“Are you seeing anyone?”
I brushed it off. I always brushed things off. That was my whole life in one sentence.
***
Then came the afternoon.
Thomas asked me to sit down.
His hand found mine on the blanket. It was cold and light as a bird.
“Sweetheart,” he said, “I feel terrible asking you this.”
By then, our conversations had become warmer with each passing day.
“Ask.”
Then came the afternoon.
“I’ve loved you my entire life. I know I’m going to die soon. But I’ve always dreamed of marrying you. Will you marry me? It’s my last wish.”
I could barely breathe. I couldn’t even blink.
Fifty-six years of “what if,” and here it was, thin and dying in a hospital bed, asking me the one question I’d never let myself imagine.
A voice in my head that sounded exactly like Raymond hissed, “Foolish old woman, don’t you dare!”
And another voice, the one I’d silenced at 17, said, “Say yes! For once in your life, say yes!”
“I’ve loved you my entire life.”
Thomas had stage 4 cancer. I decided I would grant his final wish.
“Yes,” I whispered. “Thomas, yes.”
His eyes filled with tears. So did mine.
“You won’t regret it,” he said. “I promise you that, Nancy. On my life, you won’t regret it.”
I didn’t understand then why he’d said it like that, like a vow that meant more than the wedding itself.
I only understood I’d just agreed to marry a dying man; my hands wouldn’t stop shaking, and somewhere across town, Raymond was probably already dialing my number.
I would grant his final wish.
***
The wedding took place three days later, right there in Thomas’s hospital room.
A nurse stood as our witness, and so did a quiet man in a gray suit who introduced himself as Walter, Thomas’s attorney.
I thought it was a little odd to have a lawyer at a bedside wedding. But my high school sweetheart squeezed my hand, and I let the thought go.
His eyes shone when he said his vows. Mine did too.
