She didn’t know what to do! She raced to the phone on her writing desk, throwing things everywhere in search of the doctor’s emergency contact number.
“Mom,” Charlie called.
She glanced back and threw the phone down at seeing his hand had come away from his body like he was trying to reach for something. Was it subsiding?
“Dad, make a fist if the pain is going down.”
His fingers slowly closed into a ball and Cheryl let out a breath in the form of a sob, hugging Charlie while staring at Ben. Oh God. Help them.
She sat next to him, watching his body and measuring his breaths. They were slowing, and hers followed a couple steps behind his.
“Thirsty,” he whispered.
“Water?”
He nodded.
“I’ll get it,” Charlie said, racing out.
He returned half a minute later and she took the water from him and opened it, eyeing Ben as he sat with his eyes closed. Seeing him in his white t-shirt and hunter green sweatpants with sneakers almost made it easy to forget everything wasn’t normal, and he was just sitting there, resting.
As she brought the water to his mouth, a flood of nursing duties rushed in her mind. Bathroom needs, particularly. How would she manage that when he wasn’t able to? “I have your water at your mouth. Don’t move, just try to drink.”
“Okay.” The word barely made it out as she put the opening of the bottle on his lower lip. He opened a little and she tilted it up slowly.
He drank and drank like he was dying of thirst.”
“I’ll get a straw so he doesn’t need to move,” Charlie said, as he hurried out. What a smart boy. Thank God he was there. He returned with the straw and another bottle of water and Ben finished off the first one, sighing in relief after.
“That better? What can I do for you? Do you want your legs a certain way? Are the pillows okay? Do you need more?”
“You…never kissed me.”
Her heart froze in her chest then clenched up so hard, she had to hold her breath.
“Call me if you need,” Charlie whispered, leaving and shutting the door behind him.
She stood next to Ben. “I’m sorry,” she finally said, her voice tight as she moved in to correct that. She pressed her lips very carefully against his while trying to remember him ever asking for a kiss from her. Was he having regrets like her?
At feeling how soft his lips were, her whole being ached for him. To have him the way she’d always wanted him. She administered delicate kisses along his mouth and the thought suddenly hit her. Had he liked her initiating sex? Had he thought that was normal? Right? Had he felt rejected all these years when she’d stopped?
At feeling his lips smiling, she pulled back a little. “Am I…not doing it right?”
“That’s…impossible,” he barely mumbled, sounding exhausted and yet… content. His words made her tummy dance with hope and joy right before dread and sadness slithered in and poisoned it.
She carefully sat next to him, not wanting to disturb what seemed to be a tolerable position. “I missed you,” she whispered. It was as if the words needed saying, they just came out. She’d almost said I miss you. So many days she missed him while he was right there with her. Like she mourned the man she’d always wanted him to be. And now…now that he was dying…she realized he always had been exactly the man she wanted.
The horrible idea that she was supposed to initiate sex with him all these years sat in her lap like a horrible shame. What if he’d needed her to do that for some reason? A reason he couldn’t say? As his wife, his help mate, that would be her job to do, her privilege even. To be what he needed her to be. To love him as he was.
“What’s wrong?” he whispered. Her heart sucked in the soft and tender tone of his voice. She hated that it was under these circumstances, hated that she still craved and needed it, maybe worse than ever. “You going to tell me your big secret now?”
She wiped the tears from her face, steadying her shaky breaths before meeting his blue gaze. Just like Charlie’s. So perfect and clear like the sky. Except his were clouded with the remnants of agony and other things she didn’t want to think about.
Her big secret. She was suddenly yanking it eagerly down from her mental shelf. It was heavy. Cumbersome. Oddly shaped and miraculous. She turned it around and over, searching for the best angle, the most convincing one to present to him.
“Maybe you'll kill me first with anticipation,” he managed to joke.
She swallowed, gathering her strength and courage. She’d just say it. All at once. “I researched solutions for your…condition. And I found one.” Her mouth remained opened as she watched him watch her. He waited and she remembered that's how he was, not one to interrupt or try to guess. “You can get a head transplant,” she finished in a quick breath. “And I found a doctor that said he would perform it.” When he only continued to stare at her, she hurried on with more. “It’s been done with animals many times and it’s worked. Obviously, the US hasn’t done one with their ethics rules, if you can believe that, but I have all the information and I wrote the doctor and he wrote me back. He was ecstatic Ben. He wants to do this. He’s even ready to help find the money to get it done. And find a donor.”
“A donor,” he mumbled, his brows pinching as he kept the same, unreadable stare on her.
“Somebody who is terminal with a body disease but a good head.”
“You…want me to get somebody else’s head…and put on my body?”
She knew how that sounded. Sounded worse out loud, but she nodded. “I know what you’re thinking, I thought the same thing,” she assured. “How will it be you, but they do this memory transference. Turns out they can extract your memories from your body and put them into another person, the donor’s head in this case. And they use a-a memory wipe procedure, something to do with medication and a light, and… something else to wipe the brain you’d get. Then once the transplant is done, they reinsert your memories into the wiped brain. Yes, it’s risky, yes, it may not even work,” she said, wanting him to know she wasn’t blinded by delusional hope. “But every operation in the world has the same risks, and there would be intense physical therapy, and the recovery would take months and be filled with dangers. But…” She lowered her head as tears spilled over her cheeks. “I…I’m willing to do what it takes,” she said, unable to raise her voice past a whisper. “I don’t…” she slid both hands on her cheeks, wiping them. “I don’t want to live without you. Charlie doesn’t either and so, I was thinking…”
“Cheryl,” he whispered.
She snapped her eyes to his, her heart banging her chest. The agony on his forehead indicated he was hurting, and she wasn’t sure how or why.
“No,” he barely said. “I don’t…I don’t think…that’s the right thing to do.”
She stared at him, her chest buzzing with a strange numbness. “Why not?” She heard the words but didn’t feel herself speak them.
“I've... accepted my fate. Our fate. That’s the right thing, honey.”
She moved off the bed, feeling like he'd slapped her. She stared at him. Stared for many seconds. Then she needed space and air. “Okay,” she heard herself say as she paced like she chased after her own breath and sanity. “Accepted your fate,” she repeated, stalking back and forth next to the bed. “Our fate. Our fate,” she repeated, eyeing him as she detoured to the foot of the bed now. “You accepted our fate?” she double checked. Had she heard right? “I mean... that's not even possible, that's…that’s not for you to do. How can you accept our fate? I mean I get you accepting your fate, but our fate?”