
She raised her head, tears streaming. “Ben...I needed you to touch me!” she gasped. “I was dying because I thought you didn't want me or desire me! You never made the first move, I always did, so I thought…”
“Do you remember what you told me when we dated, Cheryl? That you hated men who misread every little kindness for an invitation for sex? Believe it or not, from the moment you told me th
at, I swore to never be that man, to make damn sure to desire you when I knew without a doubt that's what you wanted from me. I wanted you to love me, Cheryl, not hate me. That's why I let you lead in sex.”
Cheryl was sure her eyes couldn't get any wider with his confession. If what he was saying was true, and she was very sure it was, that meant... “What...did you think when I didn't...when I quit...”
“I thought what I told you. That you were having female issues.”
She covered her mouth with a hand, but the sobs escaped still. She could only shake her head. “It... wasn’t female issues,” she barely wailed, putting her head back in his lap. “Oh God, Ben, I'm sorry, please forgive me. I'm so sorry.”
He shhhhh'd her, back to stroking her head. “I love you...clearly more than you've ever imagined. And... I won't lie and say I didn't love when you initiated sex. Or that...maybe I was relieved that I didn't have to. That I didn't have enough confidence to even try. Hell...” he whispered, sounding winded. “I guess I can admit that...taking the lead or even the idea of it was...terrifying. I never wanted to do something that...might be wrong. Wow,” he said, as though realizing. “Seems I've been a coward, hiding behind other excuses.”
This couldn't be happening. She couldn't be hearing all this, not now. “You can't die,” she cried, gripping his jogging pants in her fists. “You can't leave me, not now.” She shot up and pressed her mouth carefully to his, kissing him. “Please, Ben, please,” she wept, holding his face carefully, adoring him with her lips the way he deserved. “Please do this, for us. Please.”
Family Vote
They’d vote on it. That was the only right and fair thing to do after the emotionally charged diatribe Ben just had with his wife. But oddly, his rapt attention wasn’t on the topic of a head-transplant but on everything he’d gotten wrong about his wife all these years. Learning that his sacrificing to show how much he loved her was actually killing her was maybe as soul crushing as being ripped prematurely from his family. It made him desperate to rectify the problem but how could he when lava razors sliced and diced his skull at one wrong move?
