Finding Cait (15 page)

Chapter 41

*Court

    
My eyes are closed but I can hear their voices and I smile even if my mouth
won’t let me.  Stories of our younger days fill the air between us and I
pray they keep talking as I drift in and out of consciousness.  Matt has
always taken care of me, something that I could have never repaid in this
lifetime.  The sacrifices he has made for me are tremendous and one of
those sacrifices laughs as he recalls a summer long ago.

    
At fifteen I could not have given him permission to love her, my heart too
young and selfish.  I had seen his attempts at feeling the lonely space,
none of which were successful for long.  My adoptive parents allowed him
his space and would tell me we all fight our demons in our own way but I saw
the worried look on their faces as he snuck in girls to his bedroom.  They
weren’t his parents and he had made that clear so the only option they had was
to love him from afar and provide a place for him to figure himself out.

    
Cait was my best friend.  I needed her then as much as I need her now and
I know that I would have made a selfish choice back then if he had asked. 
Matt loved me too much to make me choose so he denied his heart what it wanted
most and tried to fill the empty space with sex and alcohol. His behavior
tarnished what he thought of himself and began to make true the idea that he
was not good enough to deserve her.  Too late to intervene when I finally
figured it out, I sat by and watched him distance himself from this place that
he loved so that he wouldn’t be reminded of that choice he made.

    
They laugh again and I try so hard to open my eyes.  I want to tell them
how happy it makes me that they are spending time together and that I don’t want
them to loose sight of that love when I am gone.  My heart breaks to think
that I was the thing that stood in between the two of them and the perfect love
they could have had.  My plan to bring them together is working and I pray
that my death brings them closer instead of finding them each too deep in their
dark holes to see the light the other could provide.

    
My body is
failing,
it is hard to breath as my lungs
fill with fluid.  Each beat of my heart is slower and I know that it will
stop soon.  Pain is everywhere, aching in my bones and burning in my
muscles.  The intense pressure in my head is only relieved slightly with
the morphine but at least it makes me sleep.  As I lay here dying I can’t
distinguish between what pain the cancer is causing and what emotional pain my
death is causing.  Dying is sad but my grief is for the living. 

    
Cait is a strong woman.  She has experienced so much more than any person
should have at her age.  Her mother was a mess leaving Cait no choice but
to raise herself and her mother.  As young as seven Cait was wiping up her
mothers vomit and listening to how horrible men were.  I was amazed she
had any courage to marry Elliot at all.

    
Elliot is an asshole and I had tried so hard to tell Cait not to marry
him.  I knew she loved him only because he promised her an escape from
this little town.  He had a good career ahead of him, he seemed like the
staying type and he never drank
alcohol which
made his
morals priceless to Cait.  Elliot had always been a
liar,
something Matt and I had known for a while but could never bring ourselves to
tell Cait.  We never had any proof, but word is he was out on the town a
lot more than Cait knew and while he never drank the women he kept company with
certainly did.

    
On the night before her wedding she and I rode down to the beach together, we
dropped our bikes at the sand and ran into the crashing waves.  As we
floated on the surface we laughed at how boring it was when we did not have
Matt to come find us.  We discussed our dreams in life and her fears of
being married.  She told me that there were places on this planet where
the sea is so rich with salt that everything floats.  I told her that it
would be so fun to play our game in that water, to float with no effort and
feel the weight of the world off our bodies.  Her reply was stoic; she
told me that sometimes what we think we want because it seems like it would be
perfect turns out to be painful and deadly.  Living creatures cannot
survive in water that salty; it poisons their habitat making everything
toxic.  She didn’t have to explain what had brought that
up,
I knew already she was talking about her future with
Elliot.

    
Elliot was toxic to her.  He gave her false hope that there was a perfect
life outside this town.  He built her up so the fall would be
longer.  As we climbed out of the ocean that night she told me she knew
marrying him was a mistake but that she felt incapable of being loved by anyone
else.  I begged her to run away with me, we would go anywhere in the world
for a while until the wedding day had past and people forgot she ever was
getting married.  She talked about the invitations and gifts and the
expectations of the people that supported them.  I told her fuck them all
he would ruin her.  We both knew that she was going with him and her last
moments of freedom would be the hardest.  Knowing that Matt would be here
soon and she would have to let go of any hope she had of being with him was
going to be so painful.

    
That night I had seen the look on her face when Matt walked in the room. 
I had seen the look on his face too.  Neither of them noticed I was
looking because their eyes were locked on each other as they said so much
without really saying anything.  As the night went on I pretended to fall
asleep so that they could finish what they had started. In the morning when I
had seen Matt, devastated and a shell of his former self, I knew she had made a
safe choice instead of going with her heart.  My biggest regret is that I
let her.

    
Her wedding day was so sad for me.  She looked beautiful as always but the
emptiness was suffocating.  Matt and I
were
her
only guest and the chair where her mother should have been sitting held the
basket full of programs instead.  That day I watched a piece of my brother’s
heart break
and until this week I believed it would
never be fixed.  He left after she said, “I do,” Matt snuck out before the
kiss, blending in with the staff preparing for the reception.

    
Wedding guests danced around and visited with each other at the small tables
that sat his whole family.  I watched my brother from a window inside the
hall as he sat in his truck and drank a beer he had managed to sneak on his way
out.  It was too far to tell but I was sure he was crying and as much as I
longed to comfort him I too believed he had lost his chance with her. Now with
her wedding behind her I was sure there was no going back.  He drove away
as Elliot pranced Cait around showing his prize to his family and friends. I
was still at the window when I saw her reflection behind me, wandering and
searching the guests for a familiar face, but a face that was not mine. 

    
Cait didn’t have to ask me if I had seen him, or pretend she had another reason
for wandering around lost and sad on the night that should have been the
happiest of her life.  I told her quietly that he had left and I watched
as she drew in a sharp breath between her teeth and covered her stomach with
her hand.  I knew she had just experienced the loss of her lifetime, trading
true love for a predictable life.

    
Cait would never be a martyr.  She nodded to me and we exchanged knowing
looks and then she brushed her hand over her hair smoothing out bumps that
weren’t there. Slowly she ran her hand down her dress and turned to start her
life without him.  I thought of the toxic ocean and I imagined her
floating in it. My only peace was knowing that one day when she found herself
there in the thick of the salt, Matt would come and find her just like he
always had.

    
For a while she was happy, throwing herself into her schooling and then her
career.  As long as she was his and only his Elliot was happy.  When
they started talking about a baby and a family he began to change and I would
listen to her cry to me. I would think about the salt in her tears and how they
would turn her water toxic soon, and I would worry that Matt was still under
water, not even looking for her yet. 

    
Losing her baby was the hardest thing she had to overcome.  I don’t think
that anyone has ever truly recovered from that kind of loss.  Elliot was
selfish and narcissistic, unable to see Cait’s pain through his own elation at
having a few more years to party and a wife whose figure could still turn
heads.  Today I am grateful that she can make a clean break from him, but
months ago when it had just happened I wanted to take Cait in my arms and tell
her the world is fucked up.  Karma is a powerful force but it has been
hunting the wrong victim since Cait’s birth. 

    
My only regret is that I didn’t tell them earlier about their need to be
connected.  With my death the truth will come out and I can be at peace
knowing that none of it will die with me.  I worry about Cait the
most.  She has spent her whole life taking care of other people, first her
mom, then her clients, and now me.  She has never had anyone to truly take
care of her.  When I die she will be completely alone and I pray that she
learns how to let someone love her and take care of her.  If I could just
open my eyes right now I would tell her not to be worried, that of all the
things I have learned in my life the one I am most sure about is that Matt is
never happier than when he is in the ocean finding Cait.

    
Death is not
hard,
it is the process of dying that is
miserable.  As the pain radiates from every muscle in my body and my lungs
struggle to find air, I am at ease knowing it will be over soon.  My
choice to stop fighting the cancer was an easy one.  I was going to
die,
no doctor would argue that, so I decided my death would
be on my terms.

    
Oxygen is a precious thing that many people take for granted.  If ever you
feel that it is not something to be appreciated you should try dying.  My
lungs have no room left for air but my brain still demands I keep
breathing.  Apparently my organs are as horrible at communicating as I am.

    
It is less painful now then I thought it would be. 
The
lack of oxygen causing my body to stop sending message of pain to a brain that
is working overtime.
 
A brain that is under
attack by an inoperable tumor, fighting against shutting down until the last
minute.

   No
longer able to move my legs, the only sensation I feel in my limbs is a
tingling.  It started at my fingers and toes and is working its way to my
heart.  I start to feel very sleepy, my brain imploring me to just
relax.  I refuse to give up so easily and fight until the tingling has
reached my chest.  My moment has come and I surrender to death, choosing
to sleep over taking a breath.

Chapter 42

Cait

    
As the morning light shines through the blinds we stay staring at her, having
not slept three hours between the two of us.  There is nothing to say, a
part of each of us has clearly died long before she has.  I am holding her
hand in mine when I feel it relax in my grip.  The pain in my chest radiates
throughout my body and I search Matt’s eyes for some recognition of what just
happened.  He stares at me holding his breath as the tears spring from his
eyes and his throat fights to swallow. 

“She is gone,” I
say and I tighten my grip on her hand as if holding on to her will help stop
the pain I am feeling. 

    
Matt lets out a deep breath and lunges up to the bed, grabbing the hand that
sits at the edge of the bed.  We are consumed by sadness and give into the
need to grieve as we try and remember what she looked like one more time. 
I kiss her hand while it is warm and run my palm across her head.  Matt
kisses her cheek and then leaves the room, fulfilling our duty to notify Candy.
When he returns he tells me she will be calling the doctor and that they will
take care of it from there.

    
Being rational right now is impossible and I struggle to stay sane as I wait
for the doctor.  I want to tell everyone to leave us alone, that I need to
hold her and make sure she is safe.  The thought of her in a bag is
unbearable and I want to demand that she be handled differently.  Deep
inside I know I am no different than anyone who has watched
their
best friend die, but right now it feels like I am the only one who could
possibly hurt this way. 
If others had felt this pain to
the depths that I am experiencing it they would have surely died.

    
Closing my eyes I put her hand to my face, feeling the warmth of her skin
against mine.  She looks so peaceful now and I am envious, wanting nothing
more that to die with her right now.  Our bodies would leave this house
together and our ashes could be scattered into the sea for a chance to play our
childhood game for eternity.  Instead I am here suffering, waiting for the
next step in the process that will put me a little closer to my turn to exit
this earth.

    
I can’t let go of her hand so I sit in the chair by her bed while Matt sits on
the floor next to me.  The faint sound of a knock echoes down the hall and
this time I release her hand and make my way to the door granting Matt some
quiet minutes alone with her one last time.  When the doctor and I enter
the room again Matt is distraught, and excuses himself to his room for a minute
as the doctor performs his tasks.