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AS SOON AS HE LAY DOWN, the room tilted, blurring in front of him until he blinked it back into focus. Tom shivered and his breath plumed from his mouth. He turned his head slowly and his gaze landed on Tanya.
“Hey,” he said.
Her wide eyes scanned him, and a pained crease appeared between her eyes. “What happened to you?”
“I had a rough day.” He reached out and took her hand, pulling her onto the bed despite the bone chilling air surrounding her. At least in the bathroom, the heat from the shower had kept the cold at bay.
She stretched next to him, tracing his wounds with her fingers and prisms of ghostly tears slid down her cheeks. “I’m so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.” He wrapped his arm around her and inhaled. She still carried the fruity shampoo scent he remembered, and it made him smile. “I miss you.”
“I’m not going anywhere,” she whispered.
Tom stiffened and turned, meeting her gaze. “You can’t stay indefinitely. Heaven’s waiting.”
“This is my heaven.”
The weight of her words hit him, pulling the air out of his lungs and leaving him struggling for oxygen. He closed his eyes tight; willing the air to flow in and out of his lungs until he was sure his voice wouldn’t shake. “This isn’t heaven, babe, not by a long stretch.”
“Don’t you want me here?”
Tom dropped his head back on the pillow. “You know I want you here. That’s why you are here instead of wherever your...” he caught himself. She didn’t know what condition her body had been left in and he wasn’t sure what the information would do to her.
“Instead of where?”
“Where ever they have your body,” he said.
“I think I was cremated,” she said.
He exhaled, knowing she was right. The papers had reported her cremation along with the scheduled memorial service. The fact he wouldn’t be able to say a proper goodbye ate at his nerve endings, and he wasn’t sure he could send her on now that she was here.
He glanced at her and wondered if he ever would.
“Not that I’m complaining, but why did you come here after everything you said?”
“I should have never broken up with you,” she sighed, sending a wave of cold air over his chest. “And now that I can hear you and kiss you and all, I’m not in a rush to leave.”
“Ah,” he said and closed his eyes. Exhaustion settled over him, dulling his pain and the soft stroke of her fingers over his temple lulled him to sleep.