Fly Away (Firefly Lane 2)

The man in white seems menacing somehow; I shiver when he says, “… Are you ready?”

They are talking about my body, about me, about taking me off life support. They are here, my friends and family, to watch me die.

Or breathe, Kate says. Then: It’s time. Do you want to go back?

I get it. Everything has been leading up to this moment. I see that with a clarity that should have been there before.

I see Marah walk into the hospital room. She looks so thin and frail as she stands by Johnny, who puts an arm around her.

She needs you, Kate says to me. And so do my boys. There is a hitch in her voice; an emotion I know runs deep. I made her a promise to be there for her children and I failed. In a way, the proof is in the piercings. I feel my old nemesis—longing—uncoil from its place deep, deep inside me and spread out.

They love me. Even from where I am, through the mist of worlds, I can see that. Why didn’t I see it when I was standing beside them? Maybe we see what we expect to. I do want to undo what I’ve done—this terrible, selfish thing—I want to undo it and have a chance to be another version of myself. A better version.

And I love them. How was it that I have believed I was incapable of love, all these years, when I feel it so deeply? I turn to say this to Kate, and she smiles at me, my best friend, with her long, tangled blond hair and thick eyelashes and her smile that lights up any room.

My other half. The girl who took my hand all those years ago and didn’t let go until she had to.

In her eyes, I see our lives: dancing to our music, riding our bikes in the dark, sitting in chairs on her beach, talking and laughing. She is my heart; the one who lets me soar and keeps me grounded. No wonder I went crazy without her. She was the glue that held us all together.

Say goodbye to me, she says quietly.

In the hospital room—and now it feels far, far away—I hear someone—the doctor—say, “Does anyone want to say anything first?”

But I am listening to Kate now: I’ll always be with you, Tul. Always. Friends no matter what. This time you won’t stop believing.

I had stopped believing—in her, in me, in us. In everything.

I look at her, see through the brightness to the face I know as well as my own.

When someone hip-bumps you or tells you that it’s not all about you or when our music plays. Listen and you’ll hear me in all of it. I’m in your memories.

I know she’s right. Maybe I’ve known it all along. She is gone. I lost her a long time ago, but I didn’t know how to let go. How do you release your other half? But I have to … for both of our sakes. I see that now. Still, I can’t say the word.

“Ah, Katie…” I say, feeling the hot sting of tears.

See? she says. You’re saying goodbye.

She moves toward me, and I feel a heat shimmering off her, and then, like a touch of flame, I feel a brush of skin against mine and goose bumps break out across my flesh, the hair on the back of my neck stands up. Slip out the back, Jack, she says. Make a new plan, Stan.

The music. Always the music.

“I love you,” I say quietly, and finally it is enough. Love is what lasts. I understand that now. “Goodbye. ”

At that, just the single heartfelt word, I am plunged back into the darkness.

* * *

I can see myself, I think, from a distance. I am in pain. A headache blinds me, it hurts so much.

Move. It is an old word, one I used to know, and it comes to me now. There is a black velvet curtain in front of me. I am backstage, maybe. Somewhere out there are lights …

I have to get to my feet … walk … but I am tired. So tired.

Still, I try. I get up. Each step sends pain ringing up my spine, but I don’t let it stop me. There is a light out there, onstage. Like a lighthouse beam, it flashes bright, shows me the way, and then disappears again. I keep walking, trudging forward, thinking, Please, but my mind is so muddy I don’t know to whom I am praying. And then suddenly there is a hill above me, growing fast, reaching upward, climbing out from the blackness in front of me.

I can’t make it.

From far away, I hear: “Wake up, Tully, please—”