A Sketch Of What You Mean To Me Part 19

Our hotel is funny too. It used to be a very fancy one but I guess they forgot to restore it or maybe they ran out of money. The building is still very nice and the hallways and the big stairs with carpet on them date to ancient times. However, our room is very plain, like a college dorm. Now, the funny thing is, that for the whole floor, there are only two bathrooms. One is with a normal modern shower but the other one is like this huge room with tiles on the wall and on the floor and the only thing inside it is a bathtub. It's one of these old fas.h.i.+oned ones with feet and they set it up exactly in the center of the room. Without a shower curtain. So, when you want to take a shower, you have to hold up the shower head yourself and you feel kind of lonely and out of place in that big room. To top this off, there are big mirrors on the walls around you so that you can look at yourself out of any angle and that the room appears even bigger. Somehow it works out though that never too many people want to have a shower at the same time.

The only thing I don't like about Prague is their language. In the supermarket, I always feel like they are yelling at me because their words sound so harsh. Plus, I can't see behind this writing. Consequently, we can't even read the street names. Which probably wouldn't be of much use either way since these streets are so narrow that, when we think that we should make a right at the next corner, we're three blocks too far already. I've never got lost at the same place so many times. We're walking our feet off and we probably always need about an hour for a distance we could walk in 10 minutes. Luckily, we've always found back to our hostel so far.

Thank you for your e-mail. I remember Lake George as well. I would like to return there too! Did you go alone?

Soon, I'll find back to you J I can't believe there's only Vienna and Budapest left on our travelling plan. Time went by so fast.

xoxoxoxoxoxo.

Fiona.

Well, now that she asked I'd obviously have to tell her that I went to Lake George with Lucy. But now it was only two more days. It could wait until she was home.

Chapter 22.

Lucy's condition was unchanged bad but stable - and so I could reconcile it with my conscience to go pick up Fiona at the airport. I waited for her with a red rose in my hands.

'Oh, I didn't expect to find you like this.' She smiled as she walked towards me and threw her arms around my neck to hug me. She looked great with the soft tan and everything about her seemed relaxed and happy. I hadn't planned on it but once she loosened the hug a bit, I found her lips and pressed mine against hers. When we drew apart, she looked at me a bit shocked, waiting for me to say something.

'I'm so happy you are back.' I handed her the rose. 'I can't go on like this. Not knowing if and what will be. Give me something to hold on to.'

She nodded. 'I need to arrive first. I've just been awake for almost 24 hours.' She smelled the rose. 'We had an amazing time but this whole time I missed you and wished you were there with me. It was good to feel this. I think we will be okay.' She said and her eyes gleamed with happiness.

I took her suitcase and with the other hand, I held hers.

'I have a souvenir for you. It's a beer mug from Munich. We could go there together one day. They make new mugs every year.'

'Sound's good.' I said.

'It's also good to be in an English speaking country again. It was so weird during the past few weeks. I understood a little something in Spain but other than that.' She puffed her cheeks. 'My head was spinning from all the foreign sounds sometimes.'

She spoke like a waterfall and I listened to her stories. When we arrived at her house, we both hesitated for a moment. Was it ok to kiss her again now?

'What's your plan now?' I asked to break the awkward silence.

'I think unpacking a little and then, perhaps we could eat something together.'

I nodded, a little reluctantly.

'Why, did you have anything in mind?' She asked.

'No. I mean; I can go to the hospital.'

'Why?' She sounded alarmed.

'Lucy isn't doing well.'

'Oh.' She lowered her gaze to the ground. 'So bad that you have to go to her right now, when I'm finally here and we could spend some time together?' She pierced me with her beautiful green-brown eyes.

'I'm sorry if Lucy's health condition isn't compatible with your college schedule.' I said grimly.

'You know, that I didn't mean it like this.' Her jaw tensed and she drew back a little. 'The way you act one could mean that you prefer her over me.'

'No, Fiona. I don't know what more I have to do to prove to you that I want you and only you.'

She pulled her shoulders to her ears. 'I'm sorry. I'm just tired.' She let me take her into an embrace. 'So, we will talk tomorrow?' She asked.

'Yes.' I gulped the lump away that started to build again because I was thinking about Lucy's condition.

Fiona squeezed my hand and kissed me on my cheek. 'Thank you for picking me up.'

Fiona got out of the car and although part of me rather wanted to have dinner with her, instead I drove to the hospital.

Lucy's parents were there as well. She was asleep with an oxygen mask over her face. We just sat there in silence. It was obvious to all of us, that this could only last a few more days at the tops.

I picked up the cube and twisted it some more.

'You're destroying it.' Lucy had pulled down her mask, that I'd be able to hear her.

'I can easily make it again.' I smiled at her.

'Do you want some water?' Her mom asked and Lucy slowly shook her head.

After a few breaths, she spoke again. 'We need to finish this now. You do the first three sides again and then we can do the last one.'

With the instructions, I twisted the colors back to the way they were before and then I told Lucy what to do for the last part.

'No, look, we're destroying everything again.'

'It will be alright. It only looks like a chaos but everything is in its right place.' I said.

And with a few more turns, the cube was suddenly perfect.

'Awesome.' Lucy's eyes were s.h.i.+ny, as she handed her dad the cube.

When I said goodbye that day, I had a feeling that this would be the last time that I'd talk to Lucy. And that's almost how it was.

The dreaded phone call reached me when I was cooking lunch at home the next day.

'Kevin? Here is Lucy's mother.'

I gulped, preparing myself for the worst.

'She spiked a high fever.' Her mother swallowed as well before she continued talking. 'Her heart rhythm is very uneven. You should come by.'

'Ok.' I breathed. I don't know how my brain could work properly at that moment but I turned off the stove, leaving everything else as it was, Lucy's mother's last word still ringing in my ears 'hurry'.

When I arrived at her room, her family was with her. Her mom came out to meet me. Her eyes were red and she looked drained from all energy.

'The doctors said that she'll be lucky if she makes it through the day or the night.' A sob escaped her.

My heart crumbled. Mechanically, I followed her into the room. Somehow my mind still wasn't able to entirely decipher the message she had just delivered me. Lucy had her eyes closed and was still wearing the oxygen mask. I simply stared at her for a moment, some kind of fear growing inside me. I reached out to touch her hand, which was sizzling hot. She was still wearing the bracelet we bought at Lake George.

'Kevin.' Her voice was week. I could only stare at our hands. I held hers in a tight grip. I wouldn't ever let her go. I couldn't move my eyes to her face. I knew that I'd start crying.

'Kevin look at me. Please. You know how that feels when everybody is avoiding your eyes out of fear or pity. Don't do this to me now. You knew that it would come to this.'

I slowly lifted my head. I could detect fear in her eyes as well. She closed them again.

'I'm glad you said yes to that hot chocolate all these months ago.' I said, feeling a bit awkward in front of her parents, brother and grandmother.

'Me, too.' She breathed. 'Go home now. You still have a life to lead.'

'I will miss you.' I lifted her hand to my cooling lips.

I imagined that she was smiling under her mask but all I heard was the rattling of her uneven breathing.

'Thank you for calling me.' I said to her mother who nodded.

'Of course', she answered.

'I guess, I'll go then.' I said, looking at Lucy again. She didn't stir.

I drove to the place with the view. The one where I broke up with Fiona over a year ago. I hoped that I would somehow be able to clear my head. But part of me also just didn't want to let go.

Fiona called to see whether we can do something together.

'I'm sorry, I need some time to myself.'

'Is it that bad with her?'

'She is dying. There's nothing anybody can do.' I held the phone away from me, so that she didn't hear my sob.

'Are you still there?' Fiona asked once I had calmed down enough.

'Yes.'

'Can I come see you?' She asked.

'You won't like the place I am at.'

She came despite that and we sat on the bench in silence for a while. I was holding her hand.

'Somehow it is odd to be sitting here with you again.' She said at some point.

'But so much has changed since then. I know now, that I'd have had to act differently.'

'How would you act?' She asked.

'I would have told you the truth. Then, I'd have had a real reason why I need to survive this cancer. But you still would have had to go to Florida.' I softly nudged her in her side.

'Is that so? You are more concerned about my education than my parents.' She looked at me and smiled. I pulled her closer to me and she leaned against my upper body.

Lucy pa.s.sed away the following evening. That's how her mother texted it to me.

My mom, Eric and Fiona all came to the funeral as a support and I was grateful to see such a huge crowd of known and unknown faces. But it all seemed so surreal. Fiona was holding my hand the whole time and yet I didn't feel it. The whole time I expected that when I walked out of the church, I'd meet up with Lucy for a hot chocolate. One phrase I remember clearly though. When we went to say goodbye to her parents, all dressed in black, plastering a forced smile on their faces to thank people for coming, her mother took my hand with both of hers.

'You were like her guardian angel who appeared at the right time to make her walk into the light with a smile on her face. I wish you all the best and good health.'

I had to clear my throat. 'Thank you.' And there, I always thought Lucy to be the angel here. But cancer had taught me that guardian angles come in all kinds of forms.

'Thank you.' I said to Eric and Fiona. 'This would have been even harder without you.'

'Of course. We wouldn't want you to have to go through this alone.' Fiona said.

'But can you understand that I just want to go home now?' I asked quietly.

She nodded and gave me a sympathetic kook.

'I'll drive you home.' Eric said to her and a wave of gratuity washed over me that he left me my s.p.a.ce.

'That was a nice thing to say of her mom.' My mom said in the car. I was leaning in the belt of the pa.s.senger seat like a drunkard.

'I think Brownie is our guardian angel.' She continued. 'The way he looks at me or knows when something is wrong often makes me believe that he's actually the ghost of your dad.' I turned my head towards her in surprise and she laughed lightly as if to wave away that what she just said was slightly crazy. 'I always felt very supported with him in the house. He helped raising you.'

'It's funny you say this.' Brownie always kept me company and was right by my side when I had to fight with sickness and pains all night. He was my companion, my pet, my friend, my blanket and my protector. He felt when I wasn't well and tried to sooth me in his own way. 'He always seems to have the right reaction to everything.' I smiled and when we walked into the house I gave him an extra cuddle.

The next day, I felt like a truck had rolled over me several times. And when it drove off, it took a piece of me away. I felt a big nothingness inside me. I would have liked to just stay in a dark room and never come out. But somehow I felt the need to call Fiona.

'How are you feeling today?' She asked.

'Could be better. I'd like to see you though.'

We went for a walk in the park we first talked to each other.

'Look, our lock is still here.' She stroke over it with her thumb to feel the inscription.

'I know. I have visited it on a few occasions when I needed some fresh air.'

'So, why did you want to see me?' She asked.

'No specific reason.' I took a step closer. 'I'm just sick of only communicating via virtual channels.' I took her hands.

'That's good.' She said. 'I know this is hard for you. I don't even want to think about it that it could have been you who died.' Fiona turned her eyes to the sky. 'But that's why I'm glad that you talk to me now. That you share your thoughts and feelings with me. In my opinion, that's what distinguishes a good from a bad relations.h.i.+p. I want to know, what's going on inside you.' She touched my chest.