Page 104 of A Love Song for Ricki Wilde

“Ezra, are you okay? What’s happening…”

“I’m not a Perennial anymore. I’m me, before the curse. I think?” He pressed the wound on his palm and flinched, sucking in air through his teeth. Then he sneezed again. “I haven’t felt like this since 1928!”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“No!”

“I swear, Ricki,” he rasped, his voice tremulous with awe and wild surprise. “I’m a normal twenty-eight-year-old.Jesus fuck.Pardon.”

“Well. A normal,moderntwenty-eight-year-old wouldn’t apologize,” she pointed out, grinning madly.

His face broke into a radiant smile. “Then I’m not fucking sorry.”

And then they crashed back into each other’s arms, melting into a raw, endless kiss. Drunk on their good fortune.

They were too impassioned to wonder where their good fortune had come from. They were too euphoric to care.

The two luckiest lovers in the world rushed downstairs to share their news. Ms. Della would be beside herself to see that they’d made it. Or maybe she wouldn’t be surprised at all, considering that she, like Tuesday, had utterly rejected the idea of the curse killing Ricki.

Ricki knocked on the grandiose oak door and waited. She rang the doorbell, and nothing. Did Ms. Della have her walking club that morning? She was definitely too ill to keep up with her walks. In her living room the other day, she’d looked horribly frail. Even her voice had faded, like she’d dissolve to dust from the effort of raising it a single note.

She wasn’t well, and it couldn’t be denied.

Ricki and Ezra looked at each other, unspoken worry passing between them. She raised her fist to knock again, when Naaz opened the door.

Her golden-amber complexion was sallow and drained of allradiance. Her eyes were bloodshot, and she was sniffling. The nurse, usually so bright and cheery, looked like she’d been awake all night.

Ricki’s stomach dropped. “Naaz…”

“She’s gone,” she whispered. “Ms. Della… she passed. I’m so deeply sorry. I know how much you loved her, Ricki.”

Instinctively, Ezra slipped his arm around Ricki’s waist. She slumped against his side, the wind punched out of her.

“But… it happened so fast,” whispered Ricki. “I wasn’t ready yet; I didn’t say goodbye. She didn’t want to say goodbye…”

Naaz shook her head. “The cancer would’ve taken her soon. But Ms. Della did it herself.”

Ezra flinched. “Herself?”

“W-we don’t understand. What do you mean?” Ricki’s voice was rising as panic and grief swirled inside her.

“Morphine. She knew where I kept it. And she took half the bottle.” The kind nurse reached out to pat Ricki’s arm, with a faint smile. “Ricki, this isn’t my first time experiencing this with very elderly, terminal patients. If it’s any consolation, exercising some semblance of control over the way they leave this world is often the most comforting thing for them. You know what she was like—Ms. Della was a force to be reckoned with. She died on her own terms. I don’t think it sat well with her, being at the mercy of an illness she couldn’t fight.”

All Ricki could do was nod, her arm wrapped around Ezra’s lower back, grabbing fistfuls of his hoodie, and his arms around her shoulders, helping to keep her standing.

Ezra nodded with absolute understanding. “When did she pass?”

“Just before midnight.”

Ricki’s heart plummeted. She pulled away from Ezra, the two exchanging a fraught glance.

Naaz reached into the pocket of her scrubs and pulled out a small note card. It was one from the batch of Ricki’s homemade paper. “She left you a note. Actually, it’s for both of you.”

She handed it to Ricki. Their names were written on the envelope in Ms. Della’s spidery cursive handwriting.

“Want to come in? Grab a bite, have some coffee? I’m just filling out some paperwork. Della’s great-nephew on her husband’s side, her next of kin, flew up from Atlanta and is with her now. At the funeral home.”

---