15. Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Fifteen
Cooper
H is smile. That’s all I see when I close my eyes. Green eyes twinkling, rosy cheeks I love to kiss, pretty lips set in a boyish grin. A tear drips down my cheek, and I picture the drop on its journey down my cheek. One little tear filled with every bit of me - my hopes, my dreams, my regrets, my love.
There’s this belief that just before you die, your life flashes before your eyes. Perhaps that’s true, but as I sit here, my body quaking with shivers, my breath cracking on each inhale, I’m not sure if people mean the life you had or the life you dreamed you’d have.
Behind my closed lids, I see the flash, the lights of the truck, I hear the horn, I feel my arms tense as I twist the wheel to dodge the hit and then I see him. Jamie. Us. Ten years from now, standing hand in hand, wedding bands on our fingers as we smile down at a child that looks remarkably like him. Green eyes like emeralds, a smile that could change the world. I see a big house with a beautiful garden that Caiden built just for us - with a slide and swingset. I see two dogs, their tails wagging as they bound joyfully around the garden. And we’re all smiling, even my twin. A song plays in the distance, it’s one of Jamie’s favourites. It’s the one from the movie we were meant to watch before we decided to go to the party. He hums it against my ear as we watch the child, our child, run off with the dogs.
It’s nice.
It’s idyllic.
It’s comforting.
It’s everything I ever wanted.
But as energy leaves my body, as more tears drip down my cheeks, I’m aware that it’s everything I’ll never have.
I’m so tired.
My eyes open and the perfect picture in my mind drifts away like fog clearing over the ocean and I’m smack bang in the middle of a reality that fills me with dread.
My legs won’t move, I can’t even feel them. The steering wheel pressing into my abdomen is crushing me into my seat. There’s so much pain, an ache from somewhere I can’t pinpoint and a strange pinching in my heart. I can breathe, so there is a little silver lining. I always look for the good, even if right now it seems a ridiculous thing to do. I notice for the first time that I'm lying on my side.The windshield is gone and so is Jamie. Panic rises in my chest when I picture him climbing into the car earlier this evening, clutching his swollen hand.
He wasn’t wearing a seatbelt.
Oh God.
I’ve never prayed before but I find myself now, begging whatever entity decides our fates to save Jamie.
“Coop,” a raspy voice from behind me has my eyes darting around. The review mirror is twisted and my neck hurts too much to move but I can feel who it is without needing to see him. “Coop, hold on, I’m coming.” My seat is jostled as Caiden moves and I grit my teeth, listening as he curses, banging his hand against the metal of the car. “I can't climb out, so I'm going to try to crawl into the front with you. Can you move?”
I answer him or at least I think I do but then he’s yelling my name louder so maybe I didn’t. Reality and dreams are melting into one and I’m scrambling to hold on to what is real, trying my hardest to stay here, in this moment, with my twin.
“Can’t move. Jamie, where’s Jamie?” The panic is eating me up inside, or maybe that’s my body's reaction to this mess we’re in. I don’t know because I can’t focus. Black clouds dance around my vision, like smoke clawing at the walls of a burning house. Dark and potent and inescapable. Caiden’s voice forces me to open my eyes. When did they close again? My head hurts so badly but I turn to face the middle of the car, then lean it back against the side of the door.
Caiden curses as he fumbles to get to me up front. But the car's too small and the front is badly damaged, so he leans down with half his body over the mangled console.
Despite the fear, and the soul crushing knowledge that I am not walking away from this, I smile. Because Caiden’s here with me. How poetic, how tragic, how devastatingly beautiful that we entered this world together and now I’ll leave it with him by my side too.
“Cooper, hold on okay? Help’s coming.” He tries to push at the steering wheel that’s crushing me, cutting his arms on shards of glass scattered around us. It’s a futile attempt. He’s bleeding from his head and his eyes are blinking rapidly, but he doesn’t stop touching me, tugging at my seatbelt, feeling my pulse, rubbing the hair from my eyes.
He’s trying to save me.
My head is a dead weight on my shoulders and my vision goes dark before he comes back into focus, but it wavers again, floating in and out. My body doesn’t hurt anymore. It feels cold but also numb, like I’ve been soaking in an ice bucket. Or one of those cold dipping pools. I always wanted to try one of those. My eyes sink shut and I picture the snow, and I see Caiden and I as little kids on a sled. Then we’re older and we’re riding our bikes. Beautiful, red and gold leaves whip up around us as we shout for each other to go faster, and then we are twenty and we’re lying in the garden watching the stars as the cold seeps through our clothing.
I want to tell someone - anyone, that it’s both memories of your past and your future you see. Do people already know that?
My eyes open briefly and I gaze into the matching blue eyes of my twin. There are a thousand things I want to say to him. A thousand promises and wishes and dreams I want him to know but my tongue is heavy and my words are dwindling to a few. It’s like I held a million words inside and now, as everything in me starts to settle and this calmness blankets me, there’s only a few left.
I need to make them meaningful.
“Caiden,” his name on my lips is a plea. The words delivered on a rasp that hurts my heart more than it does anywhere else.
“Look for me in the stars.” His face crumples, devastation written in every line and dip and he cries, his sorrow reaching high into the night sky.
“No, no, you’re okay.” He cries harder and even now, all I want to do is hold him and tell him it'll be okay. “Help is coming, just hold on a little longer for me. Please.”
In my mind I shake my head, but in reality, I don’t think I move at all.
“Tell Jamie…tell Jamie, always .”
My sweet boyfriend. He spun my universe, sprinkled it with stars and lit a flame inside me the day he came into my life. No one ever told me love could feel so wonderful, so life changing, so all consuming. No one told me, but Jamie showed me. He showed me every day, in every kiss, every touch and every gentle word. His love is pure, passionate and for the past year it was all mine. I hope he can forgive me for leaving him. I’d have stayed by his side and grown old with him if that had been in the cards for us.
Caiden’s warm hand brushes at the tears falling down my cheeks. “You tell him yourself, you tell him when we get out of here.”
My eyelids are too heavy to lift now and my lungs scream for air but I can’t grasp onto it, not in the way I need. I don’t feel panicked though. All I feel is incredibly sad, but also light like maybe I’m floating away.
Caiden places a hand on my cheek and rests his forehead to mine then presses a soft kiss to my skin. “I love you,” I say in the tiniest whisper.
“Cooper!” he yells. “Open your eyes Coop, please, please open them. Don’t leave me. I can’t do this without you. Please. I love you. I need you.”
He sucks in a breath and I want to tell him he’s going to survive this, but my words are done. There are no more left.
I think I’m smiling.
I think I’m smiling and I’m okay, because even though it’s dark and I never got to do all the things I wanted to, I can see Cooper and Jamie in a sea of light and they’re all I ever needed.
And I’ll find them in the stars one day.