My knees buckled.
She was recording a video for Lyra to see on her birthday. Her future birthday. A birthday Emilia didn’t think she would attend.
“You were determined to come out early. You were on a mission to give Mommy the biggest scare of her life. You were born four weeks early, and when I held you for the first time, you grabbed onto my finger and immediately smiled. I was a mess, but by touching my hand, you erased all my doubts.” Emilia’s voice cracked and I knew she was crying.
“Lyra, you are the best thing that ever happened to me. My biggest accomplishment was being your mother. You’re the most beautiful person I know, inside and out. Never change, Lyra. Continue to be the sweet, caring person you’ve been since the day you were born. The Lyra who makes people laugh, who’s friendly and loving. Continue to always be you. I love you very much, sweetie, and I hope you have a wonderful birthday.”
I pressed my head against the door as my body slid to the ground. Emilia was preparing to say goodbye.
I refused to let that happen.
79
WESTON
The following morning, I woke up to the sound of heaving over the side of the bed. This time she was violently ill. She gasped for air as her lungs tried to catch her breath. She whimpered and cried from the pain before she began to heave again.
I was useless.
I couldn’t do anything other than rub her back. This disease was taking everything out of her. Her ribs were defined under her skin as she had lost so much weight. “It’s okay, Em. You’re going to be okay.”
Closing my eyes, I tried to remember a better time. The moment I wanted something much more with her.
The music blared through the speaker. The DJ scratched the track and the bass changed. She had sat next to Axel the entire night, her petite body swaying to the beat of the song, never batting an eye at me. She was cold, her chin held high as she ignored me. She was as beautiful as the first day I’d met her at Starbucks.
When she began to dance to the Spanish song, I couldn’t resist. I stood, ignoring what Axel was saying, and walked right up to her. “Dance with me.” I extended my hand to her.
Her chocolate brown eyes locked with mine. She hesitated, gnawing on her lower lip for a few seconds before placing her hand in mine.
Leading her to the center of the dance floor, I twirled her around and brought her close to me. Her lower back fit perfectly beneath my hand. I brought my cheek to the side of her head. Her toxic scent of lavender invaded my senses.
Pulling away, I looked down at her. “Hi.”
“Hi.” She smiled up at me.
I was fucking doomed. This girl was everything I wanted.
“You’re back.” I stated the obvious.
“I am.” I noticed her chest rise and fall.
“Miss me?” A smile grew wide on my face.
“No.” Her lips pouted. “Why, did you miss me?” Before I could answer yes, she asked, “Did you ask me to dance or to talk?”
I chuckled and pulled her flush against my body. “Show me what you got.”
Emilia pushed herself up on the bed and sat back on her pillow. Her eyes were bloodshot and tearing. Her skin was blotchy with red marks around her neck and chest due to the force of her heaving.
“I’m okay.” Her voice was hoarse.
I grabbed her hand firmly. “You’re so strong, so brave, and each day I love you even more.”
Emilia’s hand cupped my cheek. Her thumb grazed against my prickled hair. “If I am strong, it’s because I have you behind me.” She coughed and swallowed back. “Every day you continue to push me. I want a life with you. I want our family, and that’s why I’ll fight.”
Turning my face, I pressed my lips to the palm of her hand.
She was my fighter.
IP chemo really was worse than regular chemo. Emilia couldn’t get out of bed, she slept most of the day, and her appetite was gone. The fire that had been inside her before, the one that sparked through her eyes, had left.
Leslie and my mother took turns caring for Lyra as I sat at Emilia’s bedside. With each grunt or moan, I begged God to please heal her. It was painful to watch the person I loved become almost unrecognizable.
“Wes.” Her hoarse voice awoke me. I had spent the last seven days by her side, and it was the first time she had slept through the night without complaining of any pain. Her soft snores had soothed me into a deep slumber.
“You okay?” I pushed off the bed.
“Hey.” She reached up and placed her hand on my shoulder. “I’m okay.” She smiled up at me. “I want to go to the beach.” She closed her eyes and shook her head. “I want to feel the sun on my skin.”
I leaned in and placed a warm kiss on her forehead. “I’ll go wake up Lyra.”
After we ate breakfast, I got the car packed for a day at the beach. Emilia had insisted we go to her spot. Though there was a beautiful beach only a few feet from her own backyard, she wanted our spot by the pier.
With the windows down and the radio blasting, we drove to the Santa Monica pier. Emilia had a scarf over her head to protect her skin from the sun. She sat on the blanket in the sand and watched us as Lyra and I ran around with a soccer ball. The smile on her face was breathtaking. Though she was physically too weak to play, she laughed when Lyra laughed, and she watched when we made sandcastles.
After I had built Lyra a fort and we stopped playing in the sand, we joined Emilia on the blanket for a small lunch.
“Lyra, you can only play with your kite if you finish your fruit.” Emilia brushed away the loose tendrils on Lyra’s face.
I pulled the kite out of the tote and handed it to Lyra after she shoved that last slice of apple into her mouth. I sat back on the blanket and Emilia lay so the sun hit her face.
“This is worth it,” Emilia said. Lyra had started assembling her kite.
“What is?” I asked. Laying on the blanket, I turned to the side to face her. Emilia’s eyes were shut and her skin was warm from the heat.
“All the pain that I feel, the aching joints, the heaving until my throat is sore, losing my hair and losing massive amounts of weight.” She cleared her throat and filled her lungs with air. “Fighting for another day, another day like today, another day that I get to live, another day worth living. All that pain—it’s all worth it because of days like today.”
I moved until I was on top of her body, my hands at her sides holding my weight. Gently I lowered my lips to hers. “You have no idea how happy I am with you.”
“Daddy!” Lyra shouted for me. “It won’t go up!”
I pressed my lips against Emilia’s. “Hold that thought.” She giggled.
I jogged to Lyra’s side. “Okay, Lyra. I’m going to hold this end.” I held the kite up for her. “You’re going to hold onto that string and run as fast as you can. Okay?”
Lyra shielded her eyes from the sun and gave me a thumbs up. “You got it!”
I held the kite as high overhead as my arm would allow. “Ready. Set. Go!”
Lyra pushed off the sand her wild, crazy hair flying in the wind as she ran with all her might.
“That’s it, Lyra!” Emilia shouted.
“Give a little on the string!” I bellowed.
The wind caught underneath the kite and lifted it up in the air. Flying high, it bobbed and weaved in the sky.
“I did it!” Lyra jumped with joy.
I sat back on the blanket and brought Emilia into my arms. Holding her the way I did the first time she had brought me here, we watched Lyra fly her kite.
“Tell me about yourself?” Emilia rested her head on my shoulder. I kissed the side of her head, remembering the same question I had asked her so many years ago.
She had been so quiet on the way over and after taking her to an abandoned restaurant, I figured she would never give me a second date.
“Tell me about yourself?” I asked.”
“There isn’t much to say. You know where I come fr
om, who my friends are, who my parents were.”
“No.” I inhaled her sweet scent and hugged her tighter. “That’s the basics. I want to know the real Emilia. What runs through your mind when nobody’s listening?”
Emilia paused for a second before she answered the question. “Music and silence.”
“That’s a contradiction.”
She gazed at the colorful sky. The sun was setting in the horizon. “My head is filled with music all the time. I didn’t get my dad’s talent in the singing department, but it’s in my blood. Everything I hear I turn into a song or a melody, and when I close my eyes, it grows louder.”
“And the silence?”
“I use it when something frightens me. When my father passed, I didn’t hear any music for a long time. It was as if the world had shut off.” She moved her fingers in the sand. “When I’m content with life, there is music all around me. I love my job because I’m around it, but when something scares me, I choose the silence. I come here.”
“Are you scared now?” I tried to keep a steady voice.
“Petrified,” she whispered.
“Why?” I needed to know.
“You make me feel things I’ve never felt before.”
“I know that feeling well.”
She was yellow gel.
“I know the basics,” Emilia said while she dug her toes into the sand. “You’ll be a music legend. You have an adorable little girl. I love you unconditionally. I know the basics. Tell me, Weston Carter, what’s inside your head when nobody’s listening?”
I moved my head down her neckline and inhaled her scent. “Music and silence.” I gave her the same answer she had given me six years ago.
“You know, now that I think about it, that really doesn’t make any sense.” She laughed and looked up at me.
I kissed the tip of her nose. “You are my music and you are my muse. You’re the beat of the drums. You’re the power behind my voice. You’ve become the music that lives within me. I feel that if I don’t have you, I will lose my music.”
“And the silence?”
“When I lay in bed, the silence wakes me. When I can’t hear you softly snoring, you whimpering, or even you softly breathing because you may have turned away from me… For those three seconds, the silence terrifies me to the bone. I can’t live in a world where you don’t exist, Emilia.”
“You can’t say that. You have Lyra, and I will live through her. I will live in your heart. Regardless what happens to me, you need to be there for her. You can’t do what my Dad did to me.”
I wrapped my arms tightly around her. “I promise that I will never let anything bad happen to Lyra.”
Later that night I cooked dinner and, for dessert, we roasted s’mores outside on the fire pit. Afterward, I tucked Lyra into bed and Emilia and I stayed on the couch a while longer talking about life. Soft music played in the background and when Emilia stood up to make a new cup of tea, I pulled out my laptop and surfed through a clinical study I had found without her knowing. Her PET scan was in a few days and I wanted to know every possible outcome. Emilia had never mentioned looking into a clinical trial, but I figured it was worth a shot in the event the IP chemo wasn’t working.
“You said something today that got me thinking.” She returned and I put my laptop down on the coffee table.
“What did I say?” I asked and patted the cushion next to me.
“That without me, music doesn’t exist for you.” She sat, resting her head on the back of the couch, and I watched her lips curl up into a small smile.
“It does exist. It just doesn’t seem right.”
Emilia covered her legs with a blanket and brought her cup of tea to her lips. “Are you working on something new right now?” Her eyes grew wide when she saw the laptop. Emilia loved talking about music.
“I am,” I lied. I didn’t want to dampen our conversation anymore.
“Daddy?” Lyra’s little voice appeared from behind us. She held her HoHo in one hand as she rubbed her eyes.
“Saved by our daughter.” I pushed off the couch and tapped Emilia’s knee.
“What’s the matter, princess?” I scooped Lyra into my arms.
”I had a bad dream.”
“Come on. Daddy will tuck you back into bed.” I kissed Lyra’s forehead and mouthed ‘one second’ to Emilia.
Laying Lyra in her bed, I brought the covers under her arms. “Do you want to tell me what your bad dream was all about?”
“I had a dream Mommy went to the hospital and never came home.” Tears pooled in Lyra’s eyes.
I ran my hands through her hair, brushing it back. “That’s not going to happen, Lyra. The doctors are taking very good care of Mommy and Mommy is a fighter, so you don’t need to think like that.” She nodded and rolled to the side. “Close your eyes, sweetheart.” I kissed the top of her head. “Daddy won’t let anything happen to you or Mommy, I promise.
My heart weighed heavily as I walked out of Lyra’s room. I hadn’t stopped to think about how all of this was affecting Lyra. Exhaling, I tried to keep my thoughts positive. I didn’t want Emilia to worry even more than she had to. When I walked back into the living room, Emilia had my laptop on her lap.
Fuck!
“What’s this?” She turned my laptop to face me.
I sat down on the couch. “It’s a clinical trial.”
“Weston, you told me you were working on music. Why would you lie to me?”
I shrugged. “Why would you go through my computer?”
“Because I realized that you haven’t touched your guitar in weeks, and I haven’t heard you sing any of your new songs. You don’t act as if you’re releasing an album soon. This is your gift, Weston. This is what God gave you. You can’t shut down because I’m going through this.”
“You’re not going through this, Emilia, We are. Together. I don’t physically feel the same pain that you do, but I’m right there with you, fearing every second of every day. And it’s just not me and you, it’s Lyra too.”
“Why didn’t you come to me with the trial?”
“Because I’m hoping that when we go in for your PET scan, the tumor has shrunk and that instead of a sixty–five percent chance, you’ll be at a seventy–five percent survival rate.” My hands ran across my scalp. “I need to have hope that everything you’re going through, that everything our family is going through, is just a small bump in the road. That this is only going to make us stronger.”
Emilia exhaled, tears dripping down her cheeks. “You know what I think of sometimes?” She didn’t wait for me to respond. “What if I had told you about Lyra sooner? What if I had called you from the hospital? Would we be here? How different would our lives be?”
“You can’t think like that. You’re never going to be able to predict the future.”
“But there are days I think there is no future for me.” Her gaze was focused on the coffee table.
“Em—”
“What if I’m not there for Lyra’s first date?” She swallowed back a soft cry. “Or when she goes to prom? What if I miss every special moment in her life?”
I shifted on the couch and moved closer to her. Wrapping my arms around her body, I pulled her to me. “Stop thinking like this. Please.”
Emilia buried her head in my chest. “What if I miss her wedding day? I had eleven years with my mom, and that was too short. The stories have become a blur, and it’s so hard to make out her face when I close my eyes.”
“Emilia, listen to me.” I pulled her away from me and framed her face. My thumbs brushed away her tears. “Nothing is going to happen to you.”
“How can you be so certain?” she asked shakily.
“Because I made a deal with God.” I grinned.
Emilia laughed and hugged me tighter. “A deal? Weston, you don’t even go to church.”
“I don’t need to go to church to talk to the man upstairs. All I need is faith and I have plenty of that. I had faith you’d come ba
ck to me. I had faith that you and I would be together as a family. So trust me, babe. Nothing will happen to you.”
The night grew longer and the hours passed, but we didn’t move. She rested her head on my chest as I drew her a love letter across her soft skin.
80
WESTON
Anger
Emilia sat on the examination table, swinging her legs back and forth. She reminded me so much of Lyra when we’d gone to the doctor’s office a few months back. Emilia was in a cotton gown, and the scarf she had worn wrapped around her head was tucked away with her clothes.
The radioactive tracer had been injected into her vein and we had to wait forty–five minutes before a nurse would take Emilia to get a scan. She’d leave this room and her life would be in the hands of a machine. This petrified me. The notion that the results were out of our hands only made it harder to sleep at night.
“Do you want me to hold your hand?” I asked with a joking smile on my face. I needed to focus on anything but what was happening.
Her lips pouted. “I’m not Lyra.”
“She looks a lot like you.” I smiled at Emilia’s face.
“Thanks. Though I think the features she has from you makes her more beautiful. Look at her eyes, for crying out loud.” Emilia giggled and shook her head. “She is going to give us a headache when she’s older. You know that, right?”
“What do you mean?”
“Boys.” Emilia cocked an eyebrow. “They are going to be knocking on our door. And she is so loving to everyone that they will all be wrapped around her little finger.
“Fuck that!” I threw my hands in the air. “She’s not allowed to date. Nope. I don’t care what you say. Fuck. That. She has to go to school until she’s thirty.”
“What’s wrong with dating?”
“Dating leads to sex, and sex leads to pregnancy, and that’s how you get babies.”
Emilia’s laugh bellowed through the room. Why did she find it so funny? This was our daughter. “It’s not funny.”
“No, it’s not, but this helped calm my nerves.” Emilia rested her hands on her knees. “I didn’t know you would get so frantic over Lyra dating. And let’s not forget that you and I dated at one time.”
Love Letter Duet: The Encore Edition Page 45
