Page 111 of Sapphire Tears

June stands for a moment looking at me, and I know what she’s seeingthatman. The monster. The unfeeling beast.

Then something shifts.

Instead of recoiling from me like she should, June just takes a step towards me and grabs my hand. She brings it to her lips and kisses it softly.

“She was your best friend,” June whispers. “She knew you better than anyone else in the world. Which means you know her right back.”

I close my eyes as invisible things in my chest crack and crumble. “I can’t do this, June.”

“Yes,” she snarls with a sudden feral viciousness, “you can. You will. You have to.” She puts two hands on my side and shoves me closer to the bedside.

It’s not her shove that surprises me—it’s the fact that it works. Something in me lets her do it. I trip toward Milana, puncturing some invisible shield that was keeping me away from her.

Now that I’m this close, I want to do what I’ve done only once before in the entire time we’ve known each other: sweep Milana up in a hug and tell her everything is going to be okay. That I’ll take care of everything.

I reach out gingerly and touch the back of her hand. Just for a moment. “You’d hate me for doing this,” I whisper in a broken voice. “For making a big fucking deal. ‘I’m dead,’you’d say. ‘Leave me the hell alone for once.’But I can’t, Milana. I won’t. The last time I hugged you was the day I pulled you from the rubble of the cursed life you thought you’d have to live in forever. You said I saved you, and that you’d pay me back in spades. You were right about that. Again and again, you were right. You saved me from people who wanted to kill me. You saved me from myself, too, and if we’re being honest, that was the bigger threat. I’m sorry for what I said. I’m just a broken person, and sometimes, the people who are unlucky enough to love me get close enough to cut themselves on my shards. It’s my fault. All of this is. It should be me there and you here, making a fool of yourself giving speeches. But since you can’t, I’ll do. I’ll be the fool. Consider it the last gift I’ll ever give you.”

Then my voice won’t go anymore.

June steps up and rests her face against my shoulder. When I glance over, I see her cheeks are wet with tears. Together, we stand there, looking down at the ruins of the one selfless thing I ever did.

I’m saved the trouble of figuring out what to do next when Sara walks in. She’s changed out of her scrubs, and that sterile look of professionalism has been replaced with genuine sadness.

“I will monitor her closely in the next few days,” she says before we can even ask, glancing towards the stoic, beeping machines. “If her brain wave functions drop any lower, though, I’m afraid…” She doesn’t finish her sentence, but she doesn’t need to.

“She won’t want to live like that,” I croak.

“W-who makes the decision though?” June asks. “To… take her off life support?”

There are three heartbeats of silence.

Then: “I do. I’m the only family she’s got.”

June’s hand clamps down around my arm. I glance down at her. “It’s time for you to look away, June. Like you promised you would.”

“Now?” she says fearfully. “But we—”

“I have to finish this,” I tell her. “I’m not going to let him slip away again. This ends now.”

“Let me come with you,” she pleads, tightening her grip on my arm. I can understand where she’s coming from. It feels like we’ve lived through a lifetime in this last hour, and now that we’ve come out unscathed, she doesn’t want to let me out of her sight.

“You know I can’t allow that.”

“Kolya—”

I kill her words by pressing my lips to hers. I kiss her deep, like I’ll never get to do it again, and then I pull away just as abruptly.

“Stay here, and follow the doctor’s orders.”

Then I give Sara a nod and head out.

I couldn’t protect Milana. But I’ll be damned if I don’t put everything I have into protecting June, as well as the child she’s carrying. Because fuck paternity: June is mine, and so is her baby.

She’s my woman.

She’s my daughter.

They are my family.

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