True Love

by Lurlene McDaniel

  “With his mother, I guess. She’s a lot more sympathetic about me and Luke than mine. And once he’s gotten his new bone marrow, he can finish high school. Then, I’m sure some coach will want him to play college ball. Oh, maybe it won’t be a big, well-known college, but a smaller one willing to invest in him.”

  “So he thinks he can still play football?”

  “Absolutely. Once his donor marrow starts working, he’ll be cured and go on with his life.”

  “You’re a brave girl, Julie. Not every girl your age would take on such a marriage and its possible problems.”

  Julie shrugged. “I love him.” She swirled the spoon through the half-melted remains of her ice cream. “I wish tomorrow was over. His surgery scares me.”

  “He’s young, and that’s in his favor. Plus the doctors wouldn’t operate if they didn’t think it would help.”

  They returned to the room, where Luke’s mother had joined him and Steve. Luke looked drowsy. “They gave him medication, so he’ll sleep soundly tonight,” Nancy said. “But we have to leave now.”

  Luke reached out for Julie. His eyelids looked heavy and his speech was slurred when he said, “The doctor said I could see you in the morning before I go into surgery. Please see me before they put me to sleep?”

  “I’ll come early.”

  “I love you.”

  She bent and kissed him. “I love you too.”

  24

  Julie couldn’t sleep that night, and headed for the hospital at six in the morning even though Luke wasn’t scheduled to go into the OR until nine. She arrived at his room just as a nurse was giving him pre-op medication to relax him. One arm was hooked to an IV, but he held Julie tightly with his free arm when she bent over his bed. Although he smelled of medicine, he felt warm, and she longed to climb into bed with him and hold him.

  “The others will be here soon,” Julie said. “Everyone wants to see you before you go into surgery.”

  “You look beautiful,” he said.

  She knew how she really looked—dark circles smudged her under-eye area and she hadn’t bothered to put on any makeup except for a little lip gloss. “I’ll look better when you come down from recovery.”

  “Julie, I want to tell you some things before they operate.”

  “What things?”

  “I want you to know I’m okay about this and I want you to be okay about it. No matter what the outcome is.”

  It felt as if a hand had reached into her chest and clutched her heart. “The outcome is that you’ll be all right,” she said stubbornly.

  “I also want you to know I’ve done a lot of thinking about some of the things we talked about in L.A. You know, about the hereafter and all. I’ve been reading up on it in all my spare time.” He grinned. “Heaven’s a real place, Julie—a beautiful place—and if I can’t wait for you at the end of an aisle on our wedding day, I’ll wait for you in heaven.”

  “Luke, you’re scaring me—”

  “Please, let me finish. I don’t want to scare you. I only want you to know that either way this surgery turns out, I’ll be fine. I—I just want you to be fine.”

  “I can’t think about losing you. Don’t make me.”

  “You’re the best part of my life and I will always love you.”

  Tears had sprung to her eyes. Behind her, she heard others come into the room, and she knew that his mother, her parents, and Steve and Diedra wanted to be with him too. She felt panicked, afraid of letting go of his hand. “I’ll see you in a few hours,” she said through gritted teeth.

  His eyelids drooped from the sedation, but still he held on to her. “If it’s possible to send a message from heaven,” he whispered, “I’ll get one to you.”

  She choked back a sob and broke her hold, then stepped aside so that the others could surround his bed. Later, in the hallway, when he was wheeled out of his room for the elevator ride down to the surgical floor, he told the orderlies to hold up. They waited while he looked from face to face of the people who loved him, reminding Julie of a man memorizing a map so that he wouldn’t get lost in the dark. Finally, he grinned, handed Julie a folded piece of paper, then gave everyone his thumbs-up signal.

  Julie watched as he was wheeled away, listened to the clack-clack of the wheels of his bed and the swish of the elevator doors as they closed behind him. Cut off from him, she shuddered.

  “Let’s go down to the surgical waiting room,” her father said, gently taking her arm.

  They trooped down to the area where family and friends waited for news from various operating rooms. A telephone linking the surgical floor with the waiting room would occasionally ring and tell people that their loved one had been taken to recovery and the surgeon would be down to talk to them soon. In the waiting room, Solena and Frank were already camped out on sofas. Julie tried to join them, but found it impossible to sit still.

  As the hours dragged by, the phone rang several times, always for others. Every time it rang, Julie jumped. She felt taut and edgy. Around one o’clock, her father tried to get her to eat something, but she refused. She stared down at the floor, listening to the thump of her heart, the whispers of those around her.

  Suddenly the waiting room door opened and she looked up to see Luke’s surgeon standing in front of their group. Surprised, she glanced at the phone, wondering why she hadn’t heard it ring. The doctor removed his green head covering. Julie allowed her eyes to travel the length of him and saw flecks of blood on the green paper coverings of his shoes. Luke’s blood, she knew instinctively. “The tumor was far more entrenched than we ever imagined,” the surgeon began. “It was totally ingrown to the side of his heart.”

  Julie heard Nancy begin to sob.

  “I’m sorry,” the doctor said. “We did everything we could.”

  Somehow, through it all, Julie didn’t lose her composure. She heard questions and answers, but the words didn’t make sense. She was beyond caring what was said anyway. Slowly, she stood and removed the folded piece of paper Luke had given her only hours before. She’d deliberately not opened it, saving it for this time when she knew she would need contact with him most.

  “What’s in the note?” she heard a tearful Solena ask.

  Numbly, Julie unfolded the paper. On it, Luke had drawn a single, perfect flower.

  The day of Luke’s funeral, snow blanketed the ground. Cold white drifts covered cars and fences and the sky was a dull shade of leaden gray. To Julie, riding in the funeral home’s limo to the cemetery, the whole world looked black and white. Void of color.

  The high school closed for the day and almost the whole city turned out to bury their hometown hero. On Main Street, traffic lights blinked yellow and a police escort led the long, lonely precession to Luke’s final resting place. Julie wore black, including a black mantilla over her long blond hair. She sat in the car sandwiched between Nancy and Steve. In the limo’s other long seat were Diedra and her parents. The trip seemed slow, endless.

  “I never thought I’d have to do this again,” Nancy said tonelessly, and Julie knew she was remembering her husband’s funeral so many years before. Luke’s mother stared through the window. “Who will ride with me when it’s my turn?”

  No one answered, and Julie tightened her hold on the edge of the car seat. Inside, she felt as dead as the world outside the car window seemed. As empty as the stretches of snow between the headstones of the cemetery.

  At the burial site, hundreds had gathered, all dressed in shades of black and gray. The car stopped, and attendants helped Julie and the others make the walk to the tarpaulin-covered pit where Luke’s casket would be placed. Because the ground was frozen, a special machine had been used to dig the hole. Julie could still see its tracks in the packed snow. She heard the crunch of snow beneath her boots, felt the sting of frigid air on her face.

  Julie watched as Frank led the pallbearers—all members of the football team and wearing black armbands—toward them. A mantle of flowers, each one as white as t
he snow, cascaded down the sides of the steel-gray casket. The petals of the flowers were frozen, singed by ice, brittle and stiff. Unbidden, Luke’s long-ago words came to her. “Someday, I’ll dress you in flowers,” he had said. Instead, it was he who had been wrapped in blossoms.

  She hardly heard the brief ceremony. She felt isolated and cut off from reality, not caring what was said. No words could make a difference. Luke was gone and nothing could bring him back. Her movements were mechanical, like an elaborate puppet’s. She went through the motions, but in her heart, she was hollow and empty. And cold. So very cold.

  Once the ceremony was over, Julie’s parents urged Nancy to receive friends at their home because it was so much more spacious. People arrived steadily all day, bringing food and flowers and small gifts. Nancy, ever gracious and kind, accepted every expression of grief over the loss of her son. But Julie felt removed from the ritual, abhorring it. Still, she knew it meant a great deal to Luke’s mother, so she tolerated it.

  Late in the afternoon, as it grew dark and colder, Diedra found Julie in the backyard, huddled against a leafless and barren oak tree. “Steve and I are leaving for the airport,” she said gently. “We have to go home to L.A.”

  “Good-bye,” Julie told her. How far away and long ago L.A. seemed.

  “You should come in the house, Julie. It’s cold and you’ll get sick.”

  “So what?”

  Diedra smoothed Julie’s hair, flecked with snow from the blackened branches of the tree. “Please come visit us this summer. Will you promise me you’ll come?”

  Julie traced her fingers along the roughened bark of the old tree trunk. “See our initials? Luke carved them for us when he was twelve.” The letters looked scarred and shrunken by the cold. She brushed them lightly with gloved fingers.

  “You’re breaking my heart, Julie. Please tell me you’re going to be all right.”

  “Luke used to bring me flowers.”

  Steve called to Diedra from the porch.

  “I’ve got to go, honey.” She hugged Julie, who stood motionless. “Don’t forget—we’re expecting to see you this summer.”

  Julie didn’t answer; she only brushed her fingertips over the worn initials as Diedra left.

  Later, when her house had emptied and her father was taking Nancy home, Julie wearily climbed the stairs to her room. She stripped, dropping her clothes in a heap onto her floor, pulled on a flannel nightshirt, and climbed into her bed.

  After knocking lightly, her mother opened the door and entered the room. The light flooding in from the hallway blinded Julie, and she turned away from its glare. “Julie …” Her mother halted beside her bed. “Honey … if there’s anything you want …”

  “I want Luke,” she said without emotion.

  “Honey … please … I’m sorry … so sorry …”

  “Good night,” Julie said, then curled into a tight ball and pulled the covers over her head. Minutes later, she heard her mother leave the room. “Luke,” she whispered into the darkness. “Why have you left me all alone?”

  25

  “Julie, your mother and I are very concerned about you.” Bud Ellis sat on the side of Julie’s bed, looking helpless, his big hands folded in his lap.

  “I’m fine, Dad.”

  “You’re not fine,” Julie’s mother interjected. “You don’t eat, you don’t go to school, you don’t see your friends. Julie, you’ve lain in that bed for over a month. You’ve lost so much weight we hardly recognize you. Please, honey, snap out of it.”

  Julie peered dully up at her parents. Why didn’t they leave her alone? Food had lost its taste and appeal. And she’d tried to go back to school after Luke’s funeral, but she couldn’t concentrate and she couldn’t keep up in her classes. All she wanted to do was sleep. Because when she was asleep, she could forget how much she hurt. “I’ll try to get up later,” she said in an effort to placate her parents. “Right now, I’m too tired.”

  She saw her father glance up at her mother. He sighed and touched her shoulder through her bedcovers. “I miss him too, Julie. Every day, I think about him. But what you’re doing to yourself isn’t right. You can’t curl up and die too.”

  Curl up and die. The idea didn’t sound so bad to her. Without Luke, she certainly couldn’t think about living.

  “Why don’t you get up, get dressed, and come into school with me,” her father said.

  “I’ll make you late.” Her bedside clock read eight-thirty. Usually, he was gone by seven-thirty.

  “Who cares? I’m the coach, remember? Besides, first period is my free period this semester. Come on—drive in with me.”

  “Not today. You and Mom go on without me. I’ll rest and maybe when you get home this afternoon, I’ll feel better.”

  Her father rose, but her mother kicked off her shoes. “If you’re staying home again, I will too.”

  Julie was mildly surprised. Her mother rarely missed work, and now that second semester had begun, more and more kids would be seeking her services at the high school for help with college applications. “You don’t have to stay home. I’m just going to stay in bed today.” Her thoughts grew fuzzy.

  Julie heard her parents whispering at her door. Then her father left and her mother came back to her bedside. “Solena called last night. She wants to come over after school.”

  “I don’t think I’m up to visitors. Tell her I’ll call her later.”

  “Julie, you’ve been putting her off for days. She’s your best friend and she calls every day asking about you.”

  Julie felt tears brim in her eyes. All this conversation was confusing her, upsetting her. She sniffed and turned over to face the wall. “Please, not today. I—I just don’t want to have to see anybody today.”

  Minutes later, she heard her mother softly close the bedroom door, and soon afterward, Julie fell into the welcoming arms of a deep, dark, dreamless sleep.

  Afternoon sunlight streamed through Julie’s bedroom window, awakening her. Someone had pulled up her window shade, and the winter sun cut a path across her bed and pillow. She buried her face under her covers, but the light was relentless. Who had done such a thing? she wondered.

  She sighed and realized that the only way to shut out the sun was to get up and pull down the shade, but her arms and legs felt almost too heavy with exhaustion to move. She forced herself upright, staggered to the window, leaned over her desk, and fumbled at the cord for the shade.

  From the kitchen below she heard her mother moving around and smelled the aroma of simmering chicken soup. Normally, the aroma would make her mouth water, but today it made her feel nauseous. She yanked down the shade and returned to her bed, then buried herself under the covers until she heard her mother come into her room.

  “How about supper in bed?” her mother asked cheerfully, setting down a tray laden with soup, crackers, milk, and green Jell-O. When Julie was a small child, green gelatin had been her favorite.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  Her mother sat on the bed and pulled Julie’s covers from off her head. “Look at me, Julie.”

  Julie struggled to focus.

  “This has got to stop. Your father and I can’t bear to see you wasting away like this.”

  “Please, Mom, don’t—”

  “No. You listen! I’ve talked with our doctor, and he says that the way you’ve been grieving is cause for alarm. When I told him how much weight you’ve lost, he said it might be necessary not only to get you counseling, but to hospitalize you and put you on an IV.”

  Julie wanted to be angry, but she didn’t have the energy for it.

  “So sit up and eat or I will drive you to the hospital personally and check you in.”

  Wearily, Julie obeyed. “I’m up, but I still don’t want to eat.”

  “You have a visitor,” her mother announced without preamble.

  “Tell Solena to come back tomorrow.”

  “It isn’t Solena.”

  The bedroom door inched open, a
nd Nancy peeked into the room. “Hi, Julie. Can I come in?”

  Julie hadn’t seen her since the funeral, and seeing her now caused fresh pain to stab at her heart. Still, although Nancy looked tired and she’d lost weight, she also looked serene, “Sure. Come in.”

  Pat Ellis moved so that Nancy could take her place on the bed. “Your mother tells me you’re not doing so good.”

  Feeling betrayed, Julie glared at her mother. “I’m tired, that’s all.”

  “You’re depressed,” Nancy corrected. “I’ve been depressed too, but not like you.” She placed her hands on Julie’s. “I lost my only son, Julie. I’ll never get over the pain. But I will get on with my life.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’m moving out to L.A. Steve’s offered me a job. He and Diedra are starting a small production company and they need an office manager. Luke talked to him before the surgery and asked Steve to take care of me.” A wistful smile turned up the corners of her mouth. “Just like Luke—to be worried about me. Anyway, I’m going where there are no memories to haunt me every day.”

  The news jolted Julie. Her last link with Luke was being broken. “When will you go?”

  “Just as soon as my house sells.”

  Tears filled Julie’s eyes. “I’ll miss you.”

  “We’ve been through a lot together through the years. Frankly, I’ve grown to love you like a daughter. That’s why it hurts me to see you harming yourself this way.”

  Julie dropped her gaze, unable to speak around the lump in her throat.

  “Luke wouldn’t have wanted you to do this to yourself, you know. He wanted the best for you. He wanted you to be happy.”

  “How can I be happy without him?”

  “I don’t know … all I know is that someday, you will be. You’ll be happy”—she paused—“and you’ll fall in love again.”

  Julie shook her head adamantly. “I’ll never love anybody the way I loved Luke. I won’t risk being hurt again.”

  “Love is always a risk. Just like Luke’s surgery.” Nancy smoothed Julie’s tangled hair. “Just before he went back to the hospital, the bone marrow donor program had found him a match.”