Love, Lose, And Repeat

Deadman's Heartbeat

They doubled his dose of morphine in May. Now, when he spoke, there was a frothy gargle in the back of his throat. I remember it was May because that was the month he asked me to marry him. He did it by trying to mount a shark in the middle of the sea. He always tried to be adventurous for me. But now there are only visiting hours, six to two, and just an overworked night nurse to talk to.
    She talks of the weather and the length of the rain. She asks me if wearing a poncho made her less sane. Poking at scars, nurse notices the half-circle bruise I got from a fishing hook to the forearm. I turn away, pretend to be shy, but she pokes with more questions about the burn on my thigh. If I told her, she'd call me a liar, because she would never believe that I set myself on fire...on a dare. When I was five, my mother hid my Christmas presents in the upstairs coat closet. She told me not to go looking for them, because she hid them somewhere so secret I would never be able to find them. So I took the challenge; I've been taking them ever since.
    So I laugh about the thigh, and I lie: tell her something she'll buy, and then find myself something to drink.   
    Coffee—
    cold in a plastic cup.  I'm buzzed to intensive care, five stories up. Windows frame nothing—just squares of black. Most rooms locked, full of strokes and quadruple heart attacks. My hand slips into a pocket of wool: single cigarette, army knife, not all the way full. In a slight corner, crumpled with trash, is the diamond ring I hide in the stash. I slip it back on and knock at the door. Behind are whispers and chuckles and a single spit, whore.
    They know when I leave, I let my ring fall into my sleeve mingling with trash and grouped gum wrappers. They've heard around town how I spend my Saturdays:
                                                                                                                         spreading
                                                                                                                                 sweat stains.
 letting men wiggle and wrap bodies behind; I just try to unwind. It's not something I sought. They cant be that mad...I don’t do it a lot. Only on days when the coffee is cold and I find mold in my hospital ham sandwich.
    In the room I hear a small voice, a gurgle. It's pleading, pathetic, and sorry. I creep my way in and am hit with the purgative smell of death and calamari. His family is there. All standing with styrofoam take-out plates. I ask if there are any updates. His mum and three sisters leave with a sigh, not with a word or utterance of goodbye.
    I hold my hand on his heartbeat. I resist and fall hard on a seat. The machines say he is with me.
    beep.beep
but it’s not my fiancé I see.   
    And there he is crying, craning his neck and feeling for me, for a dry peck on his cheek. He is no more. Not the one I fell for. He is just a hunk of flesh melting with morphine, and migraines, and molding into his bacterial bed. He is encased in casts, never suffered a quadruple bypass.
    When he fell out of the sky it was because he was trying to fly; I told him not to, but he didn’t know why. So, when he landed nearby—
I couldn’t cry.
    I just lay in his hospital bed now with the cast of the man that was almost my husband. The doctors say he won't last longer then a season of strawberries that even though he has good and bad days, the good ones are just a phase.
    Before I know what I am doing, I see myself  shaking him. I shake him and shake him. I lean over his face and I shake his cast-covered shoulders. His eyes are scarred and swollen but still the familiar shade of green grass in spring. His machine starts beeping and he starts gargling and I am crying. He points to the machine enraging with its high-pitched chirp, "dare me, come on." I say, dropping his shoulders and holding the plug by his bed. He is struggling against the heavy of his head. He is frothy saliva falling off his face.
I can't watch; I turn my back, "I'll dare myself."