Nicholas Sparks - Two by Two

I knew that she was only half-teasing, that she would have loved to have been there, and I silently berated myself for it. My mom, after all, not only wanted to see London on skates that day; she’d wanted to see her own daughter, skating with abandon and joy on her face-one last time.

As the second week of February rolled around, I had the sensation that time was simultaneously speeding up and slowing down There was a slow-motion quality to the hours I spent at Marge’s every day, marked by long stretches of silence and sleep; on the other hand, each time I showed up, it seemed that Marge’s deterioration was accelerating. One afternoon before pickup, I stopped by and found her awake in the living room. She and Liz were speaking in low voices, so I offered to leave, but Liz shook her head.

“Stay,” Liz said. “I was about to touch base with one of my clients anyway. It’s an emergency. You two talk for a bit. I’m hoping this won’t take long.”

I took a seat by my sister. I didn’t ask her how she was feeling, because I knew it was a question she hated. Instead, as always, she asked about Emily and work, London and Vivian, her voice slurred and tinny. Because she tired so easily, I did most of the talking. Toward the end, though, I asked if I could ask her a question.

“Of course,” she said, her syllables running together.

“I wrote you a letter for Christmas, but I never heard what you thought about it.”

She smiled her half smile, the one I’d grown used to. “I haven’t read it yet.”

“Why not?”

“Because,” she said, “I’m not ready to say goodbye to you just yet.”

I confess that I sometimes wondered if she’d ever have a chance to read it. Over the next three days, whenever I went to the house, Marge was always asleep, usually in her bedroom.

I would stay for an hour or two, visiting with Liz or my mom, whoever happened to be around. I would admire the latest repairs or renovations that my dad had undertaken, and more often than not eat a large plate of food that my mom would put down in front of me.

We almost always stayed in the kitchen. I thought at first it was because no one wanted to disturb Marge while she was sleeping, but I discounted that when I realized if that my dad’s hammering wasn’t enough to wake her, our low voices wouldn’t either.

I finally figured it out one afternoon, when Liz stepped outside to sweep the porch. At loose ends, I wandered to the living room and took a seat in the spot where Marge and I usually sat.

My dad was working away quietly in the bathroom, but I realized I could hear a strange, rhythmic sound, like a malfunctioning fan or vent. Unable to pinpoint its origin, I moved first to the kitchen and then to the bathroom, where I spotted my dad lying on his back with his head beneath the new sink, in the final stages of hooking it up. But the sound was fainter in both those places; it grew in volume only as I began to make my way down the hallway, and it was then that I knew what was making that horrible noise.

It was my sister.

Despite the closed door, across the far reaches of the house, what I’d been hearing was the sound of my sister breathing.

Valentine’s Day fell on a Sunday that year. Marge had planned a special gathering at her house, even inviting Emily and Bodhi, and I brought London over as soon as she got back from Atlanta.

For the first time in two weeks, London and I arrived to find Marge sitting upright on the couch. Someone-maybe my mom, maybe Liz-had helped her apply a little makeup. Instead of the baseball cap, Marge wore a gorgeous silk scarf, and a thick turtleneck sweater helped disguise the weight she’d lost. Despite the tumor ravaging her brain, she was able to follow the conversation, and I even heard her laugh once or twice. There were moments when it almost felt like one of our usual Saturday or Sunday afternoons at our parents’.

Almost.

The house itself had never looked better. My dad had finished the guest bathroom and the new tiles and sink gleamed, reflecting state-of-the-art fixtures. He’d also spent the last week repainting all of the interior trim in the house. My mom had laid out a veritable banquet on every surface of the kitchen, and as soon as Emily arrived, my mom made her promise to take a mountain of leftovers home with her, including whatever was left of the pies.

We rehashed a lot of family stories, but the highlight of the evening was when Liz presented her Valentine’s Day gift to Marge. She’d made a photo album of the two of them that opened with photos of each of them as infants, and progressed through their entire lives. On the left-hand pages were photos of Liz; on the right, Marge. I knew that my mom must have helped Liz compile the photos and as Marge slowly turned the pages, I watched my sister and Liz grow up in tandem before my eyes.

Eventually the album began to feature photos of the two of them together, some taken on exotic trips while others were merely candid shots taken around the house. No matter how formal or casual, however, each photo seemed chosen to tell a story about a particularly meaningful moment in their lives together. The entire album was a testament to their love, and I found myself close to tears.

It was the final two pages of the album that broke me.

On the left was the photo of Marge and Liz beneath the Rockefeller Center Christmas tree in New York, the last trip they would ever take together; on the right was a photo that looked to have been taken only a couple of hours earlier, with Marge looking exactly as she did right then.

Liz explained that my dad had taken it, and that unbeknownst to her had left to get it developed at a nearby drugstore. Upon his return, he asked Liz to add it to the last page of the album.

All eyes turned toward him.

“I’ve always been so proud of you,” my dad choked out as he looked at Marge, “and I want you to know that I love you, too.”

The day after Valentine’s Day, the waiting began.

I now believe that on Valentine’s Day, Marge used much of her last remaining reserves of energy. She slept almost the entire day Monday and ate no solid food from that point on, sipping only tepid chicken broth through a straw.

While my mom and dad were a constant presence at Marge’s house, I drifted in and out, mainly because of London. She had been unusually volatile since learning the truth about Marge, occasionally throwing a tantrum or bursting into tears over trivial things. She would get particularly emotional when I refused her requests to visit Marge, but it was difficult to explain to London that her aunt was almost always sleeping now.

However, a few days following the Valentine’s Day celebration, Liz called me at home in the evening.

“Can you bring London by?” she said urgently. “Marge wants to see her.”

I called up to London, who was already upstairs in her pajamas, her hair still wet from her bath. She raced down the stairs and would have rushed straight to the car, but I managed to block the door in order to get her to put on a jacket. When I pointed out that she wasn’t wearing shoes, she randomly grabbed a pair of rubber boots from the closet and slipped those on, despite the fact that it wasn’t raining.

I saw she was holding a Barbie, refusing to put it down even while donning her coat.

When we arrived at Marge’s house, Liz gave London a hug and kiss and immediately pointed her in the direction of the master bedroom.