Till Death Do We Part

Chapter One

Everybody always told me that I was the luckiest girl alive.

"Not only are you beautiful," they'd say. "But you're smart, kind, and a lovely person to be around." And I suppose that's true. I finished college early with honors, I took care of sick and injured animals and babysat neighboring children like they were my own. I gave rides, food, or money to those in need and was always willing to lend a helping hand. I baked pies and cookies for new residents and went to public meetings both within Omaha, Nebraska, and in neighboring communities to make them more welcoming and safe. I was lucky, they had told me, and I felt lucky. I thanked God every day for the wonderful gifts He gave me, and I refused to let a day go to waste.

Then my father fell ill. At only fifty-six, my father was blacking out, throwing up pools of blood, and screaming out in the middle of the night due to pains deep within his tissues and bones. After a lengthy hospital stay, he was told he had cancer, with only had a few months to live.

I was devastated. Crushed. Completely numb all over. I realized that I was no longer that lucky girl that everyone had told me I was, not when it came to the health of my loved ones. I sold my tiny apartment space to move in with my parents, where I took care of my dying father and grief-stricken mother. It was my responsibility to help with the daily chores, distribute medication to my father, and tend to his pains, as well as drive my father to regular doctor appointment's and my mother's therapy sessions. I kept my job as an elementary school teacher as an extra source of income for the mounting medical bills, but frequently left work early when my mother called to say Dad was having a fit or vice-versa. My boss was understanding, given the situation of my home life, but I couldn't help feeling guilty for leaving my employer so short-staffed at times, or face the worried expressions of the children I taught.

I began to feel hopeless. My father no longer looked like the sane, happy man he was months before. He was sickly pale and thin, so thin, in fact, I could see every bone from his hollowed, sunken blue eyes to the long and bony fingers that weakly clutched my hand. His graying blond hair fell out in clumps, his arms riddled with marks from the injections given to him to try and keep him alive if only for another day, and I found it harder and harder to see the man my father used to be turn into a skeleton before my eyes. Things were shaky, barely stable, and I felt as though I were on the verge on a complete and utter breakdown. Every day it seemed like the darkness was closing in and the unimaginable was just around the corner.

Then I met him, and everything became grounded once more.