Sadie, Someday...

Chapter 20 - Learning to Feel

Chapter 20
Learning to Feel

“I've got something to tell you, I was lost, but you saved me, I'll go wherever you want to, 'Cause I think that I've got to have you, I've had enough, I'm in love, it's true, So don't, don't take it away, 'Cause I've got my eye on you.” ~ Eyes On You – Automatic Loveletter

For some people, some of the small, beautiful things in life are birds chirping in the trees. For others, it’s a hometown show with their favorite band headlining the night. Sometimes, it’s just getting to eat your favorite food.

Waking up the next morning in Caden’s arms was one of those small things of life that I loved.

It had been so long since I had been in this position, his hand gently resting at the bare skin above my hip, my hand draping his waist and our legs entangled beneath the blankets. My head was still shoved into the crook between his chest and arm and his hand hadn’t moved the entire night. He somehow smelled like the same old Caden again, which made my heart flutter just a bit.

When my eyes opened, meeting the sun through the tacky, pink colored blinds on his hospital window, I smiled small. It was the first morning where I was happy to be awake and alive. I was happy he was alive and in my arms once again. I wanted him to wake up so he could tell me the story of how he was somehow revived. Maybe then I’d get more of an appreciation for the life I was so scared to live before.

Gently, I moved my fingers from around his waist and up to his chest. They danced across his hospital gown, almost freezing when they touched the skin of his collar. Running my fingers over his slightly freckled nose and cheeks, I smiled to myself, knowing he was finally here to stay.

It was odd though, when he wasn’t smiling beneath my fingers like he usually did. Normally, it didn’t take him long for him to realize what I was doing and chuckle. Then I’d blush and swat him in the arm for making fun of me and catching me admiring him.

“Cade?” I whispered, near his ear so he would smile at me again.

He wasn’t answering, just lying there as still as ever. My blood ran cold and my breathing stopped in its tracks. He couldn’t have died. There was no way. He couldn’t do this to me again.

“Caden, come on. Stop messing around,” I scolded, running my hand down his body to interlace our fingers together.

My mind was rushing back to last night, him dying and coming back to life. I looked down to our hands intertwined, his barely holding onto mine and thought of the way his eyes looked as they rolled back into his head as the machines started beeping. My heart was racing so fast in my chest as each memory burned a hole in my brain.

He couldn’t do this. This can’t be happening for the second time.

I can’t do this again.

“Come on,” I repeated, squeezing his hand and putting my ear to his chest.

I could barely hear anything over the stupid beating of the machines. Looking back up to his face, I saw his eyes were still hooded shut and his lips were barely open. His skin wasn’t pale or lacking any sort of color. That was a good sign, right? That had to be a good sign.

Were his machines not hooked up correctly? I mean, the machines were supposed to be what was keeping him alive. My eyes traveled up to the heart monitor and I stopped cold. There wasn’t the up and down lines like normal. Nothing was moving. The beeping wasn’t coming from the heart monitor.

Why hadn’t anyone come in to fix this?

With my heart in panic mode, I sat up in the bed and was about to scream for help. Then, as I watched his face for any sign of movement, the heart monitor suddenly started picking back up again and the straight line was gone. My eyes frantically went back and forth between his face and the monitor, wondering what had happened.