cemetery ☞ n.m

i

thirty four hours;
you're still not awake.

anna-marie tapped the black paper-mate pen onto the rough paper of her notebook, staring at the sleeping beauty that lied before her.

why won't you wake up?

she's been sitting in that same spot for about a week now, getting up only to fetch water and some food or use the bathroom. otherwise, she'd just sit there. and write.

from the corner of her eye as she wrote, she noticed that his pale finger had twitched. she grabbed it into both her hands as a reflex, staring at his blank face; closed eyes.

her eyes flickered from several parts of his face; eyes, cheeks, lips. nothing.

"sammy?" she says, coming out as more of a question than she anticipated. she waited for an answer, or a simple hand-squeeze for some sort of reassurance that he was awake or at least okay. she waited, and waited.

nothing.

she huffs, releasing his hand slowly and picking the pen up again.

this hurts.

she only got about twenty four hours of sleep since about four days ago. ever since sammy's fallen into a coma it's been all she can think about. the doctors kept telling her 'you need to get some sleep' and 'this isn't healthy, if you don't sleep we're going to have to send you home'. she didn't even know why they cared about her, anyways. and she could do anything she wanted. she wasn't going to let people that she didn't even know push her around.

how can i sleep, if when i wake up he could be gone, she thought.

anna-marie wasn't heavy-hearted. what ever that even meant. she could never handle death or the state of dying. though she knew it was inevitable. she knows that sammy would want for her to be strong, and to keep herself together no matter what happens. and she was, most of the time.

she knew that something was going terribly wrong when the machine that he was attached to started beeping loudly simultaneously. she grabs his hands again, calling out for a doctor. she stared at the red line that displayed his heart rate and prayed for it to not go straight.

about five to seven doctors rushed into the room, getting a hold of sammy. one of the men struggled to pull anna-marie away from his lifeless body. but when he did, she sobbed into his chest loudly. gripping on the soft cloth that he was wearing, rubbing against her wet cheeks.

they had escorted her out of the room, telling her sit in the waiting area for a few moments before telling her sammy's condition.

she hiccuped lowly, fiddling with her fingers harshly and biting the inside of her cheek. no matter how much she wanted to break down, she couldn't. for sammy.

it seemed as if forever before the doctor that had escorted her out of the room came back to get her, calling out sammy's full name, "samuel wilkinson". she got up hurriedly, speed-walking towards him. her eyebrows arched as she waited for the doctor to say the words that could go either good or bad for her. her hands shook as he opened his mouth.

"he didn't make it."

just then was when anna-marie felt her whole world crumple all around her. all of her fears had finally come to reality at that point in time. she lost all that she had left; now she has nothing.

she didn't say anything, she just watched the doctors' sorrowful muscles move as his expression changed. "i'm so sorry for your loss."

not only was it her loss, but it was also his mother's, father's, grandparents, friends. anyone that anybody could ever think of that knew sammy. but she knew that she was the only one that truly knew him; his deepest, darkest secrets and his biggest fears. he told her everything, and vice versa. their relationship was inimitable. she'd never open up to anyone else, and as far as she knows, she never will.