Love Always, Kate (26 page)

Chapter 29

May ?

Dear Dairy,

I’m not sure what day it is or how much time I’ve been in the hospital. That’s the thing, though—we never have enough time.

There’s nothing like being
seventeen and dying to question your belief in God. I’m so young. I can’t help but think that I’ll never graduate from high school. I’ll never go to college. Never get married and have kids. I’ll never attempt to bake another pumpkin pie with my mother for Thanksgiving. Or have that round of golf with my dad on Hilton Head Island that we’d always talked about.

I will never fly to G
reece. Or climb to the top of Mount Everest. I’ll never see a volcano erupt. I’ll never get to swim with dolphins. I’ll never get to go to Disney World with Damian. But it makes me happy to think of Brennan and his mother enjoying that trip for me. I’ll watch him from Heaven.

And that’s what makes it all okay. Of all the things I’ll never be
able to experience, I’ll get so much more. I guess that’s how God works.

Now, I’ll get to see Damian graduate. See
him fall in love and get married. I’ll be there for my parents’ fiftieth wedding anniversary. I’ll get to see dolphins every single day; even what they’re doing under the rolling blue seas. From Heaven, I’ll experience everything and more, and not be sick for any of it. What more can I ask for?

But knowing that my family and Damian will miss me…that’s the part I’m not sure I can handle. Especially Damian. He’s lost so much already, and I hate that I’m adding to it. I hate what I’m doing to him. Maybe he’d have been better off not knowing me.

I keep going back to our first conversation. “What if.” And the only ending I can come up with is: “What if I’d never gotten sick?”

If cancer had never invaded my body, I’d be golfing right now. Maybe in the LPGA, like I’d always dreamed. I’d be graduating. Going shopping with my mom for new clothes. Considering colleges. Dancing at clubs. Washing my hair an innumerable amount of times. I’d be hanging out at a friend’s house. Going to movies. On dates with guys. Planning a road trip with my best friends this summer.

It all sounds so great, and yet…

If I were healthy, I’d have never grown this close to my parents. Never met Damian. Never loved him and known the joys
of having him love me back. I’d never have gone to prom with him. Never watched my father treat him like a son. Visit his mother and brother’s graves. I’d never have been showered in flowers. Or been serenaded on Christmas.

Without it, maybe I would’ve had a lobster dinner, but not in front of the fireplace in Damian’s den. Not with him clinging to me; needing me. I’d have never fought with him and learned what it meant to really forgive someone and be forgiven by them.

I can’t stop the tears now as I think about it. The scene still plays over in my mind and scares me just as much as it did when it happened; when I saw Damian passed out that night, sprawled out on his bed. I learned we weren’t invincible. And that I loved him more than life itself.

If you’re still wondering if I could do it all over again. If, somehow, I had been given the choice to have leukemia or not, I wouldn’t have changed a thing. Nothing. My life has been so blessed, and it’s my hope that through it, I’ve been able to do the same for those around me.

I can say without a shadow of doubt…it was worth it all. All the suffering. And all the joy.

I close Kate’s dairy and set it on my lap. I’ve read it half a dozen times over the last three days since she gave it to me. Her chest rises and falls sporadically, the steady rhythm long gone. Oh God, it hurts to watch.

The skin on her hands is so thin and cold. I cover them with my palms, hoping my warmth will somehow sink into her. Swallowing the
burn in my throat, I kiss her scalp and hold her against me.

“I love you, Katie,” I whisper again, wishing I’d told her a thousand times a day since I realized what she meant to me. I
’m a fucking idiot for not telling her until the other night. “I love you.”

Kate shakes a little, then calms. I press my palm against her temple, gently pushing her
into me where she used to feel safe. Now, she’s fading away, and there’s not a
goddamn thing
I can do about it.

She shakes again, and I hold my breath. This can’t be happening.

“Jason,” I say in the darkness. “Marcy?”

Kate’s mother perks her head up, wide awake.

“You’d better come over,” I hear myself say, but I don’t recognize my voice.

Somewhere behind me, I hear them get up and rush over.
I keep a hold of Kate’s head, and her parents clasp her hand in theirs.

Marcy’s quiet
sobs hang in the air. It’s the only sound.

Without me hearing the door open, Tammy and Leslie come in and stand at the foot of the bed. I barely notice my father next to me, his hand on my shoulder.

As day breaks, my gaze is drawn to the window. Golden rays stream into the room, and I realize I have a promise to keep.

Ever so carefully, I
turn Kate’s head. “It’s sunrise, Katie. Can you see it?” I choke out the words. I take a deep breath, trying to calm myself; I have to stay brave for her. “It’s beautiful, baby.”

We watch the beams waft through the curtain. Kate’s breaths are less frequent. She gasps for air, and I press my lips against her head. Tears that I’ve fought for days now overflow.

“I love you,” I say against her.

Oh God! Please hear me!

Her chest rises again. Stops. Then falls slowly.

I whisper “I love you,” over and over again, desperate to have her know.
To me, she and I are the only ones in the room.

I wait to hear her inhale again, but her chest doesn’t rise. She’s gone.

I bow my head, grasping onto her. My dad hugs me to him, but I can’t let go of Kate. She’s all alone, and she needs me.

No, I need her.

For me, time inches forward in slow motion. I don’t remember getting out of her bed, or falling into my father’s arms. Kate’s parents embrace each other then hold me, Marcy’s tears soaking my shirt. They shake my father’s hand, and Marcy hugs him.

“We’d love it if you’d help us make the arrangements, Damian,” Marcy tells me.

I nod once, not hearing anything else she says. My eyes glance back to the bed where Kate lays, and I have to force myself to walk away. It hasn’t hit me fully yet. She’s just asleep.

Kate’s dead. She’s not waking up.

Familiar pain takes over, and everything gets blurry. My father drives me home; that much I sort of remember. Alone in my room, I collapse onto my bed, clutching the sheets to my chest.

All I want is for Kate to be back in my arms.

~*
~

Only because I said I would, I get out of bed the next day to meet Jason and Marcy at the funeral home. In a stuffy office I don’t want to be in, we discuss the service with the director. I’m numb. I don’t have much to add until I hear something about what time to hold the service.

“Sunrise,” I say without hesitating.

The man beside me is caught off guard. “Uh, that’s early, I’m not sure if people will—”

“Fine,” I cut in
, frustrated. This man has no fucking clue, and I hate him for it. “Have the service the day before, but…” I swallow whatever it is that’s rising in my throat, “bury her at sunrise.” I barely get out the last part; it tastes bitter.

A
strong hand grips my shoulder. “I love that idea,” Jason says.

“Me too,
” Marcy squeaks out.

“Well, then,” the director says. “I’ll make the arrangements with the cemetery.”

~*
~

I sit with Kate’s parents during the funeral services Monday afternoon. It’s the last place I want to be. Dazed, I stare in front of me, avoiding the white casket surrounded by flowers. I’m sure everything the pastor says is worth listening to, but I can’t. Hell, it
isn’t
worth listening to. The whole thing’s just a cruel reminder that she was taken away from me.

The song I wrote for her comes on over the speakers, and I can’t take it anymore.

“I’m sorry,” I mutter to Marcy, and escape to the bathroom.

I’m being a fucking pansy, but I don’t care.
I sit on the toilet, my hands squeezing into my head, afraid it will all pour out of me.

“Damian?”

I hold my breath.

Go away, Dad.

“Son?”

I see his feet, then his legs as he slides down the wall in front of the stall I’m in. And nothing. He just sits there, quiet.

After a handful of minutes, he finally says, “Why don’t we go back in?”

I don’t know why
I nod. Why I open the door and follow him back out to our seats. I just do it. Then I sit there, staring in front of me but unable to see anything. This is a ruse. Yeah, it must be some cosmic-ass joke. It isn’t real.

When the service i
s over, people make their way to the front to say their good-byes. I recognize some of her teachers from prom, her golf coach, and the whole team. Tammy is here, along with Leslie, who hugs me tight.

I don’t feel it. I don’t feel anything.

Marcy squeezes my hand and smiles weakly. Jason rubs my shoulder, and they make their way to the front after everyone else has gone.

Intentionally, I stay behind. I want to be the last one to see her before they close the lid, when she’ll be lost to me forever. In seeing her, I hold on to the hope that she’ll get up and fling herself into my arms.

I can’t do this, Katie. You’re the strong one.

She
looks like an angel on a bed of satin. The butterfly I’d bought her for prom is stuck to the side of her head. Metallic eyeshadow is brushed to her lids as though she applied it herself. Even the black eyeliner she hated putting on is painted over her lashes. It’s all wrong though. When she’s asleep, her eyeliner is smudged. This isn’t smudged.

Why the hell isn’t it smudged?

Her white prom dress fills the coffin, and her mother’s shoes sit in her hand.

“
Yeah, that’s not how the story goes. She gets to keep the shoes.”
I can still hear her voice in my head.

I squeeze my
eyes shut, remembering when I carried her out to the limo after prom, the shoes hanging by their straps in her two fingers.

Opening my
eyes, I glance at the flowers I’d bought. Shaped in a heart, one hundred red roses fan out among the greenery. A banner with the words “I LOVE YOU” is strung across the middle.

Carefully, I tug one of the roses from the bouquet. I kiss the petals then place it over Kate’s heart.

“I love you, Katie,” I whisper. “I’ll always love you.”

Chapter 30

Numbness consumes me during dinner. People come up to me, hug me, and tell me how sorry they are. I nod and thank them, but I don’t care. They didn’t know her like I did. Everything I ever loved is being lowered into the ground at the next sunrise.

I kiss Marcy on the cheek and tell her I’ll see her in the morning. Kate’s dad embraces me; I
still don’t feel any of it.

Kate’s face is everywhere, and all I want is to forget. How she made me feel. How she spoke to me. The way she looked at me. Her eyes haunt me, and when the numbness subsides, pain will replace it.

Heart. Wrenching. Pain.

And I can’t deal with it all over again.

I push open the front door of my house and drop my jacket on the floor. Yanking the tie, it releases from its knot, and I toss it on the floor too. I go into the kitchen, to the familiar cupboard. Not bothering with a glass, I grab a bottle of Jack Daniels and head to my room, tossing the cap as I walk.

The amber liquid burns my throat. I take another swig.

Heading to my bedroom, I see the door down the hall ajar. Anger pours into my bloodstream faster than the alcohol.

“Get the hell out of here!” I scream from the doorway of Liam’s room. Not I, not anyone, has been here in two years.

Ellie spins around. She’s clutching a picture frame to her chest.

I scan the room. It reminds me of Kate’s—everything’s in its place.

“What the fuck are you doing?” I say, glaring at her.

“Damian, I heard. I’m so sorry,” she says and bows her head, that long blond
e hair covering her face.

Fuck you.

I take another drink. “Is that what you came here for?”

A
teardrops down her face, but I couldn’t care less. “I miss him. Here, I feel close to him,” she says. “It’s…it’s been awhile.”

“Two
fucking years,” I mumble, tipping the bottle to my mouth.

“Actually,” she says, “after
you’d fall asleep, I’d come in here and sit.”

I laugh. “Well, aren’t you the perfect goddamn girlfriend.”

She stares the floor. “I’m leaving tomorrow.”

“Bye,” I clip out, annoyed.

“I’m, uh, transferring to Florida State to study marine biology.”

“Don’t let the door hit you in the ass on the way out.” I take another drink.

She steps toward me. I keep my eyes fixed on her, forcing more whisky down my throat. She’s studying me.
Pitying me
. I swallow another gulp of liquid. The alcohol isn’t working fast enough.

Ellie’s directly in front of me now. She smells so sweet, like vanilla lotion, her favorite. Pressing her lips into a straight line, she wraps her arms around my neck. I consider taking a step back, but her hold is too familiar.

“I’m sorry, Damian. I really am,” she says.

I close my
eyes and breathe her in, barely hearing her. Her silky hair tickles my cheek, and I realize that the alcohol just isn’t enough.

I dip my head down to kiss her neck, intentionally avoiding the spot under her ear. She tenses but doesn’t say anything. I slip a hand under her shirt,
gliding my fingers up her spine.

“Damian,” she says, trying to
pull away. “I don’t think—”

“Exactly. Don’t think.” I unhook her bra, pressing my palm into her back.

“Damian, you just lost K—”

I swing her around,
pinning her against the wall. “Don’t
fucking
say her name,” I yell. One of Liam’s trophies falls from shelf at the force. I slam a fist to the wall by her head, and Jack splashes over my arm. Ellie winces and jerks her head to the side.

“I’m sorry…I
—” she mutters, her voice so small.

The fear in her
eyes subdues me, and I sigh. “I just want to forget, Ellie. For one fucking night, I just want to forget.”

She faces
me, the fear fading away.

“You remember,” I remind her. “You, of all people, understand. This
looks pretty fucking familiar to you, doesn’t it?”

She bites her lip and glances to the bottle in my hand—the only difference from the night of Liam’s funeral.

“You wanted to forget too,” I say, cupping a breast.

She
lifts her eyes to me again, and I can see her breaking. I take another drink before she grabs the bottle from my hand and sets it on Liam’s dresser.

“It won’t make it better,” she says. “Or easier.”

“I have nothing to lose.”

She doesn’t say anything for a few moments,
glancing around the room. When she returns to me, her gaze is hard.

“Not in here,” she says, placing the picture of her and Liam on the dresser beside my bottle of
whisky.

“Fine,” I say, grab
bing her hand, and slamming Liam’s bedroom door behind us.

As soon as we enter my room, I throw her up against the closet doors, kissing her mouth but not like I mean it. I don’t love her. She doesn’t love me.

I hook her leg over my hip and yank her shirt over her head. With her bra straps hanging off her elbows, she starts unbuttoning my shirt. Kate’s fingers doing the same thing flashes in my mind, and I grab Ellie’s wrists.

I take off my own shirts, then press myself harder against Ellie, my mouth moving over her
breasts. She lets her bra drop to the floor and digs her nails into my shoulders. I suck her lower lip into my mouth and cringe. Ellie doesn’t taste like strawberries.

Suck it up, asswipe.

Waves of hair spill over her shoulders. I’d forgotten what a girl’s hair felt like in my fingers. I push it away, hating it.

I jerk open her jeans, and she shimmies out of them, kicking them across the room. Then she unfastens my pants and pushes them down over my ankles.
I like that she’s quick and gets to the point. My hands grab at the back of her thighs, lifting. She gives a little hop, and I wrap both of her legs around my hips, pushing her harder into the closet doors. I’m not careful with her.

Her fingers weave into my hair, but not with Kate’s tenderness. Ellie’s not being gentle either. I puff out a snicker, happy about the difference.

When I push myself inside her, Ellie cries out. Her voice is so damn experienced; she knows what I like. A lump forms in my throat. I ache for the bottle of whisky to wash it down. I ignore it and turn us around so that I fall on top of Ellie on my bed.

Her moans don’t excite me like Kate’s.
Tonight, Ellie’s are just unnecessary noise. I try to drown her out. When I realize it’s not working, I crush my mouth on hers to stifle the sound.

C
ome on, man! Just fuck her and forget.

Her thighs squeeze me tighter, and she pushes her hips into mine. I hear myself gasp. God, I hope Kate’s memory erases itself from my mind. I close my
eyes and see her hazel ones staring back at me.

“Katie,” I breathe. “Oh, Katie.”

My words won’t faze Ellie, and I wouldn’t give a shit if they did. I’m sure she remembers her own cries that night and the many nights afterward, until they finally ceased, fading to nothing more than Liam’s ghost.

Ellie squeezes my biceps, her hand covering the tattoo reminder of Liam. I don’t know if that’s why she always grabs me there. It probably is. She was with me when I got it. Her identical one, only smaller, is on her hip. She hit me once for kissing it.

Ellie’s moans grow louder, forcing me to realize it’s almost over, and Kate’s memory only increases. In my head, her arms fold around me, pressing herself into me as she comes. So different than this reality with Ellie’s arms above her head, grasping the sheets.

Kate’s voice smashes into me.
“Will it hurt?”

“I’ll take care of you,”
I’d said.
“I promise.”

Tear
s blur my vision as I cry out Kate’s name a last time. Ellie reaches for me, but I don’t want her sympathy. I roll to my side, allowing the guilt to take over. Maybe this was what I wanted; to feel more pain. Be reminded that Kate’s gone, and that I never deserved her love.

Ellie wraps her arms around me and leans her head against my back. I let her because I don’t have the energy to shove her off. Like I did for her, she’ll stay. She’ll rub my arms in compassionate circles until I cry myself to sleep.

~*
~

I wake up to my cell phone alarm at four in the morning. Rubbing the dried tears from my eyes, I find Ellie still asleep beside me. Seeing her there makes my stomach hurt. She’d been right; last night hadn’t made anything easier.

I get up and head to the shower. The hot water rolls over my shoulders and down my back, leaving my skin red. When I step out, I don’t feel better. I drop to my knees and throw up in the toilet.

Clouds of steam fill my bedroom when I open the door. Ellie is putting on her jeans and pauses to look at me. She stands and walks over, wraps her arms around my neck like she did the night before.

“Letting someone go doesn’t mean you forget them,” she murmurs. “It means you love from here and move on with your life like they would have wanted.”

She kisses me on the cheek. “Good-bye, Damian.”

I don’t watch her leave. Inst
ead, I throw on a pair of khakis and the blue polo Kate loved so much, and get in my car.

Holding back the burning in my chest takes everything—which isn’t much. I
turn into the cemetery and see Kate’s parents already here. They look weary but are holding it together. Better than I am.

I park behind their car and walk to the tent. Jason is speaking with the minister. He pauses to nod at me. Marcy hugs me to her and leans on my shoulder. Words can’t comfort me, so I figure none can comfort her either. It’s quiet, like sound-proof walls have popped up around us.

People slowly arrive. Kate’s golf coach pats me on the back and thanks me for my help with Katie. I fake a smile. The last thing I need is someone fucking
thanking
me for loving her. It should be the other way around.

Tammy and Leslie stand under the tent with my father. Brennan and his mother are in front of them. Leslie’s hands rest on the boy’s shoulders. Other people, Kate’s extended family
, I think, fill in the gaps.

Just as the sun begins to rise, the pastor recites the same words from my mother and Liam’s funeral. “
Forasmuch as it hath pleased Almighty God of his great mercy to take unto himself the soul of our dear sister here departed, we therefore commit her body to the ground; earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust; insure and certain hope of the Resurrection to eternal life, through our Lord Jesus Christ; who shall change our vile body, that it may be like unto his glorious body, according to the mighty working, whereby he is able to subdue all things to himself.”

I look to the west and close my
eyes as Kate used to do. Holding my breath, I think of sitting with her at her window.

I hear her sweet voice in my ear as if she’s standing beside me.
“It’s amazing, isn’t it?”
she says.
“No matter how dark it gets, the sun always rises and starts a new day. The darkness is forgotten.”

As the morning rays
filter in, I feel her all around me like she’s reaching down from above. But when I open my eyes, it all fades away. Before me is a blue vault, and Kate’s shiny white casket.

The pain rushes over me, and I lose my balance. My father’s hands grab me from behind, helping me hold it together. I roll into him and bury my face in his chest. Grabbing a hold of his shirt in the back, I clench my hands as hard as I can
.

I feel hands patting my back as people
begin to leave. My dad thanks them, but I don’t let go of him until small arms fold around my waist. I peer down and see Brennan’s bloodshot eyes staring back at me.

Kneeling down,
I pull him into my arms. He coughs through a sob and lays his head against me.

“I miss her,” he says.

“I do too, buddy,” I say. “I do too.”

We stay in our embrace until his mother pats him on the shoulder. He wipes his face with the back of his hand and sniffles.

“I’ll send you a picture from Disney World,” he says. “Kate made me promise I would.”

I push my fist into my mouth, fighting to not break down.
Through the stab in my gut, I smile. I love that Katie gave the tickets to Brennan; she was amazing like that. “Send me one with you and Mickey Mouse, okay? Have a good trip, buddy.”

Leslie hugs
me next. “You take care of yourself,” she says. “You were good for her.”