Julian rushes to our side of the bed and helps me sit her beside Kit. It’s the first time she’s smiled this whole time.
“Do you want us to leave you?” Julian asks her before he returns to his seat.
“That’s okay. I don’t have too much to say. I just want to sit with him for a little bit. It’s been too long.” Resting her head beside his, she wraps her arms around one of his.
We sit in silence, the whir and whoosh of the machines the only noise. Even our tears are silent.
“Okay, I’m going to go now.” She tells him softly, stroking his face with her fingertips. “I’ll see you someday, pretty boy. Not too soon, even if I’ll never stop missing you.” She pauses and inhales a deep breath. “I need you to do me a favour. Look after my baby? Tell her about me? I want her to know me. I want her to know that she was loved and wanted, and that she’ll be missed.”
I’m choking on my silent tears and when she offers me her hand, I take it. I shuffle closer before I wipe her tears with the edge of the sheet.
“I need to go now. Don’t feel guilty.” Pressing a wet kiss to my jaw, she places Kit’s hand in mine. “This isn’t what he would’ve wanted. He needs us to let him go.”
“I don’t want to.”
“Neither do I, but I think this one time we can be selfless. We can give him what he needs.” Her arm wraps around my waist tightly and with a drawn-out breath she releases me. “Jules, will you take me back to my room?”
He doesn’t hesitate. He picks her up and places her in the wheelchair. Before I know it, I’m alone with Kit.
I don’t know what to say. I’m not sure if it’s meant to be a proper goodbye, or something else. All I know is that sitting beside him, like this, it doesn’t feel like he’s gone.
Shuffling down the bed, I lie beside him. We used to do it all the time as kids. I’d crawl into his bed and we’d lay there, staring at the glow in the dark stars on his ceiling. Sometimes he’d make me go back to my own bed, but on the nights our parents would argue, he’d let me stay, and he’d hold my hand until I fell asleep.
So that’s what I do. I hold his hand until I can’t anymore. I hold his hand until I’m told I have to let go.
Until he’s gone.
Chapter 39
Leo
I never took my brother for granted, Kit and I, we had our arguments and our fights. But we never held grudges. We always found a way around our differences, but today…today I am angry at him. At our parents. At God, at myself.
Saying goodbye was never something I truly thought I’d have to do. All these months I’ve been waiting for him to wake up, I knew the possibility was there. I thought I was prepared for it. I wasn’t.
I’m still hoping this is all a nightmare I’ll wake-up from. That somehow my brother and my girl will be okay. I’m hoping I’ll wake-up and they’ll be the best of friends.
Cassie and Kit would’ve loved one another.
But he’s gone now, and my beautiful little flower is still lying in that same bed.
“You’re meant to help the good people. The innocent and vulnerable. You’re meant to protect them in the hour of their need, in the shadow of death and deepest darkness. You promised to guide us, protect the weak and make them strong. To restore their souls. Where is your goodness and mercy now?” Fisting Kit’s crucifix, I lean forward in my seat.
This place looks so different to the last time I was here. It feels like a lifetime ago that I found Cassie right here. She was every
where I turned, she is all I see and all I want. “And if you take her from me too... Where is your light?”
“If there’s no darkness, how do you expect to see his light?” Father Byrne sits beside me in the pew. His gaze wandering around the building like it’s the most wondrous thing. I used to think it was too.
“Wasn’t that one of the first lessons you were taught? Light can only shine in the dark, otherwise it’s pointless. You can’t see it.”
I am the darkness and Cassie is all the light I need, but little by little she’s getting snuffed out.
“Leo…”
Getting up, I look down at him and I wonder if he really does believe what he preaches, or whether it’s all just memorised verses and white lies.
“Pray to Him, Father, maybe he’ll listen to you.”