Page 124 of Wrecked
His cracked lips caress my forehead, trying to bring me comfort.
Lips that will never kiss me again.
I can’t. I can’t do this. It hurts so bad. The truth flays me wide open, leaving nothing but grief in its wake.
“You shouldn’t have been on that plane,” I whisper, my voice hitching at the end. I wish more than anything that we could turn back time.
He cups my face with more strength than he should have left. “If I had a choice, I would get on that plane every goddamn time. One thousand times over, Pip.” He breathes heavily through his words, as if he’s not getting enough air in his lungs. “I would do it again and again just to end up right here with you on this island.Our island.” His voice is weak, but his words are strong. “Even though this is the very worst thing I would have wished for you, these were the happiest months of my entire life. I will never regret getting on that plane, because that would mean regretting you.” His breaths stutter between words, his struggle to speak becoming more apparent.
He’s talking to me like he knows he’s dying. My shoulders shake as my cries pick up again. That’s the most I’ve heard him speak in days, but his words are full of goodbye.
I’m not ready. I’m not ready to say goodbye.
God, I’m going to miss the sound of his voice. His touch. His heart and soul. His love. I can’t do this. I can’t survive without him. I don’t want to… I don’t want to do it.
“Look at me, baby,” he wheezes, “I would choose this time with you, no matter,” wheeze, “how short it is,” wheeze, “over an entire lifetime without you. Every single,” gasp, “time. Because now I get to leave this world knowing what it feels like to be loved by you. I promise you…I’m one lucky bastard.” His voice is weak as he struggles to breathe, but his message is clear.
“Please don’t leave me,” I plead, my voice thick with tears.
“I don’t want to, baby.” His sad eyes show me the truth of that declaration. He would never want to leave me behind, but he knows he is going to.
“Promiseme you won’t leave.”
His eyes mist, and he looks at me with so much pain, so much sorrow. He wants to promise me. He wants to give me anything I want. But this is beyond his control.
“You know I can’t do that.”
“I can’t live without you, Nate. I don’t want to even try!” I cry out, the thought more brutal than anything I’ve ever suffered.
“You have to, baby. You have to keep living, keep lighting that bonfire,” wheeze, “you have to get off this island and live the life we were supposed to live together. Promise me.”
“I can’t.” I gasp. “I can’t do that. I can’t make that promise.”
It’s a promise I denied him when we were teenagers. A promise I never thought he would ask of me in our real lives.A promise I still won’t grant.
He looks at me for several seconds, nodding when he sees the resolution in my eyes.
“If you can’t stay for you…stay for me.” A tear trickles down his cheek as he utters the same words I spoke to him nearly nine years ago. The words he spoke to me when asking me to come with him on this trip. To give our love another chance.
I take his face between my hands and lean forward, kissinghis once-soft lips. I burrow my head into his shoulder and avoid giving him the acknowledgement he needs from me.
I’ve never lied to Nate. I’m not going to start now.
“I don’t want to say goodbye.”
“Then…let’s not say…goodbye,” he stutters, winded and gasping for air. “Let’s just say…goodnight. I’ll be waiting…for you…no matter how long it takes.”
He gathers me in his arms, and I hear the quiet hum of a song I’ve grown to love. He’s too weak to sing it, having used all of his energy on our conversation, but he tries to comfort me with it anyway.
It’s okay. This time it’s my turn to comfort him. I pull back and look into his eyes. He gives me a small smile, his exhaustion evident. I run my fingers down his cheeks, nose, head, and he nuzzles against them as I caress him tenderly.
Then I begin to sing through my tears.
“Wise men say…”
CHAPTER 51
ELLIE (1 YEAR ON THE ISLAND)
