My Light in the Dark

All I wanted was to see the glimpse of the sun one more time. Sure looking out the window I saw the rays of the sun, the children playing in the grass and couples falling deeper in love in the summer heat… but I was cooped up inside. I wanted to feel the heat penetrate my skin and warm my whole body. However my condition prevented me. I was in the last stages of stomach cancer and by this point I was barely able to sit, let alone walk without pain.

My parents, my friends and even my boyfriend told me that the best thing for me to do was just rest in my hospital bed and get all the 'treatment' done so that I was healthy to go back home and outside. Who were they kidding though? I knew I wasn't getting better and better yet I knew that I was gonna die sometime soon. My cancer progressed to far and at this point it had spread to my lower intestine and my kidney's. For me to survive and recover from this is a one in a million chance.

"Hello Jacquelyn how are you feeling today?" Dr. Reece walked into the room with a warm smile on his face.

"Better than I did yesterday… You know John is supposed to come today. I wanted him to come and I wanted to ask him to take me to the beach. I just wanna be close to the water and sun one last time before I pass on. Would you allow it Doc?" Dr. Reece signed, sitting in the chair next to my bed and rubbing his forehead.

"You know that we aren't allowed to let you leave until you recovered or we see that you are doing better. The hospital and I can get into a lot of trouble for this." I slightly smiled knowing that he would let me leave. I had been his patient for the past five years and he had grown to love me like a father loves his daughter.

"If John agree's to taking you to the beach, I will completely ignore what is happening and make sure that the nurses do as well. But let him know that we aren't responsible for this and that if asked I will say that he sneaked you out to enjoy your final days." I slightly sat up in my bed, wanting to get up and give him a hug but simply couldn't.

"Thank you Dr. Reece, it really does mean a lot to me." He came up to me, patted me on the head and walked out of the room. A couple of hours passed and John finally arrived at about 1 pm.

"Hey babe, Dr. Reece told me you where feeling better." He came up to me and gave me a soft hug, trying to not hurt me. I kissed his cheek and smiled softly.

"Take me to the beach, carry me out, wheelchair me out. I don't care how you get me out of here but I wanna see the water, feel the sand between my toe's, breathe the fresh salty air while the sun is beaming on my skin and the sunlight is making my eyes squint." He looked at me concerned, knowing that taking me out was a risk and that this was against hospital regulations

"Babe, I would love to but the doctor and nurses won't let me. They won't be able to sign you out." I simply smiled and starred into his eyes.

"Don't worry… Dr. Reece knows and they will conveniently not notice that anything is happening." John smiled down at me and without another world went to the corner of the room and wheeled the wheelchair to my bed. Very gently, he picked me up and sat me down. I grabbed the bag that I prepared just for this occasion and he rolled me out, to the parking lot and sat me in the passenger seat of his blue Honda Accord. Sitting in the driver seat John turned the car on, put in the special Queen mix disc he made for me and drove out of the hospital parking lot. Queen just so happened to be one of my all time favorite bands.

"Let's head to beach pace, it's private and secluded so there won't be any people there like usual." He chuckled lightly and glanced toward me when he stopped at a Red light.

"That's exactly where I was planning to go." He interwind our fingers together and gently kissed my hand. The light turned green and he turned onto the highway, speeding his way to our place. The place that we met.

The twenty minute drive was quiet, but not awkward in any way. There wasn't much to say, all we really wanted was to be in each others company. We finally pulled in and onto the sand and just like predicted there was no-one there. It all felt as if it was out of a movie because life doesn't work out as perfectly as all of this had. John got out of the car and quickly ran to my door. Opening it, he gently picked me up and carried me close enough to the water for me to hear the waves crashing, but far enough so that when the tide comes in we don't get wet.

For a short amount of time I just sat there taking everything in, the serenity of what was in front of me. This was the last time that I was gonna be here and now this place seemed more magical then it ever had before. The seagulls flying over, the wind messing up my hair and the strong smell of the salty air that I could almost taste. These kind of magical moments is what most people want to experience but don't understand that they are always right in front of them.

I laid back into the sand, not caring if the scarf that covered my bald head got engulfed in the sand. I had to close my eyes because the sun was strong and my eyes where no longer used to experiencing sunlight without the shield of a window. Slowly a shade appeared over my head and John's sweat voice filled my ears.

"So is this everything that you expected it to be." I opened my eyes and looked up at John. The sun formed a small halo around his head. At that one moment I had realized that he was the sunlight in my path of darkness, he was the angel that protected me and made me feel better when demons attacked my body and mind. He was the man that loved me and stood by me even when it was clear that I wouldn't survive the disease that ravaged my body. A smile began to slowly creep onto my lips

"This is more than what I hoped for, Thank you for doing this for me and thank you for always staying by my side even now when it's clear that I won't make it." He softly smiled, sadness clearly evident behind his vibrant blue eyes.

"I still have hope that you will make it. I just want you to know and remember that I have loved you with my whole heart and soul and if it so happens that you leave this world, I want you to know that you have left a mark on me. You will forever have my heart and soul. I know there's no-one else out there like you, as unique and positive and full of life even when everything seems to be going wrong. I love you and will continue loving you till the end." It brought a single tear to my eye and John gently wiped it away. He kissed my forehead and then my lips gently. He slowly laid down next to me and we stayed for what seemed like hours, weeks even centuries in the sand, in the place that we called our own. .

In reality it was only an hour that we stayed there until I started to feel sick again and we had to head back to the hospital. My parents where there when we got back and my mother started freaking out on me, telling me how I shouldn't have left and lectured John on how I could have caught a cold and that would have killed me off.

That night Jacquelyn passed away with John by her side, her sunlight sitting in the chair that Dr. Reece had sat in earlier that day. He had given her something more than just the beach, he finally gave her the meaning to her life and opened a deeper meaning in their relationship to her. He played a deep role in her life and was the reason for her surviving as long as she had. Doctors told her that she won't live longer than two years, especially with the way that the cancer was progressing. But she outlived that date, by three years.