Wherever You Go [Katy Perry Fan fiction]

Chapter Seventy-Three [Part One]

The light was far too bright for my eyes as they wheeled me out into the corridor. It's insanely abrasive, causing me to squeeze my eyes shut tight and bring the white sheets just a little closer to my face. There were medical professionals surrounding my bed, two nurses on my right, a doctor and an anaesthetist on my left; my consultant behind my bed. I felt mildly claustrophobic.  
I itched at my skin with nerves, just staring into thin air at the plain walls that had just about as much personality as a sheet of blank paper. There was no vibrancy to the place. The closest thing to colour was the poster on the wall that I passed, where a little boy bleeding from the head lay in the cold road alone - the warnings of drink driving, I believe it said. Something else enough to make me even more fed up than I already was.
Coming up in the distance I could just about make up the faces of my family. All of them, stood one by one, beside each other with support. My mom and dad were the first faces I saw. My mom looked tired. Exhausted, in fact, and I hurt at the thought that all this was such a shock to her and she was having to take it all in and deal with it in such a short space of time. Then my dad beside her with a quivering lip, remaining strong for everybody else but I knew that he was in pain.
My dad was one of the best men I knew. His heart and his mind were always in the right place, and his priority was always making his family happy. When I was younger I always used to tell my mom how he was my hero. I stopped saying it so much as I got older, but that didn't mean it wasn't true. My dad would always be the man that threw me on his shoulders every July 4th so we could watch the fireworks together. He would always be the man that sat at the side of my bed as I cried myself to sleep after my divorce, telling me how a man that could let me go so easily and not fight to be with me was undeserved of my tears and my love.
Beside him was Oliver. My Oliver. His arms hung loosely at his sides and he wore a pout on his face that he did when he was trying to hold back his tears. I could see his green eyes from here. I could spot them out in an arena full of cheering fans, but they weren't as soulful and full of light as they normally were. They were dull. They were tired and red around the outsides, as though he was forcing them open when really all they needed to do was close so his body could sleep.
I think back to when we were children. How simple and easy it was. I knew from the moment I saw him score that goal on the school field that I loved him. Just the way his blonde curls did a dance as he ran, and he laughed such a heart melting laugh as the ball flew straight into the back of the net at such a force that anything in its way would be destroyed. It wasn't a cocky laugh, but a soft, shy, timid laugh as the crowd erupted into cheers and suddenly he realised the attention was just on him. They were cheering for him. All the softness of his child face was replaced by chiseled jaw lines and sharp features. But don't get me wrong, softness does remain. His lips. When they would curl to form a smile that managed to get me going every single time. If only he knew how simply taken and in love I was with him. How thankful I was for him giving me my children. I wished my little boy was here, so I could kiss every inch of his face. Just to hear Luke's hilarious laugh at something so ridiculous. I smiled at the thought.
Next to Oliver stood the little lady who had taken on the role as my best friend now for what seemed like a million years. I admired Shannon's patience with me over the years. I saw it on her face sometimes when she would grit her teeth and ball her fists that she just wanted to scream at me and give me a piece of her mind, but she never did. She spoke the truth, always. She told me what nobody else dared, and that was exactly what I needed sometimes. She kept me grounded and down to earth. Shannon kept me human. I could never thank her enough, and maybe it was too late now, but I knew deep inside my heart that she knew.
In these quiet moments a little face comes to me. A ghost- like shadow of the blue eyed child I gave birth to eighteen years ago. I close my eyes and I see her looking up at me from her sheets, porcelain skin glistening under the light and the smell of talc and baby bath so strong that I swear I could actually smell it. I knew that back then I was a bad parent. I never intended to be. I let her down in the worst possible way in that I wasn't the one always there to hold her close to me when she cried, or assure her that 'Mommy's here' when she woke up crying in the middle of the night after a bad dream. I did do that, but it should have been me every single time, not just once a month when I returned to Santa Barbara from LA. That was the only thing I looked back on with a stab to the heart.
I reopened my eyes to see her, falling in love with her all over again just like I did when the midwife laid her bare body on my chest, 8 pounds in weight exactly, looking up at me with the most incredible stare that I wondered how I had lived the first nineteen years of my life without her existence. I was changed as a person that day, because before I gave birth to Sammie, there wasn't a thing in this world that I couldn't live without. Then when she laid on my chest with those bright blue eyes, our hearts beating together in sync, I knew that I had finally found my purpose. I guess... I just lost my way a little bit a few months after.
Sammie looked back at me. The most heartbroken of them all. I knew that if the worst did come to the worst, she would struggle the most, and that terrified me more than this whole thing itself. She was so innocent and full of goodness; the biggest heart in a young woman I had ever known. She was going to be a superstar. I never doubted that. I just prayed that God would allow me to witness it for myself.
I looked at them all individually. These people were the people that made me who I am today. They were my life; the people I shared every single memory with, and I loved them with all of my heart.
As the professionals wheeled me past, I gave a strong smile to them all, convincing myself in my mind that this was definitely not a goodbye.
I lifted out a hand to Shannon Woodward, pulling her slightly closer to the bed as we moved at a slower pace towards the elevator.
"I need you to promise me something," I plead with her, and her chocolate eyes look back at me promisingly.
"Anything in the world."
She lightly squeezes my hand in assurance.
"If I don't make it out of the theatre, swear to me, hand on heart, you will look after Sammie." My bottom lip trembles and I let a tear fall from my eye.
"Katy-"
"She's going to struggle, Shan. I know you all will but, she won't cope. She's breaking already I can see it. Promise me?"
"Kate," Shan breathes out, her little finger wrapping tightly around mine. "I swear to you."
"Thank you," I whisper, "and not just for that; for everything." Her hand slipped out of mine as the elevator door opened, and suddenly the faces of my family became a memory of the past that I didn't know if I was going to see again.
"Okay Miss Hudson, we're going to let you sleep now so we can get you straight into theatre once we're down there."
My body turned cold as I watched the anaesthetist squeeze the anaesthetic into my bloodstream. All the memories I had just been thinking back on flooded through my mind at a million pictures a second. Everything after that turned fuzzy, as though I wasn't in control of my body anymore but a higher power had taken over, and counting backwards from ten, I slipped into unconsciousness. I took a look at the world through the open window for what could be my last time...
To be continued