The goodbye we never got

Trigger warning: This is a story about loss. About saying goodbye. About the moment love turns into grief. It includes an end-of-life scene, terminal illness, and the death of a loved one. I cried as I wrote this.

----------

My heart is screaming, clutched in the grasp of the most devastating fear I have ever experienced. I’m not ready. I will never be ready.

I inhale deeply, filling my lungs with oxygen it doesn’t even seem to register, begging my body not to shut down. Not now, not when he needs me to be strong.

I’m staring down the hallway, lit with bright fluorescents. The smell of bleach a poor disguise for the underlying stench of sickness and death.

I walk slowly, trying to compose myself before I enter his room. Step by step, along this hallway that doesn’t end. I don’t want to reach the end. Its too soon.

His door looms in front of me, white as everything else in this forsaken place. I rest my hand on the doorknob and take a deep breath.

“You can do this. You can do it for him.” I whisper to myself, hoping without hope that hearing those words will let me believe them.

I rearrange my expression into one that shows calm, even though I’m anything but, and I open the door. Giving my Gramps a small smile as I step into the room, closing the door behind me.

“Hey Gramps”

“Hello my angel, how are you?” he responds with a weak smile.

God I can't do this. I can't look at this man in that bed. The best man I have ever known, laying in what we both know is his deathbed. He’s so frail, his skin dry and tinted yellow. Tears burn behind my eyes, and I push them back, unwilling to make him watch me cry.

“As good as always. What about you old man?” I say.

Focus on his eyes. His eyes are the same as they’ve always been. The same pale blue. The same love shining in them that I’ve seen my whole life.

Just don’t look at the rest of him, only look at his eyes.

“Mm, just a little under the weather,” he chokes out with a tired laugh.

I try not to let it show how much this is breaking me, but he has always been able to see right through me.

“Come. Sit with me a wee minute”, he tilts his head at the chair next to his bed in invitation.

I walk around the bed and sit next to him. Taking one of his hands in both of mine.

Shit. He’s so skinny. I can feel all his bones.

Breathe. Just breathe.

I can’t take my eyes off of our hands, tears threatening to break free.

He reaches over with his other hand and lifts my chin so I meet his gaze, and I can't hold it back anymore. Tears run down my cheeks, and I squeeze my eyes shut. Pulling my hands from his, I wipe at my face.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to cry”, I say between sniffles that are very quickly becoming sobs.

“Oh angel, I knew you would cry today. I knew that we both would. It’s not every day that you have to say goodbye, knowing it will be the last one.” He says. When I open my eyes, I see his are filled with tears the same way mine are.

“I’m not ready Grandpa. I need you. We haven’t had enough time, there is so much we were still supposed to do. I can’t do this without you”

“Yes you can my angel. You have pushed through so much, have survived so much. You are the strongest woman I know. You just have to take it one day at a time.”

“No please no. please stay with me. Just stay, please Gramps. Don’t leave me.”

“Oh angel I know it feels like I’m leaving you, but I promise I’m not. I'll be right by your side, celebrating with you. Crying with you. Loving you from the other side of that pesky veil that keeps us apart until it’s time for us to meet again”

I rest my head against his chest, the same way I used to do as a child. And just like he used to do, he holds my head to him with one hand, the other rubbing gentle circles on my back.

“You’re the best grandfather I could have ever asked for. I am so lucky to have had you. I love you more than I can ever say. Thank you for everything you have ever done for me, for everything you have taught me”

His hold tightens for a second and then relaxes. I can hear his heartbeat in his chest, slowing. Slowing. Slowing.

“My beautiful granddaughter, I have been proud of you since before you even knew what the word meant.”

Slower. Slower.

“Loving you was the easiest thing I ever did.”

Nothing.

He’s gone.

The heart rate monitor screeches as an alarm blares next to me.

My heart shatters. A part of my soul has been torn from my body, it went with him.

I hold him tighter. I’m not ready.

“Ma’am, I’m so sorry for your loss,” the nurse says softly, her hands holding my shoulders gently. “He loved you so much, he spoke about you all the time.”

I sit up but am unable to do anything besides sit there in shock.

Gone. Gone. Gone.

Alone.

I stare at the kind nurse as she turns off all the equipment that had been monitoring him, then turn and stare at the body of the man that was once my Gramps.

“Goodbye Gramps. I love you”

I stand, and walk back out the room, down the insufferably long hallway and out into the fresh air.

I gaze up at the night sky. Watching, waiting. For what, I'm not sure. But I can't look away.

And there it is. A shooting star, leaving a glowing trail along the night sky.

I have always been his angel, and now... He will be my angel. The one I’ll talk to when the night feels too heavy.

I watch the star, watching as it disappears from sight.

“It’s you and me Gramps. Always and forever.”