Childhood Friend Romance

chapter 15

Chaz took Didi's advice firmly. He decided to take some time-off from work to spend more time with Chuckie and Melinda. He had never worked this hard in his life, not even before preparing for an extreme school test he had nearly spent a full semester studying for.

While everyone was sending tokens of love and heavy support to the Finster family, Melinda was still writing in her diary. She had brought it with her for when she wouldn't be on heavy medication due to her ill-fated disease. She begged for it to be over with soon, but she knew once it would be over, she would eventually die. Over the course of a whole month, Chaz would bring Melinda a new flower every day to keep in her diary. Every new diary entry had a new flower which was what made Melinda herself. She also remembered the poem she wrote for Chuckie and decided to recite it as Chaz would someday come with their friends to see her one last time before she closes her diary forever, not only ending another chapter in her personal book, but on her life.

One day, Didi called Chaz before he went to the hospital again, and everyone agreed to come meet Melinda and Chaz with Chuckie. Even bringing the twins over when Betty and Howard accepted. The doctors cleared out the room to have a little reunion party with Melinda, who was formerly the new girl in town and now just their closest and most best friend any one of them could ask for. Drew and Charlotte were apologetic they couldn't come, but they sent their love and support and had mentioned Angelica had taken her first steps properly and was almost speaking fluently. Her favorite words were 'mommy', 'daddy', 'cookie', and of course, her father's pet name for her, 'princess'.

"Thanks for coming, Didi." Melinda said, her voice wasn't as chipper as it used to be, she was nearly fading away everyday she spent in the hospital.

"I had to come for an appointment anyway," Didi told her, smiling. "I just got the sonogram for little Tommy."

"Really?" Melinda took one to see with a weak smile. "That's beautiful... I'm sure he'll look just like Stu."

"So you know he'll be handsome." Stu grinned then.

Everyone laughed a bit from that remark.

However, Chaz didn't. He did his best to hold back tears, because he knew that Melinda wasn't doing well and she would be lucky if she lived another day. No one knew it for sure, but Melinda was on her final days, it wouldn't long until she would be up there in Heaven with her parents. It also wouldn't be too long until Tommy would be born. That just made Chaz feel really eaten up inside. He knew he would get over this sooner or later, but it was just very painful and unbearable. He also had often cried himself to sleep while Chuckie would sleep peacefully in his crib. Chaz just wished it could had been him instead of Melinda suffering.

Another month came and gone. The group decided to see Melinda together again after Chaz and Chuckie saw her what was mentioned to be one of her last weeks she would live. She was on life support and she could barely talk anymore. Stu and Didi came, Betty and Howard came, but this time left the twins with a babysitter. Melinda couldn't say much, but she could still sing like the angel Chaz fell in love with 20 years ago.

Melinda held Chuckie close who had wanted to be with his mommy again. The woman sang a song she grew up with. Everyone was touched by her wonderful singing. Chuckie's eyes were feeling heavy as he heard what felt like in his baby mind to be a lullaby. She was singing Mother Earth and Father Time. It just made her think back to growing up on the farm and she used it to sing to Chuckie when he felt afraid at times. Her mother sang it to her when she would have stormy nights back on the farm. As Melinda got to the final verse, she slowly shut her eyes as did Chuckie. The baby boy was on his mother's stomach and had fallen asleep. The beeps were fading on the life support and they stopped instantly as Melinda finished the song.

"Melinda? Melinda! MELINDA!" Chaz cried out, as his wife was now no longer with them.

Chuckie was fast asleep, nuzzled against his mother who was completely unaware of things going on around him. Stu decided to take his best friend out of the room and let it all out. If this was hard on anyone, it was definitely him. Chaz had been in love with Melinda ever since she first came to their neighborhood. The others came and hugged Chaz all together and Chaz clung on tight to Chuckie as Melinda was peacefully lying in the hospital bed, no longer painfully suffering. It was a fortunate death however. The sun was setting, the leaves were changing color as the wind blew outside to show the colorful leaves. Fall. Melinda's favorite season.