Page 16 of The Wish
I see you fight, so brave, so strong,
Through every night, you still hold on.
Should time fade and seasons change,
My heart will stay, my love remain.
In every breath, in every sigh,
You’ll live with me, with no goodbye.
You are my daughter, so pure, so bright,
And in your eyes, I see the light.
No matter where this journey goes,
I’ll hold you close, through all our woes
‘Who wrote this?’
‘My mum.’
All Alex can do is nod. He doesn’t trust his voice. Slowly, he starts examining the photos he had seen yesterday from a distance. He lifts a photo from the board taken at the beach, Jesse wearing her favourite floppy hat.
‘Nice hat.’
He doesn’t need to be told that the young boy photographed so often with his arms around his big sister’s neck is Sam. There is no doubt that the beautiful woman with the same features as Jesse is the author of the dazzling poem: her mum. He spies a photo which includes a man, Sam on his shoulders, Jesse beside him, all three of them laughing together.
‘Your dad? He’s not in many of the photos.’
‘That’s because he’s behind the camera.’
‘Ah, of course.’
Alex returns to the bedside but doesn’t sit down.
‘It’s a bit . . .’ He looks around the room. ‘Is there any chance we can go somewhere else to talk?’
‘Don’t like being in a sick room, is that right?’
‘Something like that.’
‘Imagine how I feel.’
‘Oh, I didn’t mean—’
‘It’s OK, I’m messing with you. Follow me, I know the perfect place.’
Jesse slides off the bed, slips her feet into a pair of sandals. From a drawer in her bedside table, she takes out a large sketch book and a pencil case. With practised ease, she wraps her right arm around the pole with a hook at the top, where the bag of liquid that’s connected to the IV in her arm is hanging. The trolley and pole become part of her as she walks to the pinboard where she removes several of the photos, a drawing and the poem. Tucking them into the sketch book she walks towards the door. Alex quickly follows her. As Jesse steps into the doorway, Amy, Ryan and Luke scurry away. Looking back, Ryan and Luke throw a thumbs-up to Jesse, while Amy blows her a kiss.
Alex and Jesse take the lift to the ground floor. Jesse pushes open the glass doors that lead out to the garden he and Kelly stood looking out on earlier. An elderly man sits on a nearbybench, a woman who Alex presumes to be his partner, in a wheelchair beside him. They hold hands, their faces turned to the warmth of the sun; only they can know the thoughts, the memories they each embrace in silence.
Alex follows Jesse to a far corner of the garden, hidden from view and set away from passersby. A picnic table with benches either side is tucked away between the bushes. Sitting on one side, Jesse indicates for Alex to sit opposite her.
‘My office,’ Jesse says with a grin. ‘This is where the dream team hang out when we want some peace and quiet.’
Alex is struck by the realisation that Jesse has spent so much of her short life here, in hospital, and of how hard she and her friends have worked to make it fun and normal. He feels small in the face of their courage and determination. He thinks of how he tried to wriggle out of helping her and feels ashamed.
