Our lips pushed into each other’s as if to create a mini big-bang within the center of these white walls. The real world would collapse letting in shades of maroon and violet each time we kissed, or at least that’s what she had wrote to me in an anniversary card once. My eyes welled, and I could feel tear droplets veering from my cheekbones onto her fatigued expression. I imagined her lips still with the fervor of past days. Excited. Fruitful. But they were withered and withdrawn now.
“Hey,” she said, “It’s okay. Don’t cry, okay?” She wiped away my tear with the end of her thumb. “It’s a beautiful day out, don’t you think?” She turned to the window, and my eyes followed. It was hard to accept that she was so assured; it was hard to not be rageful and in disarray. Emma was right, though. It was a beautiful day. The sun lit her face like gold, and rays danced between clouds making a warm winter’s afternoon.
“Emma. I don’t think I could do this without—“
“Joe,” she cut me off. “Please. Just look at the sky with me.“
I saw the changes of Emma as they came. For weeks I could feel the frustration and impatience flowing with her words. I had felt like a weight slowly uncovering the inhibition from her drowsy head, and the more I tried to nurture her the more weathered she became. As the world we had created came to an end, maybe she was right to be assured. She had grown tired, after all.
“It’s nice…It’s beautiful, Emma.” I clenched my fists inside of my coat pockets; the wool felt nice against my knuckles. I had worn the coat religiously since Emma gifted it some years ago. She would fit both of ourselves inside of it when it was below 20 in Wisconsin. It had faded and lost shape with time, but it had also been stained with memories. Sometimes bonfire smoke. Sometimes spilled wine. Sometimes just her warmth.
As I sat across from her, it felt like a stranger was wearing the coat now. Emma’s eyes were heavy, and her cheeks were plum. The coat felt empty without the color she would fill it with.
“Well, God…” I whispered. I massaged the side of my face with my empty palm, pushing up and out, feeling out flakes of dried skin from days of despondency.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “You know, I just…It just doesn’t seem fair. I just wish it was different. Like that poem you wrote me, remember? It’s embarrassing now, maybe — we were younger then. But the one about getting lost in the simple days, an—and just little joys. Where nothing really mattered outside of that. You know? I wish we could stay there a while.”
She paused, still gazing towards the clouds.
“Well,” she said, “ I wish that too. But it’s not your choice to make…It’s not mine. It’s not anyone’s. It’s not fair but it’s okay. Maybe we can focus on those little things—those little joys while we have ‘em. Maybe that’s fair.” She smiled then, her eyes glossy with sadness but mostly love. “I love you.”
When you say those words enough, they can fall out like rain from a cloud. They become weightless and outdone; the gesture becomes habitual and retired. That was never true for us, though. Even as weariness came and strangers filled a wool coat, that was never true for us.
“I love you too.” I said. My eyes glossy with sadness but mostly love. I reached for her hand , melding them together. My fear left, and so did hers. The sound of heart beat monitors and nurses marching in the corridor faded in the distance. Her pain was an afterthought and so was her dizziness.
Emma was dying. The cancer was in metastasis, and by the time we found it it had spread throughout her body. With each day her breaths would get shorter and her head heavier. We made the most of her stay in hospice care, turning white walls into the paracosm we had created where nothing else existed but the simple joys. Reminiscing over salad days. Offering our warmth and sharing love. Although the days were bitter, there was sweetness when our hands would meld into that world of our own.
Emma had received a three month prognosis, but she fought for seven.
I like to imagine Emma is still in that place, enjoying the little things. As if she traverses time in color, skipping through fragmented patterns of a kaleidoscope where white walls crumble to space and stars. Perhaps she stares out the blinds on a sunny day. Or she makes an angel in the thick Wisconsin snow on the brink of midnight. And she writes a poem for a stranger in a large coat, watching over him with sadness in her eyes — but mostly love.
