Choosing You: The Pierced Hearts Duet: Book Two

by M. Robinson

  I couldn’t breathe.

  I couldn’t fucking breathe.

  Every last part of me hurt with agonizing pain, but I stayed strong for our kids. Not showing any emotion, although I was physically dying inside. No husband should outlive their wife, no child should live without a mother.

  I was at a loss.

  Silently cursing God, hoping this was a nightmare I would soon wake up from. A God-awful fucking dream.

  Something…

  Anything…

  Other than what was actually happening right now.

  In that moment.

  In that second.

  In that instant.

  I would have sold my soul to the devil. I would have traded places with her. I would have done anything to keep her heart beating.

  Her mind clear.

  Her organs intact.

  Breathing.

  Living.

  Alive.

  Through my tunneled vision, I took in my surroundings. Knowing deep in my heart I failed my kids, myself, and her…

  My soulmate.

  The closer we got to her room, the more I felt like I was going to detonate, to shatter right then and there.

  I was there, but I wasn’t.

  Holding on for dear life.

  Each step that brought us closer to her, felt like each step to my own demise.

  My stomach dropped.

  My heart was now in my throat.

  Bile rose, but I swallowed it back down.

  I just kept moving like I was on autopilot.

  Seeing her face, hearing her voice, feeling her love in the back of my mind, was a fate far worse than death itself. I couldn’t stop it. I didn’t want to because it kept her there with me.

  Image after image.

  “I’ll share my dinner with you.”

  Memory after memory.

  “I don’t like to be by myself either. It really sucks, but I can come under there with you, and then we can hide from the mean boy together.”

  Our love story flashed before my eyes.

  “I hate my name. It’s so stupid. It sounds like I’m a belly button, but I’m not. I’m a girl, see?” Tugging on her hair that was in pigtails, she blinked her long, big eyelashes at me. “I don’t look like a belly button, right?”

  She was the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen.

  “No one has ever called me beautiful, Aiden Pierce! Now we’re going to have to get married.”

  Each memory was worse than the last.

  “Why don’t they want us, Aiden? Why doesn’t anyone ever want us?”

  “I want you, Bailey. I want you.”

  She was all I ever wanted, all I ever needed. I couldn’t live without her.

  I rasped, “To kiss you,” against her lips. “I don’t see myself when I’m with you because all I ever see… is you, Bay.”

  Our first kiss meant everything and more, and I was just happy I could kiss her whenever I wanted.

  “Jackson, Jagger, and Journey? Now that sounds like a country band if I ever heard one.”

  With a serious expression, I stated the truth, “We have a long road ahead of us, baby, but it will always be worth the journey. Because at the end of the day, it’s what leads us back to each other.”

  Her eyes watered and her lip trembled.

  “Promise me, Bailey.”

  “I promise.” She wiped away a tear.

  All our dreams came true, and now, so was our worst nightmare.

  “Dearly beloved,” he declared. “We are here to join this man and this woman into holy matrimony. Do you, Aiden, take Bailey to be your wife, to have and to hold, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, from this day forward until death do you part?”

  Looking deep into her eyes, I stated, “I do.”

  “Now you, Bailey… do you take Aiden to be your husband, to have and to hold, for better or for worse, for richer, for poorer, in sickness and in health, to love and to cherish, from this day forward until death do you part?”

  “I do,” she murmured with fresh tears falling from her eyes.

  “Then with the power vested in me by the State of North Carolina, I now pronounce you husband and wife.”

  “Dr. Pierce,” the physician stated, tearing me away from the blackhole that’d now become my life. “She doesn’t have much time left. Her organs are completely shutting down.”

  I gave her everything. Every last fucking thing…

  My friendship.

  My heart.

  My soul.

  My love and devotion.

  Our sons and our baby girl.

  The house she turned into a home.

  A family forever and ever.

  I protected her when no one else would.

  I loved her when no one else cared to.

  She was mine from the moment she offered me her food. But none of it mattered, not one single bit of it, because in the end, she didn’t remember any of it.

  Our love story.

  “Her dementia has completely taken over. I’m so sorry, Dr. Pierce,” the nurse informed me, breaking my heart all over again.

  It didn’t matter how many times someone talked about her illness, it was a bullet my soul took each and every time.

  How do I go on without her?

  When all I did was live for her.

  In a neutral tone, I said to my boys, “You guys can go in first.”

  They both nodded, staying strong for me. When all they wanted to do was fall apart with me.

  With my mind focused on them, I leaned against the railing of the door and watched as they walked into their mother’s room in the assisted living facility.

  She smiled, taking them in. I could see it in her heavy, tired eyes she had no idea who they were. Not even our baby girl, who she’d given birth to a month prior.

  “Hey, Bailey,” Jagger greeted, killing me they had to call her that.

  Anytime they called her mom the last few months, she became agitated and frustrated. She didn’t understand why they addressed her as that. To her, she didn’t have any kids. She wasn’t a wife.

  She wasn’t anything.

  Bailey Pierce was gone.

  Jackson didn’t say one word. I don’t even think he was breathing while he looked at her with so much love and hate all at once.

  “You look really pretty today. Do you want me to brush your hair?” Jagger asked.

  She didn’t say anything, didn’t even move. There were very few words she could still say. The dementia had almost completely taken her speech away.

  She was lost within herself. Staring off into space where our children were no longer her escape.

  “Can we take a picture with you?” Jagger asked, tears swelling up in his eyes.

  “She can’t talk to you. She doesn’t even know who the fuck we are, she doesn’t even know we’re here.”

  “Jackson,” I clenched out.

  “What? It’s the truth. Why are we even here? This is fucking pointless.”

  “Jackson, just cut Dad a break. It’s not his fault this happened. It’s not even hers.” Jagger affirmed, pointing at his mother.

  “I guess we should try to remember that. Oh wait… we may not have our memory in a few years either.”

  There was nothing I could say to that. It was their reality and our truth.

  “Can we just take a picture? Journey deserves to have one photo with mom.”

  “Yeah, whatever. We can pretend she gives a rat’s ass about us.”

  “Jesus, Jackson! Can you just stop? For our sister’s sake?”

  Jackson was so angry…

  At her.

  At me.

  At the fucking world.

  I couldn’t help him. I couldn’t even help myself.

  Jagger leaned in with his phone out in front of him, and Jackson followed suit with Journey still in his arms, quickly snapping a photo. But unlike Jackson, he stayed next to her, trying like h
ell to keep it together. Jackson and I watched as Jagger bent over and kissed her head, letting his lips linger for a few seconds.

  With tears streaming down his face, he whispered something in her ear that made her blink and shut her eyes as he continued privately having a moment with his mother.

  Jackson angrily scoffed out, “Fuck this,” and tried to walk out of the room, but I grabbed his arm stopping him.

  “I know you’re angry. I understand, alright? But you don’t want to do this. Trust me, Jackson, if you walk out of here and you don’t say goodbye to your mom, it’s going to haunt you forever. And I don’t want that for you. Please, son, say goodbye to your mother.”

  “Don’t you get it? She’s not here to say goodbye to. There’s nothing left of the woman who loved me, took care of me, told me she’d always be here for me. She’s already gone!” He tore his arm out of my grasp, nodding over to her bed. His eyes fixed on his mother as if he just wanted to look at her one last time, and spoke with conviction, “That’s not my mom. I don’t know who that is.” Abruptly, he turned and left us with his heart in my hand and Journey in his arms.

  Jagger walked over, instantly wrapping his one arm around me. Bawling his fucking eyes out on my chest.

  “Shhh… shhh… I got you, son. I got you.”

  “Why is this happening? Why, Dad, why?”

  “I wish I knew, Jagger. I wish I knew.”

  “Where is she going to go? You know she hates being alone, Dad,” he sobbed, his whole body shaking. “She hates it so much.”

  “Shhh…it’s alright… it’s okay… look Journey needs you to be strong. Be the strong boy we raised.”

  He nodded, sucking in his breaths. I wiped his tears with my hands, holding onto to his face when I was done.

  I expressed the words he needed to hear, even if I didn’t believe them. “She’s going to a better place, where she won’t be in any pain. Where she still knows who she is, and she can watch over you.”

  “You promise?”

  I nodded, unable to lie to him with words.

  “I love you, Dad.”

  “I love you too, Jagger. You, Jackson, and Journey were all we ever wanted. I swear to you.”

  He took a deep, long breath, catching his bearings. Hugging me one last time before he spun to follow his brother. Leaving me alone with Bailey.

  My wife.

  My beauty.

  My feet moved on their own accord. I blinked and I was sitting on the edge of her bed, grabbing her hand. I don’t know what came over me, maybe it was the fact I knew this would be the last time I would speak to her, feel her, look at her…

  I hunched over, laying my head on top of her shallow beating heart and broke the fuck down. Crying like a newborn baby. My chest ached and my throat burned. Hyperventilating, I sucked in air that wasn’t available for the taking.

  It wasn’t until I felt her hand rubbing my back that I froze against her touch for a second.

  “Beauty?” I rasped, pulling away to look into her eyes.

  There was no expression on her face, no recollection in her stare, but for a moment it felt as though she was there with me. Breaking free from the madness that was wreaking havoc on her mind.

  “I’m tiiiirrrreeedd.”

  I caressed her pale cheek, “I know, baby, I know.”

  “Slllleeeeepppp nooooooowwww.”

  I tried everything inside me to keep my soul together as the love of my life said goodbye to me one last time.

  I nodded, unable to find the words to tell her it was okay to leave me.

  “Beeeeee heeeeerrrrreeee.”

  “I’ll always be here for you, Bailey. No matter what. It’s always going to be me and you against the world, Bay. Always.”

  Her eyes drifted closed and for the second time in my life, another woman who was my everything died in my arms that night.

  I stayed with her until she took her last breath.

  Until all the machines went crazy.

  Until I died with her.

  Murmuring in her ear, “Take me with you, Bay… please, just take me with you.”

  Chapter 27

  <>Camila<>

  “I haven’t been back here since the day we buried her. This is the first time I’ve shared that story with anyone.”

  “Oh my God, Aiden,” I wept with tears streaming down my face. “I’m so sorry.”

  When he said it was time for me to know their love story, I never imagined he would bring me here.

  To her gravesite.

  Bailey Ashlyn Pierce

  A loving mother and wife

  It’s me and you against the world, Beauty.

  “I had no idea. I can’t imagine what you went through. What the kids went through.”

  Hearing him tell me about the last moments with his wife was probably the hardest thing I’ve ever gone through. There was so much I wanted to say to him, but I knew it wouldn’t matter. Nothing I said would take away the pain that would forever live in his heart.

  His memory of her.

  Where she didn’t even know who he was in the end.

  For a man who prided himself on what he provided for people, this must have killed him. It all made sense now.

  Jackson’s anger.

  Jagger’s reclusiveness.

  Journey’s desire to bond with a mother.

  Even Aiden pulling away from his family. He went with her the day she took her last breath on earth.

  He stared at me the entire time he told me what happened, but now he was staring at her gravesite with his hands in the pockets of his slacks. Lost in the memories, in the demons, in the past he could never change.

  I waited for him to continue, yet I was still startled when he shared, “At first it was little things like her forgetting something at the grocery store, or her forgetting what day of the week it was, or her forgetting where she left her phone, her purse, her keys. Small things like that. Bailey took her role in our marriage like it was her sole purpose to be a mother and wife. She was a perfectionist in anything with the kids and me. So, when she started forgetting to pick them up from school, or their activities of the week, it was extremely hard on her. She felt like she was failing at her job.”

  I swallowed hard, listening to everything he was saying. Teetering on the edge of losing my shit all together, but I stayed strong for him.

  Somebody needed to in that moment, and I could provide him at least that.

  “I told her it was from the pressure of trying to have Journey and be the perfect mom and wife. That she was just taking on too much. Though she was adamant that our family wasn’t complete, that our dreams weren’t met until we had a baby girl. She got pregnant with the boys so easily, and she couldn’t understand why Journey hadn’t come yet. Every month was another disappointment for her, and little by little, those small things turned into bigger things. Forgetting the name of the hospital I worked at, forgetting the address where we lived, forgetting the day we got married… The first time she stared at Jackson knowing who he was, her son, but stumbling to say his name. Like she remembered it, like she could see it in her mind, but she couldn’t form the words. That was one of the worst days of my life.”

  He took a deep breath, pushing through the chaos of his mind. His eyes shifted over to me with so much emotion, I could feel it under my skin.

  “I’m a doctor, Camila. I knew immediately it could be Dementia,” he admitted, getting choked up. “The life I fought so hard to give her, the one we prayed for time after time, she forgot it all in the end. When she was first diagnosed five years ago, I still didn’t believe it. I couldn’t. Not Bailey. Not her. Anyone but her. We flew to all the best Neurologists. Every single one of them diagnosed her with Frontotemporal Dementia. Even after hearing all of them say those two words, I refused to believe it. I watched my wife leave me, her kids, her family, her entire world… little by little every day. She’d have these moments of complete clarity, only to forget it seconds later. That was probably th
e hardest part of watching her slip away, and unable to do anything about it. The night we conceived Journey, I hadn’t been with my wife in months… And she was there, right fuckin’ in front of me, and I couldn’t say no. We made love and six weeks later she told me she was pregnant. You want to know what my first reaction was? What kind of father was I? What kind of man?”

  He didn’t have to say it. I knew what he was implying and yet, I couldn’t say the words for him not to tell me.

  “I didn’t want to have the baby. I begged her to have an abortion. Pleaded on my hands and knees, knowing what pregnancy would do to her mind. It would take her away from us quicker, faster. She wouldn’t survive. Bailey was adamant she was going through with the pregnancy, so fuckin’ hurt that I’d even consider getting rid of the life growing inside of her. She said she knew in her heart it was a girl, our family was finally going to be complete. So, you see, Faith…is it making sense now? Why I couldn’t hold Journey? Why I couldn’t hold my baby girl?”

  “Aiden… come on, you know anyone in that position would choose their spouse. You’re being too hard on yourself and that’s not fair.”

  “I didn’t want our unborn child to take away my wife. What kind of father does that make me? What kind of man?”

  I stepped toward him, but he instantly stepped back. “Okay.”

  “Journey did take my wife. The mother of my children died a month after she was born. And since then…until you…I was dead too.”

  “Aiden, I—”

  “Do you understand why we can’t talk about it? Why my kids, why my family, why no one can talk about it? Is it registering in your head? You’re in nursing school, Camila, you know what’s still ahead.”

  My heart dropped to my stomach. “They haven’t taken the genetic test?”

  “They fuckin’ refuse to, saying they don’t want to live life knowing they might not remember living it. All three of our kids have a higher risk of getting early onset Dementia. Are you following now? Is it all making sense? We all died with Bailey, until you, Camila. Until you.”

  “I didn’t do anything.”

  “That’s where you’re wrong. You brought life back in our home with your smile, your laugher, your ass-shaking dances.”