Love Me to Death (42 page)

Two years ago Neddie Waters died … for twenty whole minutes. It was the longest twenty minutes of my life. I’ve never felt so tortured. There was a part of me that longed to celebrate the life of my beautiful daughter and the other half of me wanted to mourn the love of my life. But I refused because I made her a promise. I promised I would marry her. I reminded God of my promise. I spoke to him for the full twenty minutes. I told him that it was wrong to allow me to break my promise; it was something I just couldn’t do. In that very moment, I became a man of my word. Something changed within me and I knew that Ned had to wake up because I wasn’t ready to lose her. I still had so much to learn and I needed her by my side to do it.

“Hey,” I whisper as her father hands her over to me with a proud smile on his face.

“Hey,” she whispers back.

“You look beautiful.”

“So do you.” She chuckles.

“Now, I’ve got a promise to keep. You ready to get married?”

“I am.”

Today just became one of the best days of my life and the list of
best days
seems to keep getting longer. I turn my head and look at my wife as she undresses.
My wife.
That sounds so good. I stroll casually through our hotel room and into the bathroom where she is standing in front of the mirror. I wrap my arms around her and breathe her in.

“You smell good,” I whisper in her ear.

“I smell of you.” She chuckles.

“I know,” I say cockily.

“I see you brought Freddy on our honeymoon.”

“Babe, I never leave the house without him.”

She rolls her eyes. I squeeze her tighter. Our eyes meet in the mirror.

“You’re my miracle,” I whisper the words she has heard thousands of times over the past two years.

“And you’re mine.”She smiles.

“And Cacey’s ours.”

“She is a miracle isn’t she?” I nod. “I never thought I could have this,” she says seriously.

“I never thought I wanted it.”

“Funny how life changes, isn’t it?”

“It really is. Ned?”

“Yes?”

“You’re my
wife.”
I watch her reflection smile back at me.

“And you’re my
husband
.”

“Best. Words. Ever.” I tease in a whisper.

“Some things never change.” She rolls her eyes. I turn her in my arms so our faces are a little over an inch apart.

“I don’t know if I’ve ever truly explained this to you but you are the best thing that has ever happened to me, Ned. You have given me so much, sacrificed so much and no matter how much I try I can never truly repay you.”

“You repay me every day, just by being with me.”

“Neddie Cole, gosh that sounds so hot. You having my name is so sexy.”

“It does kind of have a ring to it, doesn’t it?” She chuckles.

“It does but babe, you really can’t keep calling me Cole. It’s going to sound weird, especially now that you
and
Cacey share the same name.”

“I’ll call you Brennan when we’re out but at home you’re Cole.”

“Fine by me, at home your Christina Grey … I like secret identities.” I wink.

“Of course you do.” She hesitates for a moment before speaking again. “The first day we met I knew. I tried to ignore it but deep down I knew you were the only one for me,” she says seriously.

“How?”

“When I told you about my mom I saw something in your eyes and I knew that if that something ever broke its way through it would love me like nobody has ever loved me before.”

“And I do … love you.”

“I know.”

“Now, not to cut the sweet talk but I really,
really
want to make love to my
wife.”

She gasps. “What a coincidence because I really,
really
want to make love to my
husband.”

I lift her off the floor until her legs wrap around my waist and she is laughing.
Still my favorite sound in the entire world.
I crush my lips against hers and don’t break the kiss as I carry her to the bed. I lay her down gently before climbing on top of her.

“You know,” I say as I start to take both of our clothes off slowly, “we’re technically both virgins.” I smirk down at her.

“We are?” She raises her eyebrows at me.

I nod. “Yup, I’ve never had married sex before, have you?”

“Nope never.”

“I wonder what it feels like,” I tease.

“Much better, I’m guessing.”

“You’re about to find out.” I smile. I look down and admire her body. Every mark and blemish look beautiful to me. “You’re so perfect.”

She smiles up at me as I lower myself over her.

“Ah, hold on, I’ve got a gift for you,” I say jumping off her.

“I thought your gift was in your pants?” She winks.

“That’s a gift you already own; what’s in here is different,” I say as I dig into the bottom of my suitcase and look for silver paper.
Got it!
I head back to the bed with the mystery gift in my hand and climb on top of her.

“What is it?” she asks as I hand it to her.

“Open it and find out.”

She looks up at me as if I’m up to something before she slowly unwraps the paper. I watch the confusion as the pen falls out onto her chest.

“A pen?” she asks as she scrunches up her nose and picks it up.

“Look again,” I whisper.

She looks confused as she pulls out a piece of paper too.

“Unfold it,” I instruct. She does. I see the moment that recognition fills her face. The tears fill her eyes as she looks up at me with a small smile.

“Cole,” she whispers.

I slip the paper out of her hand and smooth out the creases.

“It’s my bucket list.” She breathes as a tear slides down the side of her face.

I nod. “Now you can check off the one that says ‘hold a baby in my arms’. You did,
our
baby … Cacey. You did it and I’m so proud of you.”

“I can’t believe you kept this.”

“I had to keep it, we haven’t finished it yet. Now put a check next to it.”

With a shaky hand, she lifts the pen to the paper and draws a check and then the tears really fall. I take the pen out of her hand, place the lid back on and put it down on the bed beside us with the piece of paper. I rub the pads of my thumbs gently under her eyes until the tears are gone.

“Thank you,” she whispers.

I shake my head as I hold her face. “No, thank you. Thank you for finding me and thank you for giving me Cacey. You are so much more than I could have ever wished for. I never thought someone like you could exist. You are so perfect.”

“So are you. You are the best version of perfect I’ve ever known,” she whispers as her hand strokes the side of my face.

“No matter what happens, no matter how long we have left, you will always be my forever, Neddie
Cole
.”

“And you’re mine, Brennan Cole until death do us part.”

“And even then I’ll still love you. Don’t forget to wait for me in heaven,” I whisper.

“I will.”

“Promise?” I ask seriously.

“I promise.”

“Thank you. Now, Freddy I need you to leave the room, I’m about to make love to my hot wife and things might get messy.” I hear the sound of her laughter and I feel so complete.

Ned may not be cured and we might not know how much longer we have left — or why she’s still alive — but I am going to spend every waking moment cherishing this woman because when you come across someone like Neddie you treat every day with her as if it is your last.

“I love you, Ned.”

“I love you, too.”

“I love you more …”

THE END

Just over a year ago Neddie’s story was very real for me …

Let me set the scene. My family is incredibly close … My mom, dad, brother, and sister … we are close. My mom and dad are no longer together but they are great friends. For my entire life, my dad has always been the one that never gets ill. We all get a cold, he doesn’t. We all get a virus, he doesn’t. He just never got ill. But just over a year ago he did. For the first time and it was major. It turned our family upside down and tested every bit of faith we had as a family unit.

To go from never seeing my dad ill to being told he has a weak heart, with a leaky valve, a clot in his heart and a clot in his lung is BIG. To be told that he has heart failure and that without a transplant his heart could last a week, a month or even a year if we’re lucky — he could die — is heartbreaking. Well, that was my family’s story just over a year ago. Suffice it to say, Christmas last year was pretty much ruined.

Just like Neddie my dad was fit, healthy, and young (maybe not as young as Neddie lol). The point is that nobody knew why this had happened to him but the fact was it did. My dad was a little less rebellious than Neddie and he did take his medicine but time was ticking and there was no news of a transplantation at this point — keeping in mind, we were told he could die while waiting on the list, die during surgery or die if his body rejected it. Gosh, it was a gloomy time but throughout it all, we stuck together. Like Brennan, we kept laughing and smiling. Like Neddie, we stayed positive. We kept the faith and despite being told the worst news ever, we kept smiling.

When my dad was finally released from the hospital he was given certain dates when he had to come back and have several check-ups. The first major check up was with the doctor who said that, “without a transplant there is no other way.” During this first check-up he sat us down and told us that my dad’s results came back really positive and that after looking at them they have concluded that he no longer needs to be on the transplant list because he is too healthy! What?! Too healthy!! Yes, that was my exact reaction.

Then came the second check-up in September 2015 and the same doctor sits us down and again, the tests have come back good. But he is looking at my dad in the strangest way. His eyes keep moving from my dad to his computer monitor (where he has two diagrams displayed, one of my dad’s heart during his first check up and one of his heart during this check-up). This time, he explains that he’s not entirely sure how — since it is physically impossible — but my dad’s heart has begun to go back to its original shape and size (it was enlarged but now he is telling us that it is correcting itself!). He goes on to tell us that he wants my dad to continue taking his medicine and come back in a year’s time.

Now, we were not shocked. Just like Brennan we reached this place where we had to believe he was going to be ok … like really believe but my gosh was it the most surreal thing ever. I don’t really have any other way to explain this story other than to say that my dad is a walking miracle.

We are still on the journey and sometimes it can be hard but when you are given a miracle, given hope, it’s something to fight for and be thankful for. My dad’s story changed my life and when I got the story idea for Ned and Brennan in my head I just knew it was the right time to share it. I hope that someone out there that has lost hope … lost faith can read this and understand that yes life’s hard and scary sometimes but every now and then it throws you a miracle and it makes every bit of hardship worth it.