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Before: Let Me Hold You Awhile


Nick

I helped Ashley out of the car. Her long white hair was in a braid down her back. I led her carefully into the coffee shop and helped her into her seat. She smiled up at me. "You're so good to me," she laughed.

"I do what I can." I looked up at the coffee counter. "What do you want, baby?" I asked.

"Vanilla chai," she said, smiling.

"Coming right up." I hobbled to the counter, glancing back at her. My old hips ached like somethin' else. And I had this dull throbbing in my chest that had started the week before, a feeling I couldn't quite identify. I rubbed my chest through my shirt as I waited my turn in line, leaning on my cane.

"What can I get you?" the barista asked as I stepped up.

"Two grande vanilla chai," I replied. I looked at the case. "And that little cake right there. With the spinkles."

The barista smiled, "Yes sir."

"Can you do me a favor?" I asked.

"Yes?"

I reached in my pocket and put a candle down on the counter. "Could you bring it over to me and that foxy woman sitting by the windows over there, with this on it? It's a surprise."

The barista looked past me at Ashley, who was smiling, looking out the window at the sunlight.

"Yes sir," she said. She smiled. I dropped my money onto the counter, and left the change.

"They're going to bring it over," I told Ashley as I lowered myself carefully, creakily into the seat across from her. I put my hand on the table and she wrapped hers around it. I turned mine so we were cupping each other's fingers. I smiled at her, studied the wrinkles that had formed around her face, wrinkles that hadn't been there once upon a time but that had grown and appeared over the years so gradually that I'd scarcely noticed their arrival.

"You are the most beautiful woman in the world," I said.

Ashley laughed, "You silly old man," she said. "Don't go telling lies."

"I ain't lyin," I croaked out. I grinned at her, "There ain't a single woman in the world that could hold a candle to you, you sexy thing."

Ashley's eyes sparkled.

"Thank you for being my wife," I said.

"Thank you for being my husband," she replied.

The barista brought over the chais and the cake, the candle burning happily in the center of it. She put it down in front of Ashley, smiled, and said, "Happy birthday." Then she put the two cups down and hurried away.

Ashley looked up at me, "Look what you've done," she laughed.

"I couldn't help myself," I answered.

Ashley blew out the candle. "You want to know what my wish was?" she asked, pulling the candle out and sucking the frosting and cake from the bottom of it.

"If you tell me that, it won't come true," I said.

Ashley stared into my eyes. "You make it come true every day."




Ashley

That night, Nick put on the old record of Free Falling that he'd given to me years and years ago, and we danced in the living room, holding each other close, his face buried in my hair. He rocked me back and forth gently, singing along with the record under his breath.

I couldn't have written our lives better if I'd been given a pen and paper and told to tell our story. From that day in the hospital when Nick had woken up until that very moment dancing in our living room on my birthday, there wasn't a thing that I would've changed.

Not a single thing.

We'd aged, sure, we were creaky and old and our hair had turned white and Nick's laugh lines were lost in the mess of wrinkles that had taken over his face. Weathered, I thought. But we'd lived. We'd seen the world together with our children, and we'd experienced life like some people only dream about.

We'd found that happily ever after that so many people only dream of finding, that some think only exists in fairy tales and songs.

Nick kissed me softly, his hands running down my back.

As the song came to an end, Nick took a deep breath, and he sat in his old chair, rubbing his chest as he smiled up at me, a tired expression on his face.

"Do you want a drink?" I asked him.

He nodded, "A drink would be nice."

I went out to the kitchen and I opened the fridge and poured us each a glass of pomegranate juice. "It's been a lovely day, baby," I called out to him as I put the juice away. "Thank you, for everything."

"You're welcome," he called back.

I lifted up the juices and started back to the living room.

I put the juice on the table beside him, and he lifted it and sipped it, smiling at me. I sat on the end of the couch, sipping my own juice. "Do you want to watch a little TV?" I asked him.

"Sure, that sounds good." He nodded. His hand was rubbing his chest gently.

"You okay?" I asked.

Nick nodded.

I turned on the TV.

He looked over at me about halfway through the program we were watching. "Hey baby?" he said.

"Yeah?" I looked over at him.

Nick's eyes sparkled, "I love you."

"I love you, too," I said.

He got up and came over onto the couch. He held out his arms. "Let me hold you awhile," he requested. I scooted into his arms, and he locked them around me, and rested his head on the couch cushion behind me. I leaned my head against his chest.

They said it hadn't been painful for him, that it was probably one of the most peaceful ways he could've gone. The bullet had finally shifted, though only slightly. They said if he'd gone to the hospital when his heart first started bothering him they might've been able to extract it, graph the wound, and ultimately save him. But he didn't. So the bullet had created a small tear in his artery, and his heart had simply slowed until it stopped. And he'd died on the couch, in his sleep, holding me.

I heard it when his heart stopped.

It was like the world ending.