Everyone thinks I am sleeping in a sickly way in my bed, but I am not. I still have all the voices from our afternoon at the hospital swirling around in my head. I call Louis on his personal mobile phone. We talk twice a day, every day, while he is on holiday in Thailand with his family.
‘Hello?’
‘Hello,’ I say.
‘Oh, my sweet lady, how are you? How do you feel? How was the doctor’s?’
I have to remind him to ask me one question at a time. Then I tell him everything is fine and I will be better soon. There is no need to repeat the word that Dad said in the car. He didn’t mean it anyway. Sometimes we all say things we don’t mean when we are upset. There is also no need to tell Louis about the other word: ‘transplant’. It is too complicated and may just make him worried in his heart when, really, there is nothing to worry about.
‘I have something I need to tell you,’ he says.
‘What?’ I am smiling because I can hear sparks flying around in his voice.
‘I was looking at the sunset on the beach at exactly six twenty pm and I thought of you.’
‘That’s nice. I think of you at sunset too.’
‘Excuse me, I’m not finished yet.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Well, I was thinking that I would like to marry you at sunset… sometime soon.’
My hum started to zing and hop and jump. I smiled so big and wide that it hurt inside my eye and cheek muscles.
‘Maybe we can live together after that and have a family, and we could watch TV in our own home, and make popcorn together, and no one can tell us not to eat Doritos and drink Coke.’
‘Oh, Louis, I would love that with all my heart.’
‘Uh, I’m still not finished speaking my speech.’
‘Sorry.’
‘Most of all, I would love to spend every sunrise and sunset with you from now on until the day I die.’
Die.
Why did he have to say that word?
Suddenly my eyes are spilling water.
‘Uh-oh, I’m sorry. What did I say? Did I say something wrong? I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to.’
‘No, it’s nothing.’ I shake my head, but he can’t see that. ‘Nothing. I just don’t want you to d–i–e.’
He’s very quiet.
‘Louis?’ I say.
‘Yes?’
‘Why are you quiet?’
‘I dunno.’
Sometimes he needs my help.
‘Well, this is the part where you say, “Don’t worry, I’m fine.”’
‘Okay.’
‘Okay what?’
‘Oh, sorry. I mean, don’t worry, I’m fine.’
But it didn’t feel right and I was still crying and I didn’t know why.
‘Harper?’
‘Yes?’
‘Do you not want to marry me?’
This made me cry more. I was hurting him in his heart and I did not mean to.
‘Of course I want to marry you. You are the love of my whole life.’
‘Yes, I thought so,’ he said. ‘So why are you crying?’
I thought in my mind and in my heart about this for some time, but there were no words that came to my mouth for me to speak about how I felt. It made my forehead go tight.
‘I don’t know,’ I said.