crumble | h.s

part fifty six: 24 hours

He parks the car. We're surrounded by trees. He helps me get out because the ground was pretty uneven.

He holds my hand as we walk through some of the greenery.

Then I'm hit with a clear gust of wind.

We're at the beach.

I look at him, and he looks at me with a small smile.

He brings me further out onto the sand. The wind was blowing through his curls. His skin was glistening.

"Do you know what happens here?"

"This was our first date." I smile, recalling that day.

His dimple pops, and he softly rubs my hand. He looks down, and takes a deep breath.

"You realize how much I love you, right."

I furrow my brows. "Of course I do."

He nods, his smile was gone. I feel my heart drop at his sudden serious expression.

I look around at the scenery. This place was really was beautiful. I can see why he loves it so much. He even described it as heaven.

This was his heaven.

And suddenly, his true intentions came crashing down on me.

He wasn't just doing this to remember our time together...he was doing this to relive it.

To relive it one more time because he knew he was going to die.

He didn't want to tell me...but he knew.

I feel my throat suddenly become really tight. My eyes begin to water and I blink rapidly to try and hide my tears because I promised him I wouldn't cry.

I'm gonna lose him.

"I need you to know something..." he looks up from the sandy earth. When he looks into my eyes, he notices the slow tears trying to spill out despite my best efforts to keep them in.

His face falls.

"I need you to know that," he brings his hand to under my eye, and wipes my tears. "no matter what happens, I cannot thank you enough for finding a place for me in your heart."

And that's when my tears begin to spill out.

He said that like it was a hard for me to love him. It wasn't. It came to me so easily.

"You've shown me so much. You've done more for me than anyone in my entire life has." he sniffles, becoming emotional himself.

"Harry I can't do this." I shake my head and wipe my tears with the sleeve of my jacket.

"Lyds." his voice beckons. He rubs his hand up and down my arm. "Please don't cry. It'll be alright."

I sniff and exhale slowly. I didn't want to get emotional, but I was at the point of no return.

"I'm sorry." I wipe my eyes.

My heart was filled with dread. I felt so heavy and stiff, like I could collapse at any second.

"I promise you, I'm going to do everything I can to come home to you tomorrow. But..." he trails off for a moment. "If I don't make it," those words made my heart ache. "then I need to do this." he says.

I furrow my brows and sniffle as he reaches into his back pocket.

His hand comes around in between us again. I look down, and in between his forefinger and thumb,