Chasing Charlie

PARTING SUN

  Angela gazed achingly out the living room window at the departing sun, a brilliant yellow, peeking through the leaves on the trees and surrounded by a blanket of orange and pink. It was the last sunset she would see before she lost Vince, she knew in her heart. She could see it coming. If he did by some miracle make it through to the morning, she couldn’t imagine him waking up, as he had promised her and Mitch that he would let the doctor raise his dose of morphine even higher than before once he’d said goodbye to the two of them. Mitch had volunteered to go first, seeing the terror in Angela’s eyes. He was with Vince in the bedroom right now.

  As the sun made the rest of its descent all too quickly, Angela wondered if Vince would really keep his word about the medication. She worried that he would say goodbye to her and, like with Charlie, would change his mind at the last second, would choose to ride this out in a pain so unbearable she couldn’t fathom it. Though the last thing she wanted to do was say her last goodbye to him, she knew she had to stop asking for him to stay, so she sank to her knees next to the couch, her shaking hands finding stability when they clasped together under her chin. “Please, God, give him the courage to go. I don’t deserve a thing from You, but this isn’t about me. It’s about him. Please, don’t abandon him. Tell him it’s okay if he won’t listen to us.”

  She didn’t have time for an “amen” before she heard strangled sobs from the bedroom. Sobs that drove her to hide in a corner of the kitchen, to curl up in a ball and bury her face in her knees.

  —

  Mitch’s last private bedside visit was spent in silence at first, which was only fitting for the two brothers who had spent years with nothing to say to each other. Vince lay there, his hand enfolded in his brother’s, silently lamenting just this. Mitch sat right next to him, hating himself for his little outbursts as of late, when all Vince had needed was for someone to tell him that all the feelings he had been experiencing were normal ones—his anger, his remorse, his yearning to stay.

  Mitch was the first to break the silence. “I’m sorry,” he said with a shuddering breath. “I’ve been such a jerk lately. And I’m sorry I ignored you for so long.”

  “I’m the one who…ignored you,” Vince insisted, licking his salted lips.

  “I won’t let you take the blame for this, Vince. Not now. Just…tell me you forgive me.”

  “Forgive you for what?” Vince said stubbornly.

  “Come on, man—”

  “Okay. I forgive you. For everything…that you could possibly be sorry for. I could never…say how glad I am…that I called you. That you came here…that we got to know each other again…that you pushed me…to go after Angela…that you got to know Charlie. Thank you, so much.”

  “Thank you for letting me back in,” Mitch returned. “I’m glad I got to see you so happy, you know. You and Angela and Charlie. You deserved to have a family again.”

  “I like to think so, too…and thanks again for shaving…your head, by the way. I see you’re…trying to out-beard me, too.”

  Mitch cracked a laugh and felt the thick growth of stubble on his cheeks and chin.

  “I really hope you…find somebody…without using terminal illness as a pickup tactic,” Vince said with a feeble smile.

  “I’ll try, just for you.”

  “And have kids…give Charlie some cousins…ones whose parents don’t tell them I’m a…good-for-nothing…”

  “Then I’d have to keep my mouth shut around them, huh?” Mitch said with a grin.

  “Exactly,” Vince said, smiling right back. “See Charlie as much as you can, okay? Maybe Jen will feel bad and let you have three weeks instead of two. And Angie…will let you see him whenever…you want to. Don’t worry about…the legal stuff…just show up for a weekend…and I’m sure she’d be happy…to let you crash…or take him to Chicago…”

  “Not so sure about that. Haven’t been getting the best vibes from her lately, to be honest.”

  “That’s because of me, not you. She thinks you’re great…she just uses you…to let things out…she doesn’t think I can take it. I’m sorry about that…but I promise…she has nothing against you…except maybe that you…took Charlie to a Twins game wearing your Cubs jersey…”

  “Would you stop with the jokes already?” Mitch asked desperately.

  “What? I thought you’d like it.”

  “This isn’t about me. It’s about you. Is there anything else I can do, say…?”

  Vince nodded. “One more thing…and if it’s too much, say no…but could you stay a while after I pass? At least until the team gets back? I really don’t want…Angela to be alone…even if she’ll shut herself…up in the bedroom…and not talk to you…I want her to know someone’s here…and I know…she wouldn’t let her parents sleep here…”

  “Even if I had somewhere to go, I wouldn’t even think about leaving until I knew she was back on her feet. You didn’t even need to ask me that.”

  “You have no idea…how much that means to me…” Vince gave Mitch’s hand a squeeze, then a meaningful gaze that said without the help of words that he’d said everything he thought he could say. Mitch read him, leaned down to hug him, and broke down under the pressure of unrelenting sobs, the ones Angela heard down the hall.

  Mitch emerged from the bedroom with an unrecognizably ugly face to find Angela balled up in the kitchen looking no better. He poured two glasses of water, offering one to her, which she refused, not to his surprise at all.

  Angela sat there for a while, wiping her nose on her wrist while Mitch stood and gulped down his water.

  “You gonna go in?” Mitch asked after a while.

  “Eventually.”

  Mitch waited awhile for Angela to rise, but she didn’t. “He needs you.”

  Angela nodded, gave Mitch a quick hug of gratitude that she felt she hadn’t expressed nearly enough lately, and made her way to the bedroom. The first thing she did was crack open a window. The evening news on mute on the living room television had informed her of unseasonably low lows that night, accompanied by a refreshing breeze. A chorus of crickets sang to them while she nestled up next to Vince, face-to-face with him, smoothing her hand up and down his stomach. Before long, he took off his cannula again, wanting her to see him as human as he could be.

  “That feels good,” Vince said. “Nice breeze…makes me actually want a blanket…can you go get me one, please?”

  Angela nodded and left the room, leaving Vince a bit confused. There were plenty of blankets in the room. She came back with a specific one, though. The one that almost always remained folded across the back of the couch unless it was being used by the two of them. She nuzzled into him again after spreading the blanket across their bodies. She breathed in his scent—not the hospital smell that had somehow made its way into their home, not the sweet summer air that welcomed itself in through the window, but his very own scent. One she knew she would remember the rest of her days.

  “I need to apologize…for a lot of things…can you do me the biggest favor?” Vince asked after a while of the two of them just lying there together.

  “Anything at all.”

  “Don’t brush me off. You can say you forgive me…but don’t say I’m not allowed…to apologize. Everyone else…keeps doing that…and it’s driving me up…the wall.”

  “Okay. I promise. I’m listening.”

  “First…I’m sorry I haven’t been helpful…I’ve been stubborn…I even left you guys to do the…funeral arrangements…and I’m sorry that…I did the chemo trial behind your back…and I’m sorry for the stupid fights we had…they were all…my fault. And a waste of time.”

  When Vince didn’t speak for a while, Angela asked, “Is that all?”

  “I think so.”

  “Then I forgive you. And I love you.”

  “I love you, too.” Vince ignored the pain in his spine when he contorted his neck for a kiss followed by a long, nose-to-nose stare. “Thank you for telling me you loved me first??
?for not wasting time…that was one of my…favorite moments.”

  “Mine, too. It was perfect. The hat helped,” Angela said, kissing him again.

  “Oh, I’m sorry about…the hat, too,” Vince said with an awkward smile. “It’s not that I didn’t like it…I just felt like I was…trying too hard when I wore it.”

  Angela laughed as the tears rolled down her cheeks and onto Vince’s shoulder. “I forgive you for that, too. Like I said, I got my use out of it. You’re still so handsome, you know.”

  “Even now?”

  “Of course. I look at you and I still see the strong, confident man—”

  “That I’m not anymore.”

  “So? That’s all part of the process. No matter what, you’re still my…knight in shining armor,” Angela said, playing with Vince’s sleeve. “You really did save me.”

  “And you me,” Vince said with a deep search of her eyes before kissing her again. He could kiss her for the next year and it wouldn’t be enough. He would have to get it all in now, though. “You…are hands down…the best thing that’s happened to me, ever since I left…that oncologist’s office for the first time. When I try to imagine…what the rest of my life would’ve…been like, without you, it hurts. It physically hurts. When I said…goodbye to the team, to your parents…I kept saying I regretted this…regretted us. Because I know how much you’re hurting right now. But…they all helped me realize…that if I could go back…and do this all over again…there’s no way I’d be able to…stay away from you. You have no idea how…how happy you’ve made me.”

  Angela ran her thumb along Vince’s jaw, following it to his lips. “I’m glad you don’t regret it. Because I don’t either. Not for a second. And even once you’re gone…I’ll still have all these perfect memories, and I’ll still have Charlie. I’ll never have to forget you. Thank you for letting me get close to him. I love him so much. Just like I would my own.”

  “I know you do. I’m so glad that he…got you and Mitch out of all of this. His family’s about to get a little…weirder…but it’ll be a great one.”

  Angela nodded and rested her head on a pillow now, wanting some peace and quiet before anything else was said. Some time to soak him in, memorize every speck of him, feel his heart beat under her hand.

  Vince broke the silence, but only after quite a while. “Can you, uh, make sure…that I’m buried with my ring?” he asked, even though he knew earthly possessions would be going nowhere with him.

  “Of course.”

  “Unless you want it,” Vince said.

  Angela shook her head. “I have mine. You keep yours.”

  “Anything you want…around the apartment…it’s yours. Definitely take the fireplace.”

  “Thanks.” Angela kissed Vince’s shoulder and fished around for his hand. She wished she could think of more to say. Now was her chance. Her chance to get everything out, to let him know exactly how much he meant to her, exactly how much he’d changed her. She wanted to tell him she would never get over him, too, but she knew that one of his deepest-seated fears was her being broken beyond repair. No matter how true that might be, she couldn’t tell him he was right. “I feel like I could talk to you forever and still not say everything that’s on my mind right now,” she admitted stuffily. She squeaked before a cry came out and Vince’s arms gently drew her nearer.

  “I know, sweetie. I know. Me too.”

  “Is it okay that I’m not ready?” she asked in a lapse of reasoning.

  “I guess it has to be,” Vince said. “Because I’m not either.” Not without bodily protest, Vince found Angela’s cheek with his far hand and framed her face, brushing her flushed skin with his cool thumb. “I’m not done falling in love with you…Give me all the time in the world…and I’d still never be done.” Vince finally surrendered to the shameless crying, the sniveling, the gasping for air, right alongside Angela.

  “I love you so much. I—always will,” she said. “And you did—everything so perfectly. Absolutely everything.”

  “I wish—I could stay,” Vince stammered. “I want that future…with you…I’d do anything for it…”

  “I know. But you’ll be somewhere so amazing that you won’t feel that way anymore. But I do know exactly what you mean.” After a few moments with no one speaking a word, Angela closed in for another kiss, one that helped radiate calm throughout both their bodies, abating the crying and exchanging it for a series of more kisses, each one more than just a brief meeting of the lips, more than a gesture of love. Different from any they’d ever shared.

  “Thank you for bringing me to church with you,” she said once things toned down between them. “I think that…all those years, I was just using my past as an excuse to stay away from God and…live my life how I wanted, not how He wanted, you know?”

  “Trust me, I know…more than anyone. I’m so glad we were…able to take that journey together. I’m still…a little jealous, you know. Of your experience.”

  “Vince, you have an eternity with God ahead of you,” Angela said, locking eyes with him and stroking imaginarily thick hair behind his ear.

  “Yeah, I guess you’re right. Don’t take this…the wrong way…but I kind of wish you were coming with me.”

  Angela took a deep, unsteady breath. “I’ll be there before you know it. In the meantime I’ll be busy reading bedtime stories with Charlie and watching him grow like a weed. I bet he’ll end up even taller than you.”

  “Good luck with that. You sure you don’t…want some insurance money…just so you can afford to feed him?” Vince asked with a playful smile.

  “Nice try.” Angela blocked her nose with a tissue.

  “I know they say…heaven’s a place…where all your worries disappear…but I don’t think…that there’s any way I won’t…miss you,” Vince said, starting to cough. “I just don’t see it.”

  “Don’t talk like that,” Angela chided him as he warded off a fit. “You’ve earned your peace.”

  Neither one knowing what else to say, they lay there listening to each other’s evening breathing and their chirping friends outside. “Do we say goodbye now?” Angela asked, the uncertainty creeping over her once again.

  “Not yet. Soon, but not before…they come to swap out my meds.”

  “Are you ready, then?” Angela asked.

  “Yeah…I guess…”

  Angela knew that was as confident as Vince would ever get with his remaining time. She didn’t want to leave his side, but she didn’t want to yell across the apartment, either. Not without a struggle of heart and mind, she peeled herself away from him. “I’ll be right back.” She was gone only long enough to tell Mitch to call a nurse. She then lay back down with Vince, reclaiming her position precisely.

  With Vince’s breaths growing shorter, Angela knew she had talked him out. She wouldn’t be able to get much more out of him, so she settled for the most meaningful thing. It didn’t matter how many times she’d already said it in the last half hour. “I love you.”

  A soft sigh. His teeth bore down hard on his bottom lip as he choked back the tears that brought on so many different kinds of anguish. “I love you, too.”

  Neither one of them had moved a muscle when Rosie arrived. Mitch knocked softly and asked if they were ready. It was Vince who nodded, Angela’s head remaining still against his shoulder, her face that of a sick child needing a parent’s loving touch.

  “Are you scared?” Angela mumbled before Rosie came in.

  “Not as much as I was before.” Vince knew Angela would appreciate the honesty, that she wouldn’t buy that he was going into this without a single fear.

  Vince gave a saddened Rosie permission to raise his dose substantially, knowing there was no longer a point in being lucid. As best as he could, he’d made his peace. Rosie started up the syringe driver one last time.

  “Rosie?” Vince asked in a whisper.

  “Yeah, honey?” She said, sitting at the edge of the bed. “Is there something else I
can get you?”

  “No. I just…wanted to know…do you usually know…when someone’s going to…to die?”

  “Well,” she replied with careful thought, “I usually know when they’re ready. And usually, God’s good enough to come take them when they are.”

  Vince nodded, crying anew. “Thank you.” Angela echoed him.

  “In case I don’t see you again, it’s been my pleasure to get to know y’all,” Rosie said, giving Vince’s hand a good squeeze. “Go in peace, sweetheart. I’ll let myself out.”

  It wasn’t long before the morphine kicked in, stronger than ever, as promised. Most of the bodily sensations Vince had grown accustomed to over the last few weeks finally left him, with only his rattling, harder breaths, slowing heart, and Angela against him to remind him that he was still alive.

  Mitch came in quietly after a while, apparently trying to give Vince and Angela some last moments alone if they wanted them. He took the recliner, making eye contact with Vince in the dim light provided by the bulb that always burned in the bathroom as a nightlight.

  It was then, seeing his brother watching him, and realizing how close Angela was to him, that Vince realized he couldn’t put them through any more.

  “Guys,” he struggled.

  “What is it?” Angela asked right away, sitting halfway up.

  “I don’t want…I don’t want…you guys to see…or hear…I’d rather…be alone…is that okay?”

  He feared it would break their hearts, and he had never been more right about anything, but what kept him resolute was the sinister feeling that they would be forever scarred by the sound of a pneumonic man taking his final breaths.

  Mitch and Angela would deny him nothing at this point, so amidst their new tears, they nodded. Mitch said goodbye first, laying a kiss on his brother’s forehead and telling him he loved him before he left the room.

  Angela couldn’t find the breath to say what she needed to say. She hadn’t been prepared for this. He’d promised her long ago that she could be there for the end, but that had never been clearly defined. “Are—are you sure?” she asked, stroking his cheek. “We’d love to stay with you.”

  “I’m sure. I’ll…be okay…I just don’t…wanna put you…through all that…I’m ready…and I’ll be okay…” He coughed, hardly feeling his chest’s objections. “I’ll just…fall sleep and not wake up. You won’t miss…anything, really.”

  “If that’s what you want,” Angela said without bitterness. “I guess this is goodbye, then. Most likely, anyway?”

  Vince nodded slowly, licking his lips. “It is.”

  Angela lay her head on Vince’s chest, careful not to make him support her weight. “Okay.”

  “Goodbye, sweetheart. I love you.”

  “And I love you.” After one long, gentle but heartfelt kiss to Vince’s shaking lips, Angela thumbed his tears away and slowly crawled out of bed. Shutting the door behind her was tantamount to lifting a car. She tried not to wail and disturb Vince, so she got to the living room and pulled her shirt collar up over her mouth, muffling her cries. Mitch was there in a flash, holding on to her, trying to offer her some sort of comfort, but she knew nothing anyone did for her right now would make this any easier. With a hushed apology, she pulled away from him and stumbled blindly back down the hallway. She took the Spider-Man comforter folded up on Charlie’s bed, as well as both his pillows, and made herself her own bed in the hallway, right outside her and Vince’s bedroom door, caring not an ounce how pitiful and foolish it looked. This was the closest she could get to him. And just in case he changed his mind, she needed to be within hearing distance. She sandwiched her face between the pillows and kept her weeping as quiet as she could.

  Vince didn’t hear Angela nesting on the floor outside the door. Not above the crickets, the loudening of his breaths, the air purifier, the humidifier, the distant hum of the fan that kept the breeze going. He lay there alone, wondering if this was really it, and if it was what he really wanted, all things considered. His thoughts wandered here and there, to Charlie kissing him goodbye, to Harry telling him he was the best friend he’d ever had, to Angela telling him how God had held her in His arms. Then further back, to holding Charlie for the first time, to watching his first steps on a video, to his very first encounter with Angela at work. They didn’t come in some sort of flashbulb form like he’d expected. He chose which memories to revisit.

  One in particular changed everything.

  It was the moment when, during his first case back on the job after being shot in that dark Chicago alley, Angela had taken him into an empty room at a police department, shut the door, and told him he wasn’t alone. She hadn’t hidden behind clever words; she’d said it directly, fearlessly. It was as if she’d known exactly what he’d needed to hear. That reassurance had brought him to tears when he’d gone to sleep that night. But it wasn’t so much Angela’s proclamation that had touched his heart then and again now. It was how ardently she had always desired to be there for him—sticking her head into his office at night to chat with him, to tell him not to stay too late. She’d initiated a team night out once a month just so Vince would get out of his apartment. She’d brought him lunch countless times when she knew he was too busy to eat.

  And more recently, she’d married him, taken time away from work, cared for him in every possible way.

  At all costs, and given his consent, she would stay by his side until the very end, would ask for nothing more than the opportunity to be the one who held him for the last time.

  As the sedating walls closed in around him, as his body melted into the sheets, as the crickets went to sleep, Vince discovered he had never felt more alone and had never been in a place where being alone scared him so effectively. “Angie,” he croaked. He coughed and cleared his throat. “Angela…Mitch…Angie…please…” He panted after his pathetic tries. The door creaked open and Angela appeared, drifting into the room like some sort of angel coming to accompany him until he was ready for his journey to the great beyond.

  “Did you change your mind?” she asked, knowing he was too out of breath to explain himself.

  Vince hadn’t stopped crying since Angela had left, and his tears only multiplied now as he nodded. “Mitch, too,” he mouthed.

  Angela went to inform Mitch, then joined Vince once again, as overjoyed as one could be in such circumstances. Vince thought she felt so perfect next to him that he didn’t know how he’d found the strength or the stupidity to turn her away. Mitch moved the nightstand and kitchen chairs away from the bed, then dragged the recliner to take up the empty space, He made himself comfortable enough to sleep, then ran his hand along Vince’s head.

  “Sorry,” Vince breathed.

  “It’s okay,” Mitch and Angela said together.

  “I just…I don’t wanna be alone after all…”

  “And you’re not. You never have been,” Angela said, her voice as sweet as the summer breeze that tickled his face. “You can go to sleep now. We’re right here,” she whispered into his ear, kissing his temple. It had officially been a week since her last full night’s sleep. Coffee had long ago stopped doing its job. For fear that she would miss something, that Vince would need her, and for fear of life without him, she hadn’t gotten anything beyond a sad excuse for a nap. But now that Vince was at peace, now that she could be here with him when he left this world for another, her heart finally gave her permission to shut her eyes and expect not to awaken for several hours. She didn’t resist the temptation. “I love you,” she said before she drifted away.

  “I love you, too,” he said, knowing they would be his very last words. As his eyelids cloaked his weary eyes for the last time, Vince entertained himself with thoughts of Charlie sleeping peacefully across town, of him being happy again, spending Christmas with his remaining family.

  Vince knew that, at this very moment, he wasn’t dying, but he had no doubt it would come sometime soon. He hoped he wouldn’t be awake for it, but if he was,
at least he knew he needn’t be afraid, that he was going somewhere far better, and that he was surrounded by two people who had stopped at nothing to bring him and one another to this very night in one piece.