Hello Stranger

“I’ve seen a lot of people in hospices, you know. Plenty of people in a similar situation to me have been very low and resigned, especially since their families are suffering so badly around them. I’d always say to them, if you were more positive, they would find it so much easier to be positive too. Which is pretty damn true. Without being rude, I’d say, what is it you want to be remembered for? What do you want your final part of the road to mean?” She paused again. “Every morning my first waking thought is ‘thank you universe for another day’ and to sum it up in a nutshell, another woman I knew who is dead now, bless her soul, said that her first waking thought was always shit, what’s going to happen today? Tragic.”

It was tragic. I could imagine the poor woman who said it, petrified of every hour ahead of her.

Jackie carried on.

“I know I’m viewed that way by others – as a super happy, positive person. At the hospice I hear it a lot from doctors I’m involved with, and nurses – because it is unusual apparently. Don’t get me wrong, when you are ill as fuck there are lots of things that aren’t pleasant, lots of things aren’t nice, but just look away, think something nice for a minute, and bish bosh bang. Done. Fear. What fear does, what feeding anxiety does is exacerbates, so for me, I am in pain all the time, but I don’t suffer my pain, because pain is there for a reason. And that reason doesn’t define me.”

I was nodding. Listening. Trying to soak her up with every scrap of my mind.

She laughed again. “Yeah, I mean, I suffer with some things, like I’m always going on about my ass, because when it’s sore, it’s fucking sore. But there’s always more than that bubbling away under the surface. My lungs have been in pain for years, right up until getting this morphine driver. But I don’t let it define me, because otherwise I can’t let the life and joy in.”

Once again I saw the similarities between Jackie and Logan, mother and son. I saw the same passion in their eyes, and the same determination. The same unwillingness to be defined by their bodies and not their hearts.

She pulled me in closer, and I could hear it in her voice. Every word was a struggle.

“And this is what I want you to know, sweetheart, before I say my goodbye. Every single excruciating experience I’ve been through, I’ve taken something valuable from it. It’s had a purpose. People don’t give credence enough to the power and strength of mind over matter. I’m not saying you can make pain go away, it’s just, again it’s this fear based thing. We fear what we don’t fucking know. So make it known. Take it onboard. Feel it. Feel yourself, always feel yourself.” She paused and smiled a fading smile enough that it choked my breath. “And feel, Logan, sweetheart. Please feel Logan too. He’s gonna need you. He’s gonna need you by his side. Even though he might try to push you away.”

I nodded, and I knew the tears were coming, I couldn’t have stopped them if I’d tried.

“I’ll be by his side, I promise.”

“Thank you, darling, because I need that too. I can’t say goodbye until I know you’re going to be holding his hand at my funeral.”

“I will be, I promise. I swear.”

Tears ran down her cheeks as mine did, both of us trying to smile, and with that she reached up behind her and pulled an envelope out from behind her elephant postcard.

“On that note, sweetheart, I need you to promise me something else.”

“Anything.”

She handed the envelope over, and the scribble only made the tears fall harder.

Logan.

It was a letter for Logan.

“Please make sure he gets this,” she said.

And with that, she gave up.

She lay back against her pillows, and smiled as she let out a breath, tears still flowing as I watched the weight of the world fly away.

I kissed her hand before I got up from my seat, choking back my tears as my legs found their strength.

Then I rushed to get Logan.42LoganChloe shook me awake, trying to hold back the tears and failing.

The words were out of my mouth without any thought.

“Has she gone? Has she?”

A shake of the head from a sobbing Chloe as she grabbed for my hand and pulled me from my bed.

It doesn’t matter how prepared you think you are to say your goodbyes, it falls to nothing as that pain slams like molten hell in your gut. When the little boy is screaming inside, begging that his mum doesn’t die. Please, please, don’t take my mummy. Please, no. Please. When your memories tumble right the way through you, all the things you wanted to do, all the things you wanted to say. All the things you’d said and wished you hadn’t. All the things you are losing, when your rock of a mother takes her final breaths.