“I love you too,” she replied.
He sobbed and drove 80 miles an hour toward the hospital. The same
drive he’d made every day for the past five months. Except today,
he felt as if he’d been smacked in the belly with a baseball
bat and robbed of his life with her.
He thought about their trip to Chiapas last winter, waiting for her
at Estacion Central surrounded by short wiry-men, Zapatistas, wearing
red, black and yellow bandannas around their necks. They boarded buses
with forty-pound bags of flour slung over their shoulders. Nearby,
hens cackled in their woven-wicker carry baskets.
They loved seeing the brightly colored strands of thread embroidered
or woven into shirts, blouses and dresses, and recognizing the traditional
patterns from the villages they visited.
He sat on his pack in the shade leaning back against a worn wooden
post.
Dusty buses arrived and shed their loads, but no brown-eyed beauty
towering above the crowd.
Afternoon blended into evening, the station emptied, he was worried.
He heard someone pounding on a high-pitched horn. He looked around
and saw a rusty, little red dented car packed with giggling Mayan
women stutter to a stop. The first one out laughed the loudest and
was head and shoulders taller than her friends. Her smile flashed.
Pi was back.
She thanked each woman with smiles and hugs and introduced them to
him, one by one. With each introduction she flipped through pages
of her sketch book to show how she had captured the essence of three
generations weaving, cooking and playing in the single room home.
After profuse good-byes and more hugs he slung her easel box and
pastels over his left shoulder and wrapped his right arm around her
waist.
The steel cross-arm barring entrance to the parking structure jolted
Ty into the present. He reached out and depressed the big green button.
He quickly found his way into the lobby of the hospital.
She ran in to his arms. As her tears flowed into his she realized
their life together was almost over. She couldn’t let go of
him.
They headed home.
After a few miles he said, “Let’s get married.”
“I’m dying,” she said, “How can I get married?
For two hours I’ve been planning my death. Why get married?”
“I love you and I want to. I wanted to wait until after the
transplant. No sense waiting now. It’s more fun to plan a wedding
than a wake? Let’s call your family and friends and invite them
to our wedding. You can say goodbye to all of them at once.”
“Oh Ty.”
Exhausted, she leaned back into the leather and smiled.
Eyes on the road he brushed away tears.
They watched the full moon rise and smile across the bay as they
lay next to each other.
“Ty, you have to ask me…… to marry you.”
“I love you so much Pi, will you marry me?”
Silence.
More silence.
“Yes,” she whispered.
