Chapter 20
STAY
KIARA
By the time Ethan pulled up at the hospital, my hands were shaking. He asked me if I could walk or talk. I shook myself and scrambled out of the car, clutching his hand in mine to stop it from shaking. He didn’t mind.
My mom was on the bed, various IVs and pipes attached to her frail pale body, her eyes closed as she breathed slowly from the mask propped on her face, covering her nose and mouth. Ethan held my hand tightly and I knew he wanted to assure me, but he himself was shocked.
“What happened?” I asked my father, who was talking to a doctor, looking worried.
He turned to me and sighed in relief when he saw Ethan too.
He pulled me in a hug. He smelled like medicines and the mild scent of Mom’s sandalwood.
“Your mom was having chest pains for a while, and when I asked her to show it to the doctor this morning,” he paused and took a deep breath, “she had a heart attack.”
My heartbeat pounded in my mind and I bit my bottom lip when it started to waver. She was having chest pains and she didn’t seem concerned enough to tell us about it.
“Is she okay?” I asked, my voice small.
He looked grim and I knew the answer. I shook my head, backing away from him and stepping closer to Mom’s bed.
Dad rambled how they had taken the ECG, blood tests, chest X-ray, Cardiac CT, and even MRI.
I didn’t understand a thing. I was too shocked to see my beautiful mother on a hospital bed in the dull scrubs.
Her golden skin had turned ashen and she looked pale.
I gently held her palm and talked to her, urging her to open her eyes and greet me.
But she didn’t want to listen to me. My brother, Karan, rushed in and almost started a commotion when he realized Dad knew about her chest pains but didn’t tell us.
Ethan stayed with me even though I hadn’t spoken a word since my talk with dad.
I squeezed his arm which was wrapped around me. I didn’t want him to leave.
I didn’t move away from her until the doctor came to check up on her.
I clutched Ethan’s hand, hiding my face in his chest when he pulled his arm around me.
He didn’t say anything, and I was thankful for that.
My silent tears streamed down my face when the doctor mentioned that they were trying their best, but her heart attack was critical, and she needed emergency care.
The next morning, I woke up with a start as the beeping on mom’s heart monitor started ringing.
Nurses and doctors rushed in and we were told to stay outside.
I clenched my palms in a fist, fighting off the burning tears of impending loom.
My lungs were aching and there was thickness in my throat.
I didn’t want her to leave me. She is my mom.
Warmth enveloped my cold hands and I peeled my eyes open to see Ethan’s hands cocooning them. “I’m here, Bella,” he whispered and placed his lips on my temple. The heat of his body radiating to me, enough to stop me from shivering. I didn’t know I was shivering.
My heart dropped in my stomach when I saw my father without his white coat, fighting off tears. His dark eyes were glistening with tears and I knew whatever it was, it was bad. Nonono.
“What happened, Dad?” I managed to mutter.
He looked at me and slowly shook his head as a tear slid down his cheek. I bit down on my bottom lip as a sob heaved out of me and covered myself in my arms. Ethan was there with me, so was my brother and my father, but I could only taste the salt of my tears and feel the hollowness inside me.
The worst part of hearing your father, the rock of our family, cry as we said our final goodbyes to mom.
My brother was hugging her waist and sobbing on her lap wanting nothing but to feel her hand run through his hair again.
I clutched her hand, feeling the callouses of her fingers for one last time and my heart broke at the thought.
On September fifth, my mom took her last breath in the hospital bed.
Only silent tears escaped my eyes when I held her hand for the last time.
I didn’t want to leave her hand, but Ethan made me, telling me that she needed to go away.
I knew he had cried too, but how could I tell him that I didn’t want her to leave?
I wanted her to stay.
I couldn’t speak because every time I tried to, I wanted my mom beside me even though it seemed selfish.
I stared at her paintings in the art room, her faint smell lurking in the air.
I tried not to cry when I got ready for the funeral the next day.
It was an Indian cremation, so everyone had to wear white.
Dad was being strong for me and Karan, but I could hear him sob in their room when I couldn’t sleep last night.
I didn’t cry when they burned her body. I didn’t cry when they gave us her ashes.
I didn’t cry on the way back. I didn’t cry when Dad gave an excuse to be in the hospital and drown himself in his work or Karan leaving for his university.
I didn’t cry when Ethan cuddled with me, hiding his face and crying silently, wetting my T-shirt.
I couldn’t cry.
Turning to Ethan, I looked at him. His eyes were swollen with crying and glistened with tears. I wiped away the stray tear from his cheek and looked at him.
“Ethan?” I asked, my voice strange to my own ears. “Will you make me forget?”
“What?” He sat up. “What do you mean to make you forget?”
I swallowed the lump in my throat and straddled his lap, noticing the sharp intake of his breath. “Please.” My voice broke and I closed my eyes, clutching his shirt. “Please make me forget.”
His hands cupped my cheeks. “Kiara, sweetheart, I can’t make you forget about what happened like that. It’s wrong.”
I shook my head and opened my eyes, my vision blurry with tears. “Please, Ethan, I am begging you. I don’t want anything else. Make me forget. Please.”
“I’m not going to be intimate with you just because you want to forget about what happened.” He was angry, but his voice was soft and firm. “Bella, I apologize, but I can’t give you what you need right now. You’re not in—”
I was furious.
“Fine.” I tried to pull away from him. “I’ll go ask someone else to make me forget.”
He pulled me back to the bed and hugged me. “Kiara.” His voice was throaty and I knew I hurt him by saying that. I shut my eyes closed, listening to his wild heartbeat. “Don’t. If we do this now, you will regret it later or hate me for this. Just stay.”
“But I want this, Ethan.”
“But you don’t need this right now, Bella.” He took a deep breath. “Look at me.”
I did, his warm breath fanning on my cheeks as he pulled me closer. I kissed him, his hands holding my waist, and he pushed me back on the bed, hovering above me. I closed my eyes, feeling the hot, wet kisses on my neck, his hands sliding over my legs when I wrapped them around his waist.
“I know you don’t want this, Bella,” he said, holding my hands away from him and pinning them on the bed. “You’re crying. I can taste your tears on my tongue. Open your eyes and look at me.”
I did and a small sob broke out of my throat, I quickly hid my face, curling into a ball, and he let me.
“I am sorry.” I apologized, my voice muffled as I cried.
“It’s okay, Bella, I am here.” He gently stroked my back as my body shook with sobs, and I kept muttering I was sorry for what had happened, what I had said to him and how I behaved. He let me cry, stroking my hair and muttering sweet words to me.
I cried and cried and cried. Until my whole body bled with the pain of realization that my mom was no more and wouldn’t make me gulab jamuns on my birthdays.
She wouldn’t correct my mistakes when I was painting with her, she wouldn’t hug me, oil my hair, or sew back the broken stitches on my clothes.
She wouldn’t repeat her love story to me or convince me that Ethan loved me. She passed away.
I let the hurt swallow me whole and cried.
And through all of that, Ethan was beside me, stroking my hair and back, telling me it was going to be okay. Just like I had when his brother died.