Apex [h.s]

chapter twenty seven

Song: Supermarket Flowers, Ed Sheeran

You were an angel in the shape of my mum.

Frankie Doyle

September

Often people say that when you are asleep, that's when you look most peaceful. Your eyes are closed and your mind is drifting from dream to dream. 

Sleep is a state where the worries of reality can't follow, the pain can't take a hold.

What a load of bullshit.

I used to agree with most people, but right now standing here, looking at my mum, I knew that was a load of bullshit.

After she came to the track, she fell asleep on the ride back to the hospice. Five days later, they haven't been able to wake her up.

At first I was convinced that it was my fault. If she hadn't have come to see me, then she wouldn't have been so exhausted...

The doctors told me that wasn't true, it was just the natural course of her cancer. They said I should be happy that she got to see me in the car, but how can I be happy? She doesn't deserve this.

Now, I'm standing at the edge of her bed, watching her fragile body rise and fall as she breathes. 

There are tubes and wires everywhere. The doctors have explained to me multiple times what each one is for, but I've never been able to focus on their answers.

Her skin is pale and even in sleep, she looks like she's in pain. 

Not even the body's natural escape could take her away from the disease that riddled her anymore. 

They told us when she hadn't woken up the day after the track to be prepared, but it felt like I had already lost her.

The last time I spoke to her, I said goodbye, but I didn't know it was going to be the goodbye.

There was so much that I wanted to tell her, so many things I wanted to thank her for, and now she'll never hear the words I will whisper into her ear before she goes.

It was six in the morning when my dad called me today. My heart dropped when I saw his name on the screen. I knew what he had to be calling about.

He told me that the doctors said today was the last day. They said that her body had begun to permanently shut down, piece by piece.

I barely had time to explain to a very dazed Harry where I was going so early in the morning. He offered to come with me, but I knew that it just needed to be my family in that room today.

I was so thankful that he understood that.

I let him drive me to the hospice and I told him I would call him when I needed to be picked up.

There was something so strange about getting out of his car. The next time I saw him, everything was going to change and I didn't know how I was going to deal with it.

The 10am sun is streaming through the blinds, casting shadows across my mums bed. Dad and Benji were outside to let me say everything I needed to say, but now that I'm here, I have no idea how to start.

I make my way to the side of the bed, sitting in the chair that had become my dad's bed as of recently. 

I grab her fragile hand in my own, trying to hold on to every piece of her that I could.

"Mum," I whispered, "I don't know what I'm going to do. We've been so lucky that we've been able to spend this last month together, but I'm not ready for it to be over. There's so much I still have to do, so much you still have to see."