I dial Lachlan’s number and while it rings, I calm my heart by trying to figure out what time it is over there. It has to be the evening. God, I hope he’s around, that he still cares for me, that he hasn’t found anyone else, though I know, I know from the intensity of his love, neither of those things seem likely.

When he answers with “Kayla?” I breathe in so sharply it makes me cough. “Kayla is that you?”

“Yes,” I manage to say. “I just…I wanted to talk to you.”

“Alright,” he says in that beautiful brogue of his, deep, warm and silky. I close my eyes, imagining it wrap around me. “I’m so glad you called me.”

“Me too,” I whisper. “I’m sorry I was so mean last time.”

“No, listen,” he says. “I more than deserved it for the horrible way I’ve been.”

“You’re not horrible.”

“Oh, love, you know I can be.”

“But that’s not you. It’s not the you that I know and I should have been more understanding. I didn’t want to end things like we did.”

“I know but you had no choice. You had to go.” He pauses. “How…how is she?”

I let out a little whimper. “We’re pulling her from life support tomorrow. I have to figure out how to say goodbye in the next twenty-four hours.”

He groans softly. “I am so sorry my love. I can’t…if there is anything I can do for you, please, just tell me. I wish I could take all your pain and carry it for you. I’d do anything to help you through this.”

“I know you would. I guess that’s why it hurts even more. Because I could have had you here. I mean, if rugby wasn’t a factor. How…how have your games been?” I ask, trying to switch the topic.

“Good,” he says slowly. “Lost a few, won some more. Kayla…just tell me what you need me to do.”

I need him to be here. But I know he can’t be.

“Do you…do you still love me?” I ask rather bravely.

He sounds breathless at that. “I’ve never stopped loving you. Please. Please believe that. You’re the only way I see the sun.”

My heart swells, the feeling so strange and unaccustomed as of late.

“Then, please keep loving me. I need it. And if I can’t have you here, then I need your love. As cheesy as that sounds, I need it. I need the strength in it.”

“You have it. All of it. All of me.” He pauses. “What hospital are you at? Are the doctors being nice, has she been taken care of well?”

“I’m at UCSF,” I tell him. “And yeah. They’re some of the best. They’ve been doing what they can and they’re very patient. They want what’s best for her just as we all do.”

“That’s good…good,” he says softly. “That means that she’s had the best people looking after her. It’s all you can do Kayla. You’ve done all you can do.”

“And now I have to say goodbye.”

“I’m so sorry.”

I can barely exhale. I get to my feet and stare up at the building, knowing I’m going to be spending the weekend here. I’m not leaving until the very end.

“Thank you,” I tell him.

“For what?”

“For picking up the phone.”

“I’ll always pick up the phone when you call. You know this.”

How wonderful it is that it’s the truth.

“I better go,” I say softly.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.” I hang up the phone. It feels like all my bravery goes with it.

But even so, through all of this, his words have bought me a little bit of strength.

I slip the phone back in my pocket and head back into the hospital.

***

I don’t know how I get through the night, sleeping on the chairs in the waiting room for maybe an hour at a time. We all spend our time with her throughout the night, though Nikko is the first to really say goodbye and leave, heading back to his family. We hug and cry and it’s so unbelievably horrible that we all have to go through the same thing.

For the moments I’ve gotten with her, I just talk. I’m saving the best for last, letting her know how I feel at the very end. I don’t want to pretend she’s dead until she’s gone. So I talk with her as I have been these last few weeks. About everything I can.

Finally, when the birds start chirping somewhere in the sky and you can feel dawn about to break, I feel the end is near. For us. For a mother and her daughter.

I take her hand, squeezing it, rubbing my thumb on her skin and thinking that she’s nothing more than a husk. That the real her, with the way she used to do a little dance when she was eating a good piece of chocolate, the way my father used to make her laugh so hard she’d almost fall out of her chair, is somewhere else. I remember the look of concentration in her eyes, while these same hands pruned her roses. She took so much joy in them. She took so much joy in everything. She loved life so much, I just think she loved my dad that much more.

I cry, my head on her arm, holding onto her like a baby. I’m still her baby. I don’t know how I’m going to get through the rest of my life without her. She’s just always been here, always been watching me, loving me. Even when I do something to upset her, she could never hold a grudge. Her heart and arms were always open.

“I hope I’ve learned so much from you,” I cry out, the sobs shaking me. “I hope you’ll be proud of me. I love you so much mom, I don’t think I ever said it enough, but I hope you know now. You’re my best friend. I don’t know how I’m supposed to live the rest of my life without you.”

I’m crying so hard now that the bed is shaking, her arm is soaked. I’m dying for her to wake up, dying for anything other than the beep of the machines. But she doesn’t. She’s gone to me and I’m left all alone without the one person in my life who loved me unconditionally.

It’s losing my father all over again, but so much worse, because I know the absence of both of them together is something that will sever me for the rest of my life.

I don’t know how long I cry onto her for. I know at some point someone opens the door and looks in, one of my brothers, maybe a doctor, but they leave me alone in my violent grief. This is pure agony and it consumes me. The tears just never seem to abate, my face hurts sharply from the pressure behind my nose and eyes, my lungs are burning, raw.

And still she doesn’t wake up.

Now I know, she never will.

Eventually I’m worn down to nothing. I feel flattened out, weak, my heart too heavy now to even extract itself. The tears stop and I’m a numb, painful mess.

I take in a deep breath, looking my mother over, hoping, wishing, praying. But it’s a lost cause.

“You know mom,” I say softly, my mouth so dry it hurts. I take her hand again and hold it between both of mine. “I fell in love. Just as you said I would. With Lachlan.” Just saying his name to her makes my lips want to smile. “It was impossible not to. I guess I knew it from the start, but you know me. I refused to believe in that kind of thing…love at first sight, true love, crazy love that consumes you until there’s nothing left in you but love. The kind of love that you and dad had. I always thought it sounded horrible.” I let out a dry laugh. “And in some ways it is, because it’s a disease and it takes over your whole life and every cell in your body. It was like everything I did somehow related to Lachlan. He became my everything and my always. But…I guess even fairy tale love has a dark side. There isn’t always a happily ever after. The prince can seem more like the villain at times but…then again, so can the princess. Maybe that makes them right for each other. I don’t know. But I did love him, mom. I still do. I got to experience it fully. And then I got to lose it too and that was always my greatest fear. Losing that wild, beautiful love, the same love you had for dad. But now…now you’ll be with him again. And I know how happy you’re going to be.”

I raise her hand to my mouth and kiss it softly. “I’ll see you again too, one day. And I’ll tell you all these things all over again. But I’ll make sure I’ll have something good to add.” A single tear rolls down my face and I wipe it away before standing up and giving her hand another squeeze. “I love you.”