I smiled, though my chest tightened. No, not too much fun the night before major surgery. But Miller had asked me to come back after visiting hours, and I wasn’t about to leave, so long as he wanted me there.
He sat on the edge of the bed, on top of the covers; he hated the helpless feeling of lying down, and he absolutely hated the gown. Instead, he wore flannel pants and an undershirt, his eyes full of thoughts.
“Hey,” I said, sitting down beside him, his guitar case resting on my knees. I kissed his cheek, his lips, brushed his hair back from his eyes. “Thinking about tomorrow?”
“Tomorrow and every day after,” he said. “If I have them.”
“You will,” I said fiercely, a shiver skimming over my skin.
“I shouldn’t talk like that to you, but…”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m scared too. But they’re going to take care of you, and when it’s over, you’ll have a new life.”
We’ll have a new life.
Miller unlatched the case and retrieved his guitar. “We’ve been here before. Seven years ago. That was the day you saved my life. Feels like a lifetime.”
“I think you saved mine that day too,” I said. “That’s when I knew I was in love with you. A pretty big revelation for a thirteen-year-old. I didn’t know what to do with it all.”
Miller turned to sit with his back against the mattress, raised all the way up.
“Come here.” He made room for me as I climbed onto the bed, my back to his chest. He set the guitar in my lap, his arms reaching around me. “I don’t know what to do with it all, either. Or mess it up with words. I want you to feel it, Vi.”
I leaned back against him to give him room, his cheek brushing mine. I could feel his heart thump against me, a steady beat that kept time. The first notes of our song reverberated through me, joined by Miller’s singing, low and rough, as he strummed the guitar gently.
“You know, you know I love you so…”
Miller’s playing stopped abruptly, and he pushed the guitar away. He wrapped me up in him and pressed his face to my neck.
“I’m here.” I held him, trying to be the anchor he’d so often been for me, when my world felt like it was coming apart. “Are you…scared?”
“Only of leaving you.”
I closed my eyes. “You won’t. I won’t let
you.”
His chest rose and fell against my back in a heavy sigh. “I want to marry you, Vi. I want to grow old with you. I want to celebrate wedding anniversaries with you that make people stand up and applaud when they hear the number. I want to tell people that you’re the love of my life and that I knew that was true because I met you when I was thirteen years old. And that was it. There was never going to be anyone else.”
I turned in the circle of his arms, a tremulous smile on my lips. What are you asking?
He read my thoughts as he so often did. “I don’t know what’s going to happen tomorrow, so I’m just putting it out there to who or whatever’s listening that if I get the chance, I’m not going to screw it up again.”
“Neither will I,” I said. “I’ll just put that out there too. To who or whatever might be listening.”
Happiness shone behind Miller’s eyes. Elusive. He never trusted it to stay, and I vowed to do everything in my power to give it to him, every day.
He kissed me, and despite the fear, a lightness swelled in my chest. Hope. I fed it instead of the fear and smiled into our kiss. A pact that sealed the proposals and vows permeating that hospital room but waited for another day to be made real.
I knew that day would come. Miller and I ebbed and flowed, but we always came back. Inevitable as the tide and beautiful in the end.
Epilogue
Three years later…
I see her the minute I take the stage. Even among a thousand faces in the festival crowd and wearing a floppy hat to protect her fair skin, I recognize Violet immediately. She’s standing with Sam. He’s getting taller, filling out more from the skinny boy we fostered six months ago. He has a camera up to his eye, snapping photos of the crowd, the festival tents, and me and my band on stage.
My family.