Until Then

Chapter 33

Chapter 33

Kenneth

I know that each time I can feel more of her it means that less of her is tethered to the living world. I try to push that thought out of my head because it causes me to feel a deep sadness that her time on earth is being cut short when there was so much left for her to live. I guess the same could be said about my life, but I signed up for the risk and she had been drafted into this fate.

We are home from the hospital now and she's been asleep for three hours. Her tired body is curled sleepily on her bed. No words needed to be said to let me know that she needed comfort, someone to hold her after what she'd been told. I was here and all too happy to wrap my arms around her. As time goes by I can feel something changing but it isn't new. It isn't moving in a forward direction, it's as if the more time we spend together the more history we recover. I can't shake this feeling that I've known her before.

I close my eyes and gently rest my forehead against the back of her head. I remember having done this before, the way you walk into a new place but it feels like you already know everything about it. I know my arms have held her. I know my heart has loved her. She has been mine and I've been hers and maybe this time we didn't get to be together in flesh, but we found each other in this space between and I don't want to leave here without her.

"Do you think you'll get to stay with me until I pass over?" she asks, her voice rough from sleep.

"I'm going to try. I won't go into the light until you're with me."

She pulled my arm around her tighter and I noticed I could feel her heart beating against my chest. Maybe I wasn't in heaven yet, but lying there with her was pretty close.