It doesn't end with a bang like Jade has been preparing for. It's a whimper and a soft, breathy sigh, Perrie's frail chest rising once, twice, three times more and then everything is still, like the earth has stop turning on its axis.
Somehow, knowing it's coming doesn't make it any less painful. If anything, it makes it worse - like every place Perrie has ever touched her is burning, flames licking hungrily at her blistering skin.
It takes her a long, long time to move, and even longer to get herself untangled from Perrie because she's trying to be careful. So, so careful - don't wake Perrie, don't wake Perrie she thinks. Her fingers shake as he dials the number - she's got it memorized at this point, she's been ready for weeks - and her voice cracks a little as she explains the situation to the operator.
Perrie looks okay, at least - less tired, mouth slack. She looks like a kid again. Jade hopes she's not hurting anymore.
When the paramedics finally come, Jade is running her shaking fingers through Perrie's hair, just the way she likes - liked, she reminds himself, feeling another shard of her sanity crumble to the carpet - and it almost feels like normal. Almost.
After they take her away, Jade sits on the edge of the couch, shaking hard and clutching at her knees as it sinks all the way into her very core that she's never going to see Perrie ever again and she's put his fist through the drywall before her reason can catch up.
It's not until two weeks later when she wakes up cold and alone in bed that she remembers the note. The fucking letter.
She nearly dies tripping over her own feet on her way to the dresser, yanking out the envelope and clutching it to her chest desperately, head tilted towards the ceiling and for the first time since Perrie died she feels something. Not a good something, but something nonetheless.
Her hands are shaking so badly. Shr's scared to even look at it, scared because this is the last piece of Perrie she has. That's untrue, really, because she has all Perrie's clothes and pictures and her phone and her everything, but somehow this feels like it, the final nail in the coffin.
Jade's dry expression makes way for a choking sob as her eyes land on the front of the envelope - two crudely drawn stick figure girls, holding hands with a lopsided heart in between them, J+P forever!!!!!!!! scribbled in its center. Next to it is what appears to be the two said stick figures engaging in what Jade can only assume is scissoring and she can't decided whether to laugh or cry harder. Maybe both.
Before she can remove the contents of the envelope, the doorbell rings.
It takes him a long time to make her way to the door, but when she finally is able to open it after flipping all the locks with shaking fingers, Jade is surprised to find Leigh-Anne and Jesy standing there, all with their left sleeves rolled up, grinning like mad and Jade wants to punch them for looking genuinely happy. She can barely remember what a smile feels like on her mouth, what it's like to not have a weight hanging heavy on her heart every second, like if she tries to just breathe for a second it's going to crush her.
What's so great? She wants to ask, doesn't. When they hold out their arms for her, he gets her answer.
Tattooed on each of their wrists is a tiny P.
It takes Jade a full ten minutes with her face buried in Jesy's neck to stop crying and invite them inside. They all sit awkwardly in the sitting room, like they're not quite sure how to function without Perrie. Jade understands all too well.
"D'you want us to stay?" Leigh-Anne asks in a low, level voice, like she's trying not to scare off a baby deer.
"Yeah," she says quietly, head still wrapping itself around the fact that Perrie's note is in her pocket and she hasn't read it yet. "Gotta take a piss first, though."
When she's finally in the bathroom he slams the door shut and presses her back against it, heart going a million miles a minute and she's scared that any second now it's going to just stop.
With shaking fingers, she pulls it from his pocket and slips it from the envelope, unfolding it and smoothing it against his leg. Something small and square slips out - Jade leans down to grab it, lips quirking up the tiniest bit at the picture. It's one she's never seen before, probably something recent from Perrie's phone. In it, they're in bed, Jade's chin resting on Perrie's chest, lips pressed fondly to Perrie's collarbone and Perrie is holding the camera out and grinning, all shaggy blonde hair and tanned skin and bright eyes and Jade knows at once it's how Perriewould want to be remembered.
Jade,
I'm writing this while you're downstairs washing the dishes and I'm curled up in bed. Our bed. I don't like the thought of leaving it to just be yours - I've always been a greedy bastard, haven't I?
I don't know if you're reading this while I'm still here or if I'm already gone, but I kinda hope it's the latter because the other is just too embarrassing.
I'm really scared, Jade. And I know you're scared too but I am really, really fucking scared, and the intention of this letter wasn't to make you feel bad or anything but it just dawned on me that I'm writing a letter for you to have after I die, which is going to be soon, I think. And that's scary. But the scariest part isn't dying, exactly. It's leaving you behind. Don't wanna leave you behind to fend for yourself.
I have to say this now, though, because it's too hard to talk to you about in person. Try to move on? Like, I'm not asking you to go out and get laid the second they've lowered my casket into the ground, but. Just don't stay in bed for weeks on end. Or do, if that's going to help. Just make sure to eat and shower and feed Bruce. Don't do anything stupid. Keep in contact with the girls. They love you, you know.
Before I forget - go give Bruce a cuddle for me, because I love him, too.
You said I was brave, but you're the bravest person I know. I love you, I love you, I love you. I've loved you since the day I met you and I will love you until I die and maybe even after, if there is an after, you know, besides rotting in the ground with maggots crawling out of my eye sockets. Is that too much? Sorry, got a little carried away.
It's just, I can't stop thinking about dying. I'm not scared, except that I am, but I'm curious, because what's after that? Peter Pan was always going off about how dying must be the biggest adventure of all, but I'm not so sure. What if there isn't an after? What then?
You probably expected this to be some horribly sentimental letter with me expressing my undying love for you, which it will be, but not yet. Oh, and now you just walked in on me writing this. Nice. I'll have to continue again later.
Okay. So it's morning now and I'm going to finish this dumb thing. You're not wearing a shirt and I can see your cute Mickey Mouse bra. Here's a secret: I'll tease you for it till my dying day, but the Mickey Mouse one my favorite. You look hot, by the way. You're making breakfast. Egg on toast. My favorite. I hope you don't get offended if I don't eat much of it - it's nothing against your cooking, love, I promise. Dying just makes doing other basic things kind of hard. I don't want to die. At least, I think I don't.
I'm gonna miss you so much, though, and you know what? Fuck it, even if there is no after, I'm going to miss you. I'm going to miss you forever and ever and ever and now I'm really kind of sad, because I don't want you to throw your life away after I'm gone.
I love you. I love you. I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I love you I LOVE YOU I want to wrap you in a blanket made out of my love. Here, I made you this sweater. It's made out of my tears. Haha! I hope you get the reference. If you don't, my love for you just decreased a little bit. Don't worry. I still love you so much it feels like I'm going to explode with it sometimes. Can't handle how much I love you, didn't know I could love someone this much.
Thank you. Thank you for changing my life, for teaching me how to love myself and being there for me when I was at my best and my worst. Thank you for putting up with me, thank you for moving in with me, thank you for making me egg on toast every morning, thank you for coming into my life. Thank you for being my home away from home since day one. Thank you for being someone I can trust, someone I can love unconditionally, and someone who loves me unconditionally in return. Because of you, I believe in soulmates. I might guide you, but you keep me anchored. God. We really are a couple of saps, aren't we?
I hope you and the other girls make more music sometime. I know you said you wouldn't without me, but I wouldn't be offended. I hope you sell a million more albums and then some, I hope you go on tour again because I know how much you all love performing, and I hope it reminds you of me. In a good way. Everything reminds me of you.
If you do fall in love again, as many people do, just do me one favor. Don't let it be Lucy or Lydia. That's literally all I'm asking.
Also, don't cut your hair. Ever. Or do, if that makes you happy. Just want you to be happy. Want you to smile, Jade. You're a good person, a really good one. You can do a lot of good things for some good people, Jade. You can move mountains, still the seas, change lives. I hope you take advantage of that.
Maybe I'll see you again, in another life or something, where I'm the waves and you're the shoreline. There's some sappy quote about that, but I can't quite remember it. Look it up, you lazy bum. Maybe I'll see you again, when I've disintegrated and become part of the stars and you have, too, but even then I hope it's not for a long, long time, after you've lived your life in full and traveled and experience everything all over again and then some. After you've become a mother and a grandmother and maybe even a great grandmother, with all that dumb health food you like. After you've seen all you've wanted to see and done everything you've ever wished to do and made number one on People's 'Sexiest Woman Alive' list.
I can't wait to hear all about it.
Always in my heart, Thirwall.
Yours sincerely,
Perrie
Jade's not crying, except she is, and she's sad and aching but she's so, so fucking happy.
Opening the door, she steps out into the hallway. From downstairs, she can hear Leigh-Anne laughing ridiculously at something and Jesy shushing her, the sounds drifting up the stairs and curling around him, it feels a little like home. A new beginning.
Jade presses her fingers sharply into the imprint of Perrie's heartbeat on the back of her neck - like Jade, out of sight but never out of mind.
With Perrie's letter tucked safely in her pocket, Jade turns her face towards the sun and heads downstairs.
THE END
im crying btw