Epilogue
Cori
Five Weeks Later
Idecided to sit out this taping of our show and let the others handle the EVPs and the sensory equipment. I’ve not been feeling great, and I wonder if maybe I’ve been pushing it too hard. Overdoing it.
It would explain why I'm so fucking tired lately. Tired doesn’t even begin to cover how truly exhausted I have been.
It started about a week and a half ago and has only gotten worse.
I thought at first it was just because we were traveling so much.
We’ve already done two episodes for the season, and now we’re doing our third in Salem.
Three locations in four weeks would cause anyone to be worn down.
And on top of all the traveling, I have a damned good reason to stay up versus sleeping in.
Mac Temple. He’s been…wonderful. I loved who he was when I thought I knew him, but now that I truly know and understand him, I love him even more.
He’s been great about balancing my gifts and the fact that I don’t want it widely known that I can see and hear things without special tools with including me in everything on the show.
Roxie, Tray, and Theo have been great about it, too.
Even going so far as to cover for me sometimes when I can’t control the responses I have.
Ripley decided she wasn’t going to come back to the show after she almost died on the first outing.
I can understand that. I’m even kind of glad about it.
She didn’t seem to like me very much, and I'm not sure how long she would have kept my secret if she were with us every day. So we’re a party of six most times, the five of us and an extra cameraman.
My mind goes back to how drained I’ve become. Maybe it’s the flu or a virus or something. I have been a little nauseous lately.
“Hey, baby. You okay?”
I jump like I just got caught doing something naughty, even though all I was doing was napping.
“Oh, Mac! What are you doing back so soon?”
“It’s not all that soon, baby.”
I look at the clock. A couple of hours have passed, so I must have drifted off to sleep at some point, but he’s still back early.
“Is everything alright?” I sit up and get a little dizzy. “Do you need me to come help?”
“No, I told everyone to go ahead and break for the night.”
I narrow my eyes at him. “Did you come back early because you were worried about me?”
“That and I wanted to talk to you about something.”
Oh shit!
“Are you firing me again?”
“What?” He chuckles, but also won’t meet my eyes. “No, of course not.”
“You’re breaking up with me!”
“No, baby. I wanted…damn it! This isn’t really how I wanted to do this. I wanted to take you to dinner and romance you and…do this right, but if what I think is what is happening, I want this done before so you don’t think it is because of…anything.”
I’m so confused. Mac is never like this. He’s always precise and eloquent when he talks and focused.
“Sweetheart, you're kind of scaring me.”
He goes down on one knee beside me, and I sit forward. It takes me a second to realize he is holding something in his hand because I am so focused on him and how odd he is acting.
“Cori Elizabeth Moore,” he opens the box, and I look inside at the ring that sparkles and shines, “will you marry me?”
“Oh my God!” My heart thuds in my ears, and I realize I’m crying. My head starts nodding even before I find my voice to accept. “Yes! Yes!”
I throw myself at him, offering him kisses and hugs and more kisses. He slips the ring on my finger, and I hold it up to see it sparkle in the light. It’s beautiful and so unique. I love it!
“You don’t think it’s too soon?”
“I wanted to propose to you the day after we first made love, baby. It’s felt like forever for me.”
“The day we went to meet the others at the restaurant? You wanted to ask me then?”
“I would have married you then, but I didn’t have the ring. I got busy fixing that right away. I’ve had it for two weeks now, and it’s been killing me.”
“Wait…you said you wanted to do it now because you were worried I would think there was a reason you had to do it. What does that mean? What would make me think…?”
“Roxie’s pregnant.” His words sit heavy in the room between us. “She told Tray, and Tray told me. She just found out last night.”
“And you were…worried…I would be mad that you knew and I didn’t?”
“Not exactly. I didn’t really think about that.” He winces as he says the words. “A lot of her symptoms…are similar to the ones you’ve been having.”
My mind shuts down, and I can’t make sense of what he is trying to tell me.
“I want you to take a test so we can find out…for sure.”
Oh my God! I…we never did anything about protection, never tried to stop it from happening. My hand drops to my belly as it lurches like I might want to hurl.
“You…think we’re…that I’m…?”
“I want to know for sure, baby. I…Hope you are.”
“You do?” That shocks me almost as much as the fact that we might be having a baby.
“Of course I do! I want everything with you, Cori. I want marriage and kids and…we need a bigger place.”
“Slow down, slow down. I might not even be…”
He holds up another box, this one blue and pink with the picture of the test on the front of it.
I take the box and spend the next three minutes wondering how much my life has changed over the past two months.
Before I started our show, I was lonely and lost, and now…
Now, I have a family that understands me and protects me.
I have Mac, who loves and takes such good care of me.
I look down at the stick as I clutch Mac’s hand and see the two pink lines.
And now, we have our baby.
We hug and start our brand of celebrating, where we end up naked and wrapped around each other.
No more loneliness, no more fear, no more endless questions.
No more Chasing Ghosts. I only do that on television now!
And only with my soon-to-be-husband and best friends.
I might not know all the answers, but I'm having fun finding them and that is what matters most in life. ..and maybe beyond!
The End!