True Love (19 page)

“The others will be here soon,” Julie said. “Everyone wants to see you before you go into surgery.”

“You look beautiful,” he said.

She knew how she really looked—dark circles smudged her under-eye area and she hadn’t bothered to put on any makeup except
for a little lip gloss. “I’ll look better when you come down from recovery.”

“Julie, I want to tell you some things before they operate.”

“What things?”

“I want you to know I’m okay about this and I want you to be okay about it. No matter what the outcome is.”

It felt as if a hand had reached into her chest and clutched her heart. “The outcome is that you’ll be all right,” she said stubbornly.

“I also want you to know I’ve done a lot of thinking about some of the things we talked about in L.A. You know, about the hereafter and all. I’ve been reading up on it in all my spare time.” He grinned. “Heaven’s a real place, Julie—a beautiful place—and if I can’t wait for you at the end of an aisle on our wedding day, I’ll wait for you in heaven.”

“Luke, you’re scaring me—”

“Please, let me finish. I don’t want to scare you. I only want you to know that either way this surgery turns out, I’ll be fine. I—I just want you to be fine.”

“I can’t think about losing you. Don’t make me.”

“You’re the best part of my life and I will always love you.”

Tears had sprung to her eyes. Behind her, she heard others come into the room, and she knew that his mother, her parents, and Steve and Diedra wanted to be with him too. She felt panicked, afraid of letting go of his hand. “I’ll see you in a few hours,” she said through gritted teeth.

His eyelids drooped from the sedation, but still he held on to her. “If it’s possible to send a message from heaven,” he whispered, “I’ll get one to you.”

She choked back a sob and broke her hold, then stepped aside so that the others could surround his bed. Later, in the hallway, when he was wheeled out of his room for the elevator ride down to the surgical floor, he told the orderlies to hold up. They waited while he looked from face to face of the people who loved him, reminding Julie of a man memorizing a map so that he wouldn’t get lost in the dark. Finally, he grinned, handed Julie a folded piece of paper, then gave everyone his thumbs-up signal.

Julie watched as he was wheeled away, listened to the clack-clack of the wheels of his bed and the swish of the elevator doors as they closed behind him. Cut off from him, she shuddered.

“Let’s go down to the surgical waiting room,” her father said, gently taking her arm.

They trooped down to the area where family and friends waited for news from various operating rooms. A telephone linking the surgical floor with the waiting room would occasionally ring and tell people that their loved one had been taken to recovery and the surgeon would be down to talk to them soon. In the waiting room, Solena and Frank were already camped out on sofas. Julie tried to join them, but found it impossible to sit still.

As the hours dragged by, the phone rang several times, always for others. Every time it rang, Julie jumped. She felt taut and edgy. Around one o’clock, her father tried to get her to eat something, but she refused. She stared down at the floor, listening to the thump of her heart, the whispers of those around her.

Suddenly the waiting room door opened and she looked up to see Luke’s surgeon standing in front of their group. Surprised, she glanced at the phone, wondering why she hadn’t heard it ring. The doctor removed his green head covering. Julie allowed her eyes to travel the length of him and saw flecks of blood on the green paper coverings of his shoes.
Luke’s blood
, she knew instinctively.
“The tumor was far more entrenched than we ever imagined,” the surgeon began. “It was totally ingrown to the side of his heart.”

Julie heard Nancy begin to sob.

“I’m sorry,” the doctor said. “We did everything we could.”

Somehow, through it all, Julie didn’t lose her composure. She heard questions and answers, but the words didn’t make sense. She was beyond caring what was said anyway. Slowly, she stood and removed the folded piece of paper Luke had given her only hours before. She’d deliberately not opened it, saving it for this time when she knew she would need contact with him most.

“What’s in the note?” she heard a tearful Solena ask.

Numbly, Julie unfolded the paper. On it, Luke had drawn a single, perfect flower.

The day of Luke’s funeral, snow blanketed the ground. Cold white drifts covered cars and fences and the sky was a dull shade of leaden gray. To Julie, riding in the funeral home’s limo to the cemetery, the whole world looked black and white. Void of color.

The high school closed for the day and almost the whole city turned out to bury their
hometown hero. On Main Street, traffic lights blinked yellow and a police escort led the long, lonely precession to Luke’s final resting place. Julie wore black, including a black mantilla over her long blond hair. She sat in the car sandwiched between Nancy and Steve. In the limo’s other long seat were Diedra and her parents. The trip seemed slow, endless.

“I never thought I’d have to do this again,” Nancy said tonelessly, and Julie knew she was remembering her husband’s funeral so many years before. Luke’s mother stared through the window. “Who will ride with me when it’s my turn?”

No one answered, and Julie tightened her hold on the edge of the car seat. Inside, she felt as dead as the world outside the car window seemed. As empty as the stretches of snow between the headstones of the cemetery.

At the burial site, hundreds had gathered, all dressed in shades of black and gray. The car stopped, and attendants helped Julie and the others make the walk to the tarpaulin-covered pit where Luke’s casket would be placed. Because the ground was frozen, a special machine had been used to dig the hole. Julie could still see its tracks in the packed snow. She heard
the crunch of snow beneath her boots, felt the sting of frigid air on her face.

Julie watched as Frank led the pallbearers—all members of the football team and wearing black armbands—toward them. A mantle of flowers, each one as white as the snow, cascaded down the sides of the steel-gray casket. The petals of the flowers were frozen, singed by ice, brittle and stiff. Unbidden, Luke’s long-ago words came to her. “
Someday, I’ll dress you in flowers
,” he had said. Instead, it was he who had been wrapped in blossoms.

She hardly heard the brief ceremony. She felt isolated and cut off from reality, not caring what was said. No words could make a difference. Luke was gone and nothing could bring him back. Her movements were mechanical, like an elaborate puppet’s. She went through the motions, but in her heart, she was hollow and empty. And cold. So very cold.

Once the ceremony was over, Julie’s parents urged Nancy to receive friends at their home because it was so much more spacious. People arrived steadily all day, bringing food and flowers and small gifts. Nancy, ever gracious and kind, accepted every expression of grief over the loss of her son. But Julie felt removed from the ritual, abhorring it. Still, she knew it
meant a great deal to Luke’s mother, so she tolerated it.

Late in the afternoon, as it grew dark and colder, Diedra found Julie in the backyard, huddled against a leafless and barren oak tree. “Steve and I are leaving for the airport,” she said gently. “We have to go home to L.A.”

“Good-bye,” Julie told her. How far away and long ago L.A. seemed.

“You should come in the house, Julie. It’s cold and you’ll get sick.”

“So what?”

Diedra smoothed Julie’s hair, flecked with snow from the blackened branches of the tree. “Please come visit us this summer. Will you promise me you’ll come?”

Julie traced her fingers along the roughened bark of the old tree trunk. “See our initials? Luke carved them for us when he was twelve.” The letters looked scarred and shrunken by the cold. She brushed them lightly with gloved fingers.

“You’re breaking my heart, Julie. Please tell me you’re going to be all right.”

“Luke used to bring me flowers.”

Steve called to Diedra from the porch.

“I’ve got to go, honey.” She hugged Julie,
who stood motionless. “Don’t forget—we’re expecting to see you this summer.”

Julie didn’t answer; she only brushed her fingertips over the worn initials as Diedra left.

Later, when her house had emptied and her father was taking Nancy home, Julie wearily climbed the stairs to her room. She stripped, dropping her clothes in a heap onto her floor, pulled on a flannel nightshirt, and climbed into her bed.

After knocking lightly, her mother opened the door and entered the room. The light flooding in from the hallway blinded Julie, and she turned away from its glare. “Julie …” Her mother halted beside her bed. “Honey … if there’s anything you want …”

“I want Luke,” she said without emotion.

“Honey … please … I’m sorry … so sorry …”

“Good night,” Julie said, then curled into a tight ball and pulled the covers over her head. Minutes later, she heard her mother leave the room. “Luke,” she whispered into the darkness. “Why have you left me all alone?”

“J
ulie, your mother and I are very concerned about you.” Bud Ellis sat on the side of Julie’s bed, looking helpless, his big hands folded in his lap.

“I’m fine, Dad.”

“You’re not fine,” Julie’s mother interjected. “You don’t eat, you don’t go to school, you don’t see your friends. Julie, you’ve lain in that bed for over a month. You’ve lost so much weight we hardly recognize you. Please, honey, snap out of it.”

Julie peered dully up at her parents. Why didn’t they leave her alone? Food had lost its taste and appeal. And she’d tried to go back to school after Luke’s funeral, but she couldn’t concentrate and she couldn’t keep up in her classes. All she wanted to do was sleep. Because when she was asleep, she could forget
how much she hurt. “I’ll try to get up later,” she said in an effort to placate her parents. “Right now, I’m too tired.”

She saw her father glance up at her mother. He sighed and touched her shoulder through her bedcovers. “I miss him too, Julie. Every day, I think about him. But what you’re doing to yourself isn’t right. You can’t curl up and die too.”

Curl up and die
. The idea didn’t sound so bad to her. Without Luke, she certainly couldn’t think about
living
.

“Why don’t you get up, get dressed, and come into school with me,” her father said.

“I’ll make you late.” Her bedside clock read eight-thirty. Usually, he was gone by seven-thirty.

“Who cares? I’m the coach, remember? Besides, first period is my free period this semester. Come on—drive in with me.”

“Not today. You and Mom go on without me. I’ll rest and maybe when you get home this afternoon, I’ll feel better.”

Her father rose, but her mother kicked off her shoes. “If you’re staying home again, I will too.”

Julie was mildly surprised. Her mother rarely missed work, and now that second semester
had begun, more and more kids would be seeking her services at the high school for help with college applications. “You don’t have to stay home. I’m just going to stay in bed today.” Her thoughts grew fuzzy.

Julie heard her parents whispering at her door. Then her father left and her mother came back to her bedside. “Solena called last night. She wants to come over after school.”

“I don’t think I’m up to visitors. Tell her I’ll call her later.”

“Julie, you’ve been putting her off for days. She’s your best friend and she calls every day asking about you.”

Julie felt tears brim in her eyes. All this conversation was confusing her, upsetting her. She sniffed and turned over to face the wall. “Please, not today. I—I just don’t want to have to see anybody today.”

Minutes later, she heard her mother softly close the bedroom door, and soon afterward, Julie fell into the welcoming arms of a deep, dark, dreamless sleep.

Afternoon sunlight streamed through Julie’s bedroom window, awakening her. Someone had pulled up her window shade, and the winter sun cut a path across her bed and pillow.
She buried her face under her covers, but the light was relentless. Who had done such a thing? she wondered.

She sighed and realized that the only way to shut out the sun was to get up and pull down the shade, but her arms and legs felt almost too heavy with exhaustion to move. She forced herself upright, staggered to the window, leaned over her desk, and fumbled at the cord for the shade.

From the kitchen below she heard her mother moving around and smelled the aroma of simmering chicken soup. Normally, the aroma would make her mouth water, but today it made her feel nauseous. She yanked down the shade and returned to her bed, then buried herself under the covers until she heard her mother come into her room.

“How about supper in bed?” her mother asked cheerfully, setting down a tray laden with soup, crackers, milk, and green Jell-O. When Julie was a small child, green gelatin had been her favorite.

“I’m not hungry.”

Her mother sat on the bed and pulled Julie’s covers from off her head. “Look at me, Julie.”