The Waiting Game

The Thirteenth Letter

From the corner of my eye, I saw Devon reach out to touch me. The moment his hand was about to touch my back, when my skin was jumping alive like an electric wire, he pulled away, making a face.

“I don’t know what to do anymore,” I whispered miserably, gripping at my hair. “I just don’t know what to do.”

I know that I’m not making this easy for you, Gia.

I’m going to be gone again soon. I only have a little bit more to tell you, and then that is it, and there is going to be nothing more left of me. I wish I could put this off forever, sweetheart, but I know that is going to be impossible. So all I can do is sit here and plead with you, not even knowing if you are going to argue with me, and I’m going to try and give you a chance at having a future.

I’m not going to lie that, for the longest time, I had always dreamed of us having a future.

We would meet up again after going to different colleges and we would move to Brooklyn together because I know that is where you wanted to go to get a job at a big shot book publisher. I didn’t know what kind of job I would find and it didn’t really matter. I knew that your dream was going to be in New York, and I was willing to watch you follow your dream because I never really had one of my own. I probably would have had more happiness in my life if I just watched you chasing yours than I ever would have getting one of my own and going for it. You just have that kind of effect on me.

I wondered sometimes how far our relationship would go, and I wondered if it would go forever. I thought about the day I would ask you to marry me and when we would get married and how many kids I would want to have. I wondered if we would want to live in the suburbs or the city. I wondered what it would be like to watch my own children grow up and become parents of their own.

I thought a lot about the future. I guess I just never expected not getting to have one, you know?

It always seemed like a given, that we were all going to grow up and do amazing things and make a life for ourselves in this unforgiving world, but then we remembered that it truly is unforgiving. Now that I know not all of us are going to make it to that endpoint, all I have left in me is going to hope that you do.

That’s all I have left for me, is to think that you’ll go on, that you’ll have the future you always dreamed of.

Even if it doesn’t have a thing to do with me.

If you’re going to let me go, Gia, let me go for Devon.

I trust him to take care of you.

I trust him to love you maybe even more than I ever could.

I want you to be happy, and I would be comforted to know that you are happy with him.

Devon reached up and held my face in his hands, touching me so softly that it made me feel fragile, like cracked glass. He held me so carefully because we both knew that I was about to break, shatter into a million pieces, and if I did we knew that I would never really be whole again. We would never be able to put together all of my pieces if I fell apart.

I squeezed my eyes shut but I could feel how close he was, so close that I could feel him breathing. His lips brushed lightly against the skin of my cheek and it was all I could not to shiver.

“Hey,” he whispered, touching my face, and I kept my eyes shut for another long moment of peace before forcing them open, looking into his eyes. He smiled at me softly, brushing my hair away from my face as he moved closer, pressing himself closer to me. “It’s okay, Gia. It’s okay.”

I wished that his saying my name didn’t make my pulse jump, but it did. Maybe then I would have been able to control my heartbeat, and maybe my heart in general, but somehow Devon Mueller won it all.

I tried to shake my head at him but he held it firmly in place, as if stopping it from shaking meant that I would accept it. “I just don’t know what to do,” I whispered helplessly.

He stared at me without much emotion for a second before he reached out and tugged me closer, taking me by surprise as he pulled me onto his lap. He kissed the top of my head and held me close, pressing me against his body securely, and after a moment I felt myself begin to relax in his hold. I breathed out and leaned my head against his shoulder, pressing my face against his neck as I felt his pulse drumming underneath of my lips, his chest rising and falling beneath me.

“You shouldn’t be ashamed of yourself for any decision you make, Gia,” he murmured. “Especially not when you’re trying to make yourself happy.”

I bit my lip. I didn’t want to argue with him right now. I just wanted to stay here in his arms and pretend like nothing is wrong with it, like I didn’t love his dead brother and this was the way it always had been, but that would never be true. His little brother’s ghost will always be between us, and I wondered if he was ever going to become less of a rift than he has been since the beginning.

He told me that I had to move on, but I didn’t know if I was ready to just yet.

Devon kissed me on the forehead and told me, “I’m always going to be here, Gia, and I’ll wait until you’re ready if you want me to. I just want to see you happy.”

I closed my eyes.

I hate that I have to let you go, but I can’t have you now. I’m going to die and I don’t want to drag you six feet under with me, even if it is in spirit. I want you to live on and have the life you’ve always wanted to live, even if it is with someone else. Nothing would make me happier than to see your dreams come true.

So don’t cry, Gia. Don’t feel guilty.

I’m up here watching you live on without me by now, and I know I’m going to always be proud of you.

I want you to make the decisions for you, angel, and not for me.

You need to let me go. You need to move on. You need to know the truth.

I know I haven’t told you much about my real reason, Gia, but I wanted to make sure that you were ready to hear it, that you were starting to accept me being gone before I hit you with something so big it was going to burn you into the ground. I wanted to make sure Devon was going to be there to help hold you up before I broke it to you both. Because, when you hear this, the two of you are going to need each other in a way you never have yet. If you thought the things that have happened before might have been enough to break you, then I hope that Devon is going to be enough for you, sweetheart.

Now, it’s time for you to find out the truth.

I want you to go to Morton Plant Hospital. Go to the front desk and ask for a nurse named Nancy Alford. She will have the fourteenth letter.

The answers will all be there.

-Holden

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Sorry this one was so short. It was really a filler, a buildup to everything that’s about to blow up in the fourteenth letter . . . LOL

One more!! Can you believe it?

WHAT WAS THAT ENDING?

You’re going to find out ALL of Holden’s secrets soon enough!

x Riley