All is Never Enough | ✓

Chapter 29

I can't believe I'm writing this again only months after Cameron Boyce's death in July. Kobe Bryant and his daughter, Giana, as well as seven other loved ones passed away on the 26th of January. I can only hope they're at peace and know how much they impacted us all. Whoever is reading this, please be grateful. Life is so precious.

Nora Johannes

"You gonna come back to the room with us?"

"Nah, I'm okay. I think I'll just walk around for a bit."

The boys eyed each other, hesitating, before nodding and kissing my forehead as they walked around me to head back up to his room. Mason, of course, stayed behind and sat down in the seat in front of me and held my hands tightly.

"You need to start talking about it, Nora. What's going on in that head of yours?"

I shook my head. "Nothing. I'm fine. I'm just processing the news."

He gave me a sad look. A look of pity. "It's been almost three weeks and you've been inside his room twice. You've processed the news already, baby bird, you're just preventing yourself from going in there. He would want you to go see him."

"No he wouldn't." I answered immediately. "Hero would not want me to see his decaying body. He would want me to see him happy, and alive, and breathing on his own. I know my Hero."

"Okay, okay." He calmed me down, realising it was a triggering thing to say, "I'm not going to force you to see him. I'm just gonna ask you to visit him whenever you can. We don't– I don't–... none of us know how long he'll be like this. Or how long he has to live. You both deserve to be together... even if he's not verbally there."

I swallowed, nodding, and pulled my hand away. "I understand. I'm just... I'm just not ready. I'll see you later, Mason." Without letting him get another word out, I hurriedly walked out of the cafeteria and to the first staircase I saw. I didn't want to cry. I just wanted to walk, to stop thinking completely. To be blank.

That was hard to do in a hospital of dying people.

I began my walk by going up the elevator. I didn't think, I just clicked the first button I saw and left from the first stop it paused at. My feet felt like they were dragging my along more so than I was actually walking myself.

I don't know how I ended up there. But here I was, standing in front of the NICU, tiny little babies sleeping in their cots with blankets wrapped securely around them. Much like Hero they had wires strapped to their chests and all around the delicate little features. The wetness on my lips was what got me to realise that I was crying.

"They look so fragile." A voice suddenly said, one unfamiliar to me. My head turned to the left as an older looking lady, probably in her thirties, came to stand besides me. She wrapped her arms around her stomach and smiled politely at me but I couldn't bring myself to do the same.

There was silence for a minute. "That's my little baby. Benjamin." She pointed to a baby near us. My heart stopped and I looked at her.

"He's yours?" I asked. She smiled, nodding.

"Born premature with a few health problems. He's three days old."

My lip quivered due to my sensitivity and the lady noticed immediately. I was pulled into a hug without a second glance and she rubbed my back soothingly. "Oh, don't cry, sweetheart. He's a strong boy. He'll make it through."