With the Last Goodbye

by Len Webster

  Her mother would take her last breath on a sunny Saturday.

  And it was a beautiful day for her last day on this Earth.

  It was a day fit for the best goodbye.

  That was what Josie had to remember.

  “Josie.” She heard Stella call out.

  Josie swung her gaze over to see her best friend with West by her mother’s door. When she and Max reached them, Josie hugged Stella.

  “I’m here for you, Josie,” her best friend whispered, and Josie hugged her tighter.

  “I know, and thank you so much for everything, Stella.”

  “I love you too much to ever let you be alone,” she said once she ended their embrace and smiled at Josie. Then she glanced over and directed her smile to Max. “Hey, Max.”

  “Hey, Stella,” he greeted politely.

  Stella dropped her hands from Josie. “No hard feelings? You understand why West and I were protective, right?”

  “I do,” he confirmed.

  “Your father is in there with your mother,” West announced.

  Josie nodded. “I’ll just be a minute,” she told them as she reached out and opened the door to her mother’s room. When she stepped inside, her father turned his head her way, and she pushed the door shut behind her, leaving Max, Stella, and West outside.

  “Morning,” her father greeted as she walked towards him.

  She stood next to him, set her handbag on the ground, and wrapped her arms around her father. “How are you?” she asked in a small voice.

  Her father wrapped an arm around her and looked down at her. The sadness in his eyes was painful to look at. Josie knew he still loved her mother. And she knew he wasn’t ready to say goodbye. “I’m good. Thank you for yesterday, Josephine.”

  “You’re welcome. But it was for her.” Josie pulled away from her father and glanced over at her mother. Even lying on that bed hooked to those machines, she was still beautiful. Josie peeked over at the window to see the sunshine pouring in. “Today’s a nice day,” she pointed out.

  “It is,” her father agreed.

  Josie craned her neck and smiled at her father. “Today’s a nice day for one final goodbye.”

  His eyes washed over with tears, and he nodded his head with a smile. “A beautiful day for one final goodbye.”

  “That’s a lot of flowers, Stell … We bought none,” West whispered next to Max.

  Stella shushed her boyfriend. “We didn’t break Josie’s heart.”

  Max turned and faced Josie’s friends. He had no reason to correct them because they were right. He was the one who broke Josie’s heart. But Max hadn’t bought the roses to get on Josie’s good side. He bought them because he believed her mother deserved a room full of pink roses.

  He would give her La Vie En Rose.

  For Josie.

  He had to be strong for her.

  He had to support her in any way he could.

  Stella offered him a smile. “It’s a nice gesture, Max. Don’t think we’re making fun of you. Honestly, it’s really heartfelt. I know Josie loved it.”

  He nodded. “I wanted today to be a little easier on her.”

  “Besides what happened between you two, I think you’re a really good guy for her,” Josie’s best friend admitted. “I’m sorry we were jerks to you, but she was hurting and didn’t want to see you. Josie means a lot to us, and we had to protect her.”

  “Stella, you have nothing to be sorry about,” Max assured.

  Her smile curved in appreciation. A throat clearing had Stella straightening and saying, “Dr Frederickson, hello.”

  Max spun around to find a man in his late fifties in a white coat holding a clipboard. “Good morning, Stella. Is Josephine here?”

  “She is. She’s in Emily’s room with her dad.”

  The doctor nodded. “Thank you. I’ll just go inside and have a chat with her.”

  Max watched the doctor let himself into the hospital room and shut the door behind him.

  Twenty minutes later, Dr Frederickson walked out of the hospital room with Josie behind him. Max pushed off the wall he had leant against and made his way to her.

  “Hey,” he said, still holding all eight bouquets of pink roses.

  Josie let out a soft sigh and smiled tightly at him. “Hey.”

  “You okay?”

  Her eyes shone, and he knew she had been crying. “Yeah. We talked about turning off my mother’s life support. Dr Frederickson is going to give us some time with her, and then when I sign the form, he’ll supervise the nurse.”

  “So it’s going to be today?” he asked.

  “Yeah. My dad is saying goodbye now.”

  “Josephine, I’m so sorry.”

  He’d hug her, but the roses were in his way. As if she sensed his need to comfort her, Josie set her hand on his shoulder, got on her toes, and pressed a kiss to his cheek. “Thank you for being here,” she whispered once she was back on her feet.

  “There’s nowhere I’d rather be,” he admitted.

  Her smile softened at his words, and then she turned to face her best friends. “Seriously, thank you both for being here. When my father finishes saying goodbye, did you both want to say goodbye as well?”

  Max glanced over to see Stella’s green eyes shimmer. “I’d love to. West?”

  Stella’s boyfriend nodded, his face taut and serious. “I’d love to, as well.”

  Then Josie faced Max. “I know you didn’t get a chance to meet her. But would you like to say goodbye, too?”

  Max nodded. “Is that okay?”

  “I’d really appreciate it if you did.”

  “Then I’d like to say goodbye to your mother,” he confirmed.

  But Max had more than just a goodbye waiting for Josephine’s mother.

  He had promises she needed to hear before she left this world.

  “Are you okay?” Max asked as he dipped his chin and gazed down at Josie staring at the hospital door.

  When Josie’s father walked out of that room, he had wiped his cheeks and nodded at his daughter. Then the ambassador said he needed air and had left them, promising to return. Max and Josie leant against the hallway wall as Stella and West said goodbye to Emily.

  “I’m okay,” she said in a small voice. “I had almost twenty-three years with her. Almost twenty-three years of amazing love and memories.” Tears trickled down her face. “Years of her being there when I was disappointed. It took her having cancer a second time for me to realise that I should have stopped focusing on my father not being around and appreciated the fact that she was.”

  “She knows how much you love her,” he assured.

  Josie nodded, blinking free more of her heart’s pain to roll down her cheeks. “I know that. I thought when she beat cancer, she’d never be sick again. She’d be immune. I thought I had more time with her. I think back to my recitals and my high school graduation, and my memories have shifted, Max.”

  “They have?”

  “Yeah. Now I don’t see that empty seat anymore. I don’t see that seat where my father was meant to be sitting. It’s like my memories of all those bad times have shifted to the left, and all I see is her. I just see her—” Her sobs had her stopping as she reached up and swiped at her cheeks.

  Unable to take it anymore, Max bent down and set the bouquets on the ground next to him. Then he pulled Josie to him and wrapped his arms tightly around her, letting her cry into his chest.

  “I see her smiling at me. Why didn’t I appreciate that more, Max? Why didn’t I just look to the left more often? I’d have more memories of her if I’d just looked to the left …” she sobbed. “I just had to look to the left.”

  “Josephine,” he said, hating he couldn’t say more to comfort her.

  “I don’t want today to end … b-because it means she’ll really be gone. I have so many moments I don’t want to live without her.”

  She cried harder.

  And harder.

  So much harder that sh
e began to shake.

  Max rubbed circles on her back as her tears soaked through his shirt and met his skin.

  It was awful not being able to do anything but hold her and whisper that she wasn’t alone. That her mother knew she loved her.

  The sound of her mother’s door opening and footsteps had Josie pulling away from him and sniffing. West closed the door as Stella dabbed the tissue against her cheek, her eyes red and puffy from her tears. Josie walked up to her best friend and hugged her, both letting out sobs.

  “You want to go in, Max?” West asked.

  “Yeah,” he replied. Once Josie had untangled herself from her best friend’s embrace, he stepped towards her.

  Josie spun around and tilted her chin to look up at him. “You don’t have to if you don’t want to, Max. Don’t feel like you’re obligated to say goodbye to my mother.”

  His heart squeezed at the concerned expression on her face. She feared he was uncomfortable with this. But he wasn’t. That woman had brought Josephine into the world and raised her. Max had a lot of respect and appreciation for Emily Faulkner.

  It was his duty to thank her and promise to take care of her daughter.

  Josie would always have someone to look out for her.

  And he would watch the moments and memories that she couldn’t.

  Max bent down and kissed the top of her head. “I have to, Josephine,” he said as he picked up the roses and stood straight. West opened the door, and Max thanked him on his way inside the hospital room. When the door closed behind him, Max inhaled a deep breath.

  Turning, he saw Josie’s mother lying on the bed as the bright lights of the machines continued to twinkle and change. The beeps and heavy breaths were constant and almost comforting as he made his way towards her. Once Max reached the bedside table, he set some of the bouquets down. The pink roses made the surface of the table disappear. Then Max walked around the bed, to the other table, and set the rest of the roses down.

  On either side of Emily Faulkner was a sea of pink roses.

  Her own moments of La Vie En Rose.

  Max took in the sight and knew Josie would appreciate it. Then he turned and sat down on the visitor’s chair by the bed. Once he was comfortable, Max reached out and grasped her hand in his. He glanced up at the machine that beeped and spiked with each heartbeat and knew she was with him.

  He was sad he had never gotten to meet her.

  But he was honoured that she knew of him before he really knew of her.

  “Hello, Ms Faulkner,” Max said as he focused on her face. He wondered if she had blue eyes as bright as Josephine’s. Her hair was almost the same colour as her daughter’s, and they both had the same slim face and defined cheekbones. Max wondered if she had that same laugh and smile as Josephine did. He wondered so much about her and knew that when Josie was ready, she’d find love in sharing her mother’s memory with him.

  Max was silent, not sure where he should start.

  So he let silence hold their conversation for a while.

  Just for this moment.

  He and Josie’s mother shared an unvocal moment.

  After some time, he inhaled deeply and decided to thank her.

  “I just wanted to say thank you, Emily,” he said as a small smile tugged at his lips. He was so thankful for this woman. She had raised the woman he loved. The woman he would always love. “Thank you for bringing Josephine into this world. I told you she saved my life the other day, and that wasn’t a lie. Before I met your daughter, I was lost and thought I deserved nothing out of life and love for what I had done to the people I loved most. I was so tired of feeling sick to my stomach with envy for everyone else’s happiness. And when I stepped away from it all, there she was. She just stood on that bridge, lost in her own world. Then she invited me into her world and gave me this smile and asked me the one question I didn’t realise I needed someone to ask …”

  Tears began to run down his face as he replayed the moment that changed his life.

  “She asked me if I was okay. No one had ever stopped to ask me that. I saw in her eyes that she had her own problems, but she put them aside to see if I was all right. Your daughter put me first, and no woman has ever done that. Josephine gave me compassion and love. And I know you taught her that. So thank you, Emily. Thank you for your daughter. Because without her, I don’t think I would be the man I am. She changed my life with a question. She made it better with her friendship. She made it worth living when she let me become her La Vie En Rose. She made my life hers the moment she let me fall in love with her. You probably don’t need me to tell you this, but she’s the most important woman in the world … because she is my world.”

  Beep.

  Beep.

  Beep.

  Max’s thumb gently stroked the back of her hand.

  “Your daughter, Josephine, is my La Vie En Rose, the true love of my life who I adore. So I’m going to make you a promise, Emily.”

  He licked his lips and felt his heart race against his ribcage.

  “I promise I will be there to witness every amazing moment in her life for you. I will be there when she’s sad. I’ll be there when she’s happy. I’ll be there when she misses you. I’ll be there when she spends all night studying for her exams. I’ll be there when she’s angry with the world. I’ll be there when she cries because she doesn’t know how else to feel. I’ll be there when she graduates with her law degree. I’ll be there loving her. I’ll be her friend. I’ll be everything she needs.

  “And even if she needs space because I hover too much, I’ll be on the other side of the door, ready to hug her and tell her I love her. I’ll be there every day and every night telling her I love her. I’ll be there to make sure she never feels lonely. And I’ll be there to witness all the smiles you can’t see in person. I promise I’ll be there at the end of the altar if she ever decides I’m the man she wants to spend the rest of her life with because she’s the woman I’m waiting to walk towards me. I’ll be there waiting for her. She might want to take her time, and that’s okay. Because I love her enough to wait.”

  Max squeezed her hand one last time and held it up to his lips. He pressed a kiss against her skin, then set it gently back down on the mattress.

  “Thank you, Emily. Thank you for being one of the most important women in my life. I wish I’d got the chance to tell you that earlier. I will never stop trying to make Josephine happy. I promise you that you don’t have to be afraid of her being lonely because so many people love her. Josephine might love me, and she might claim I am, but you are her true love. The first person she ever loved. And she’ll take your memory and live a life with you always by her side.”

  Letting her hand go, Max slowly got up from the chair.

  “Goodbye, Emily,” he whispered.

  After he listened to her heart make five beats, he spun around and made his way towards the door.

  Those heartbeats he heard, he would always think of them as the words she never got to say to him.

  Just as he was about to leave, he paused and slowly spun around. Max made his way back to the bedside table and removed a pink rose from the bouquet and set it next to Emily’s hand. Then he whispered, “You will always be Josephine’s true La Vie En Rose. Long after the song has ended.”

  Max had been in her mother’s hospital room far longer than Stella and West, but she didn’t mind. Josie assumed he sat there and allowed her mother to speak volumes in her silence. She wondered what he had told her. She wondered if he told her mother that he loved her. She hoped so. She hoped he told her more than just goodbye. Told her of his reason behind the roses.

  When Josie was in there with her father, he had told her mother just how much he loved her. He told her how honoured he was to have been her husband and apologised for letting her go. He told her of his regret for letting Josie grow up without him. And his voice became soft whispers when he said he wished she told him of her health. Then he changed the topic and spoke of his favourite me
mories they shared together. He had even laughed for a moment when he teased her for trying to knit Josie booties when she was pregnant. Her mother had dropped so many stitches that it ended up looking like Swiss cheese rather than footwear for a newborn. Josie had laughed, too. It was something she could imagine her mother doing.

  When Dr Frederickson entered the room, the happy memories ceased, and they were plummeted back to reality. He asked for Josie’s decision, and she answered that she would sign the papers today. That she wanted her mother’s life to end on a beautiful sunny Saturday. The doctor had nodded and said that he’d let them have some time before she signed the form. Although Josie was heartbroken about her decision, she knew it was the right choice.

  After Stella and West said their goodbyes to her mother, they joined her father downstairs for air, leaving Josie alone to stand in the hallway. They insisted on staying, but she had refused and said she needed to prepare herself mentally and emotionally for her goodbye. While she waited for Max, she thought of all the things she had yet to say to her mother.

  All the promises she wanted to make her.

  But as she leant against that wall, staring at that same door, she came up blank.

  Her brain was heavy with words that didn’t make proper sentences.

  So Josie decided to sit with her mother and let her heart speak for itself.

  She knew she’d never be able to tell her everything, but she would tell her repeatedly that she loved her. And thank her for being there when everyone else had walked out on her.

  Hug her one last time.

  The door opening had Josie pushing off the wall and walking towards Max as he stepped out. He hadn’t closed the door all the way as he stood in front of her. She noticed the shine in his eyes and knew he had cried during his goodbye to her mother.