C Reiss - Sing

“You’re playing City of Dis aren’t you? Where do you find the time?”

“This job doesn’t afford the time for a dazzling social life so, video games it is. And I have UNOS up on a screen right here.” As if responding to what must have been a baffled look, he continued. “The transplant list.”

“Ah. I heard someone came in...” I didn’t know if I should continue. This was surely privileged information, yet once I started talking I could hardly stop. “He’s brain dead is what I heard. I don’t mean to be creepy, but—”

“I think that’s going to be a no-go.”

“You telling me more or Jonathan getting the heart?”

“Yes.”

I looked into my lap. Margie’s text had given me enough hope to get in the door, and when it dropped out of me, there was nothing to replace it. We were back where we were this morning, only I was one day closer to the end.

“How are you holding up?” Brad asked.

I shrugged. “I guess I’m all right.”

“You’re never home.”

“Doctor, my presence at home is hardly under your purview.”

“I’m not asking as a doctor. I’m asking as your friend. How are you doing?”

“Fine. I feel like I’m waiting for him to either die or be saved, so the regular events of my life aren’t so interesting right now.”

He leaned back in his chair, eyes glowing in the screen’s light. “I’ve lived next door to you for a couple of years.”

“Three, I think.”

“I wish I’d gone to your door with something besides the leaves falling on the car, or the new fence. I should have known you better, sooner.”

His hands were folded over his tie, and his feet pushed his office chair back until the corners of his white lab coat dragged on the floor. Besides the hands, it was an exposed position, and even if he didn’t intend consciously to send the message he did, I understood the meaning in his heart.

“I’m too upset to give you a thoughtful response. I’m sorry.”

“I understand. If you want to go up, he should be back any minute, I think. Irene’s at the desk. Check with her if he’s ok to see. I’m watching this screen.”

I stood up and touched the doorknob. “I’d give him my own heart if I could.”

He sat up straight and put his hand on the mouse. “I hear that all the time.” He glanced up at me, his expression sucking the sarcasm out of the comment. He was just stating the fact. This was hard, and people loved one another.

MONICA

Police milled around the hallways, radios squawking, belts laden with black leather geometry, swaying hips from the weight of the instrumentation. I leaned on the nurse’s desk, peering to see Irene’s Russian newspaper.

“Hi,” I said. “What are all the cops about?”

“Security.” She waved her meaty hand and shook her head. “You feel safe? I feel safe. Like in middle of street.”

“I’m going in.” I stepped away.

“No, you don’t.” She picked up the phone and hit one of the buttons on the bottom of the keypad. “Wait.”

The person on the other side must have answered, because she muttered something in Russian, listened, then hung up. “Come with me.”

She shuffled from behind the desk, and went toward Jonathan’s room. I didn’t know why I needed her to guide me. My world revolved around that room, and going to and from it. The door was closed. She knocked. A deep, powerful voice that couldn’t have been Jonathan’s at that point, made some sort of affirmative noise. Irene opened the door.

There was one lamp on, a warm one that I hadn’t seen before. And the room smelled nice, like the salty sea and clear water. I located the squat blue candle lit on the windowsill that must have been the source of the scent. A huge, bald man stood by the doorway, one of the regular orderlies who didn’t talk much. His nametag said Gregory. Irene and he babbled something and he babbled back in the same language, and he stepped out of the way.

Jonathan sat on the edge of the bed. I hadn’t seen him actually sit up since the Collector’s Board show, and I must have gasped a little. He wore a jacket over his hospital gown, and pants and shoes. Tubes stuck out of his sleeves and the effort it took for him to sit up was visible once I got over the initial shock.

“Jonathan,” I said. “I—“

“You sit,” the Gregory interrupted, pointing in front of Jonathan, to an antique, early modern chair I recognized from Jonathan’s bedroom. I’d described that chair and its place under a sconce one night, back when I thought I’d have him back.

I glanced from Gregory to Irene, and then to Jonathan, who waited patiently.

I sat.

“What’s this about?”

No one answered. Gregory and Irene got on either side of Jonathan, facing me.

“You ready, Mister Drazen?” Irene asked.

“For a long time, now.”

They did something that made me draw my breath in and clutch the arms of the chair. The two put their hands under Jonathan’s arms and slid him off the bed and lowered him to the floor.

“What—?“

When they let him go, I was too stunned to finish the sentence. He kneeled before me. I heard his labored breathing, the rattle of the IV pole, and glanced up at Irene and Gregory.

“What are you doing? This is crazy.”

I was ignored. Gregory said something to Jonathan in Russian and he answered in kind, with a wave of his hand that indicated, “I got it.”

Jonathan, with great effort, pulled a knee up, until he was on just one, then glanced up at me. “I’m going to lean on you a little,” he said.

“Sure?”

He put a forearm on my knee, and reached into his jacket pocket, pulling out a small black box.

“Oh, Jonathan...”

He opened the box and handed it to me. It had a ridiculously huge square cut diamond.

“Thank Theresa if you see her. I’ll get you one that suits you when we’re up to it,” he said.

“You don’t have to do this.”

“Shh. Behave, would you? For once?”

I pressed my lips together to keep from laughing. One side of his mouth curled in a smile, and then he laughed gingerly. I wanted to kiss him deeply, and for a long time, breathing him into me, but I knew he didn’t have the breath to spare. I settled for a fraction of the kiss I wanted, leaning down and brushing my lips against his, the softest parts of our faces melting together for a brief second, half a gasp, a tease of desire.

“Goddess,” he said, his breath on my mouth. “Have me, please. I was wrong. You’re not the sea under my sky. You are the sun I revolve around, the stars that mark me, the moon rising through me. I’m lost without you. And if you won’t have me, I’ll break, I swear to God. I know it’s selfish, and I’m sorry. Let me serve you. Have me as yours. Let me live under you.”

I held his face, running my fingers over the stubble on them, jaw in the heel of my hand. I could feel him leaning into me, weak, as if this had taken everything out of him.

What could I say to this? What could I say to being loved enough for this monumental an effort? Did I ever, in my wildest imaginings, think I deserved this level of devotion after I’d rejected him the first time?

After I’d left him, cursed him, denied him? After lying to him, drugging him, disobeying him, using him, could I justify letting him make this mistake, even if it was the last mistake he made? I was ambitious, venal, antagonistic, impoverished, and arrogant. I was unworthy, by a mile, and overcome at the circumstance that would lead such a man to beg to be bound to such a woman.

So, I said the only thing I could.

“Yes.”