One Last Miracle [complete]

Epilogue

Epilogue

Both the graves remain the same as they were six years ago; only now there's more flowers, most of the plants overgrown. Every year, on the anniversary of their deaths, I bring fresh white roses, placing them right in front of his grave.

It's always white roses, never anything different. And it will remain white flowers until I can't lay them over the grave anymore.

Over time, the words have faded but they're still the same. His photo has withheld the pressures of being outdoors; each time I see the same innocent, boyish grin on his face, the same bright blue eyes. It's a face I've never forgotten, even to this day.

A face I'll never forget.

The face of the beautiful boy I'd fallen in love with all those years ago—hard and fast. Everything about him... I'd fallen in love with all of it. The imperfections. The perfections. The way he'd laughed silently, the sound the best thing I'd ever heard. The way he'd hold me close, unafraid to say what he wanted to say. The way his eyes used to light up when he saw me. All of it.

Above all, it's the fact that he was my first boyfriend, first kiss... first love.

In the years since his death, I've made mistakes; I've rectified them. I've jumped hurdles to get where I am today. I've learned to let go of the guilt, just like Catherine had said, all those years ago. It's been a hard journey but I've succeeded—and that alone fills me with a sense of accomplishment. Catherine's words have always stuck with me, the ones she told me on the curb side after the funeral. The mornings when I felt like I was drowning in the grief, they were what I recalled. They gave me the strength to keep going, though I was missing an integral part of me that I could never get back.

I helped James' mum along the way, though it was more of a tandem effort.

There's been moments when everything fell to pieces around me. All progress I made dwindling into nothing but burnt hope in the following years after his death. I'm a miracle according to the doctors, but I don't see it the way they do.

I beat the cancer. Even after six years the tumour hasn't never come back. But I paid the price—my right leg from the knee down is gone. In its place is a prosthetic leg. The amputation had happened shortly after his death. For him, I'd gone through with the operation.

Winning the fight had been bitter sweet. James hadn't been there to celebrate the victory with. I didn't get the chance to tell him—to see his reaction. To this day, he doesn't know. Every year that I come to the grave I tell him everything that's been happening, how everyone misses him.

But I don't think he hears any of it.

Sometimes I feel him there, feel the presence of someone watching me. It feels like him. In those moments, I see his face, the smile he always wore. I feel his arms wrap around me, holding me close.

The nightmares are the worst. I wake up thinking he's there.... only to realise that he's not. It's just a dream; my imagination. I feel arms around me and I think it's him. I stare at The End of Us and remember him asking me out, right after watching the movie.

Since his death, I've never been able to read the book again. Looking at it is physically painful and I can feel my heart threaten to shatter every time.

Nothing feels the same—at least nothing I'd done with him.

Without James there's parts of me I miss. And it will always remain that way. I don't feel whole.