JESSIE
Ryan is alive.
Just.
If Darryl hadn’t found him he would have slipped away.
I cry, imagining him dying with no one by his side. No hand in his. Nobody to say goodbye.
It was my postcard. Those words that I wrote touched Darryl enough that he’d disturb his employer to show him.
Darryl tells me that he knew that me and Ryan had fallen for each other, and he felt that he should try and convince Ryan to go after me now, not wait until another lifetime. He was going to tell him that we all need to make the most of this life. Sometimes you have to seize your chances. You have to challenge fate and see what happens.
It’s Darryl’s romantic heart that saved Ryan.
Ryan.
He’s connected to high-tech machines by tubes. A mask covers most of his handsome face. His once intense eyes are closed to the world and he’s being kept alive. Just.
They told me they’d lost him twice. Twice his heart has stopped and they’ve had to bring him around. They’ve told me I need to say goodbye to him, but how can I? How can I give up on him when he has so much to live for?
Our baby rests in my belly like a tiny pinprick of hope; this life that we’ve made together that he has no idea exists.
His legacy.
A big ball of love surrounds my heart. I thought this man was so strong, so in control. Impenetrable, almost. Now I’ve found out what he was planning, I see the truth. He’s not larger than life. He’s just a man. A noble, strong and intelligent man. A man who was faced with a terrible diagnosis and decided that living was no longer an option.
He has to live.
Of this I am determined.
I tell him he has to live. I put my mouth to his ear and tell him to fight, to come back to me. I tell him that I’m sorry. I tell him he’s going to be a daddy. I take his hand, the one with the cannula linked to all the drips he’s hooked up to, and press it against my belly. I tell him he’s made a life and he needs to come back so he can see his child come into the world. He needs to fight to make the most of all the days he can share with our baby.
I tell him there is hope, even when life seems hopeless.
I tell him that I love him and that I’ll spend all the days of my life with him if he’ll just come back to me.
Days pass. The doctors come in and out, looking at his chart, looking at him, and frowning.
It’s the frowning that I hate the most. I know that with each day that passes, he becomes less and less likely to come out of the coma he’s drifting in.
Leaving the hospital is awful. I fear that he will die and I won’t be there. After the first two nights, I confide in Darryl who speaks to Ryan’s PA. Ryan is moved to a room where there is space for me to stay with him. Geraldine appears with a bag filled with all the things I’m going to need at the hospital. I go down to the pharmacy in the hospital and buy more vitamins.
I stay with Ryan for two weeks, three days and twenty hours, and in the middle of the night, as I’m drifting off to sleep I hear a sound. It’s a gurgle, then I look across and I see his hand move, fingers curling and uncurling.
I fly out of bed and stand next to him, watching as his eyes flicker. Is he coming around? I press the button for the nurse, then take hold of his fingers and squeeze gently. I lean close to his ear and beg him to wake up. I tell him that I’m right next to him. I kiss his cheek and kiss it and kiss it. My lips feel wet and when I look up a tear has slid out of the corner of Ryan’s eye.
“Baby.” I smooth his face, wiping away his tear. I lick my lips and taste his sorrow. His eyes flicker again and this time they open for a few seconds and fix on me. They seem glazed and I have no idea if he sees me or if all of this is just reflex.
“I’m here, Ryan. I’m here,” I say. “It’s time to wake up now.”
The nurse rushes in and checks his vitals. She stands with me and we observe Ryan’s struggle to regain consciousness, and just as I think he’s coming back to me, the machines begin to scream and his heart stops.