The Stars Lie

-x-Three Years Later-x-

“Dylan, c’mon, little dude. Stop antagonizing your little sister,” Matt chuckled as he watched his four-year-old son stick his tongue in front of her face, causing the three-year-old Madison to give him an angry pout as she hit her fists on her knees. The little girl only knew a select few words in her vocabulary, and neither Matt nor Elise could understand her most of the time, but she definitely had her father’s feisty attitude.

“I’m not doin’ nuffin,’ Daddy.” Dylan defended himself, immediately pulling his face away from the space in front of his sister’s, giving his father his puppy-dog look. Matt just rolled his eyes and leaned over to pick up his son, hugging him before pressing his lips to his forehead.

“Nothing or not, she doesn’t like it,” Matt chuckled before looking down at Madison, who was reaching for him to hold her as well, not wanting to be left out. Matt had become adept at bending over to pick things up while holding his children over the last four years, and he easily leaned over to pull his daughter into his second arm. She giggled and gave him a wide grin before poking his cheek, leaning her head on his shoulder.

“I wuv ‘oo, Daddy,” Dylan said to his father, wrapping his arms around Matt’s neck. Elise giggled when she saw the way her husband was interacting with their children from the doorway, and then gave him a warm smile. He just grinned at her. He had the whole world in his arms right now, and the sun was standing right in front of him. He knew it was a stupid way of looking at things, but he knew for a fact that he’d never have felt this completely satisfied with life if he hadn’t met Elise. Their children made him feel like he was learning love all over again, and only now that he was a father did he truly understand some of the things his own parents had done for him when he’d been a kid. He couldn’t wait to see Dylan and Madison grow up into beautiful young adults. He’d be there for every one of his son’s sports games, if he ever got into sports, and someday, he’d walk Madison down the aisle with a man he knew wouldn’t be good enough for her—because no man would ever be good enough for his baby girl. He’d watch them grow up, and though it was a sad thought to him that they wouldn’t stay this little forever, it made him feel good to know that he’d be there every step of the way. And then someday, when Dylan and Madison were grown with families of their own, and the band had performed their farewell tour followed by a reunion tour some years later, he would settle into a small, cozy house with Elise somewhere in the middle of nowhere, and he’d watch her hair grow grey and hold her wrinkled hand in his. He had his whole life right here in this room with him, and he felt amazing for it.

“Are you ready to go?” Elise asked him softly, setting her coffee mug down on the end table beside the doorway that led into the kitchen. Matt looked over Elise’s shoulders and saw Carissa and Brian standing there, smiles on their faces. They’d gotten married a year or so after Matt and Elise had, and though they didn’t have kids of their own yet, whenever they needed a babysitter for Dylan and Madison, they were the first people Matt and Elise called.

“Yeah,” Matt nodded before looking at each of his children yet again. “Mommy and Daddy are going shopping, but we’ll be back tonight, alright?” he told Dylan and Madison, who immediately frowned and shook their heads.

“Daddy stay!” Madison whined, holding on tighter to his shirt, balling her small fists tightly into the fabric as she continued resting her head on his shoulder. “Mommy too!”

“Take us with, Daddy,” Dylan tried to ask, meeting his father’s gaze and then wrapping his legs tighter around Matt’s side, as if it would stop his father from putting him down. “I promise we’ll be good. Don’t make us stay.”

Matt smiled at his kids, feeling his heart ache as he handed Madison to Brian, though the little girl didn’t make it easy for him to hand her over. When Dylan saw his father hand his sister to his uncle, he felt tears pricking his eyes as he clutched his arms around Matt’s neck. “Please don’t leave, Daddy,” he sobbed into his father’s neck, holding on as tightly as he could. “I didn’t mean it when I spat at Maddie.”

Elise giggled, though she too felt somewhat guilty for leaving their children here with Brian and Carissa. But she and Matt had already decided that they needed a few hours to spend by themselves, since it had been so long, and they would be back before Dylan and Madison even knew it.

“I know you didn’t, tiger,” Matt said in a soothing tone, hugging his son tighter for a few minutes before leaning him back so that he could meet his gaze. “Take care of your sister while we’re out, okay? And be good for Uncle Brian and Aunt Rissa.”

Dylan knew by this point that he wasn’t going to be able to convince his parents to let him tag along for the shopping, and he jutted his lip out as he looked up at his Dad. “I will,” he muttered, before hugging Matt again. “Love you, Daddy,” he said after a few moments. Matt felt his heart warm at his son’s words, and he pressed a kiss to the four-year-old’s forehead before handing him to Carissa.

“I love you too, son,” he told Dylan before he leaned over to kiss Madison’s wet cheeks, giving her a reassuring smile. “Daddy and Mommy will be home soon, baby girl,” he reassured her before stepping back and grabbing Elise’s hands. He didn’t know why it was always so hard to leave their kids with someone else when they needed to get out, but this time, it felt different. This time, it hurt a little more, but he just chalked it up to the fact that the two of them had been trying so hard to convince him and Elise to bring them along to the store.

“They’ll be okay, Matt,” Elise murmured into Matt’s neck as they walked out to the car. “We’ll be back in time to feed them dinner.”

-x-

“Baby, what are we making for dinner tonight?” Matt asked as he grabbed a pepper out of the display, studying it for a few moments before putting it back as he wrinkled his nose. He didn’t do much of the cooking at home, so he’d just leave the food selections to his wife, especially when it came to fresh fruits and vegetables.

“I feel bad for leaving Maddie and Dyl there, so I was thinking we could make their favorite,” she murmured, giving him a small smile as she studied the vegetables before grabbing a small white onion, putting it into one of the plastic bags before adding it to the cart. Matt chuckled at his wife’s suggestion and licked over his lips as he nodded.

“I think they’ll like that,” he agreed with her. He put his hand on the small of her back before they started making their way out of that section of the store and towards the other aisles, in search of the ingredients that she’d need for this week’s dinners and snacks for the kids.

They took well over an hour to go through the grocery store, and they both decided that it would be a good idea to get a few little extra things for Dylan and Madison because they felt bad for leaving them behind. Matt had chosen a little white teddy bear for her, and a small Hot Wheels car for his son, knowing that Dylan was in that stage where he wanted to grow up to be a racecar driver.

“I didn’t realize we got this fuckin’ much,” Matt chuckled softly under his breath as he and Elise started to take the groceries out of the cart and put them on the checkout counter. Elise just smiled at him, leaning her head up to press her lips softly against his. She had just reached her hand into the cart to grab the final item before the sound of a gun going off rang out throughout the store. Several people screamed and Elise jumped, feeling Matt push him behind her and hold her against the magazine display rack.

“Nobody move!” A loud voice called out. Elise saw over Matt’s shoulder a man coming closer to the checkout counter that they were at, and several others at the other stations. This was obviously an organized robbery, and it scared her to her core. The first thought she had was of her children, and how grateful she was that they had decided to leave them at home this time. Then she thought of Matt, and how he was holding her, guarding her with his own body. He was left unprotected if one of the men shot a bullet at him.

She reached her hand up to place it on Matt’s shoulder, but he stopped her, shaking his head. “Don’t,” he murmured to her, keeping his eyes on the man that was now at their checkout counter. The cashier, a young girl no more than sixteen or seventeen, had already opened the register for him, and he was stuffing the money into a tan burlap bag. Elise saw Matt’s cell phone in his back pocket, and slowly started reaching to pull it out of his pocket. She had just dialed 911 when dropped the phone out of fright when one of the men fired another gunshot at the ceiling.

“I said not to fucking move!” The same man as before yelled out angrily before pointing his gun at one of the cashiers, the barrel pointed directly at the man’s head. Elise gasped, and tears started springing out of her eyes when she realized instantly that the man she was looking at right now very well could be dead within a second. When she gasped, the man turned his attention to her, and she saw his lips turn into a sinister smile. That smile turned into an angry frown when he heard sirens coming closer to the grocery store, and then looked at her feet to see the cell phone.

“You fucking bitch!” He yelled at her before pointing the gun in her direction. Matt shoved her onto the ground the second he heard the gun fire, and Elise screamed as she hit the cold tiles hard. In those three seconds after the gunshot had been fired, everything stopped. There were no gunmen, there was no robbery. No angry voices, and no gut wrenching fear. All she saw in those three seconds was the bullet hit Matt’s chest. It was as if she was watching an action movie in slow motion, the bullet seeming to take forever to enter his body, and then everything sped up again. Elise let out a strangled cry when Matt hit the floor, and she crawled over to him, not caring if the gunmen shot at her. She vaguely heard one of them cuss and say they had to get out of there, but she wasn’t paying attention to them. All she could see was Matt’s wide, hazel eyes staring up at her, the fear obvious in them as his hand shakily reached to grab her own. She felt the sobs wracking throughout her body when she saw the red blood seeping through his shirt, staining it, and she reached to touch his face.

“M-Mattie, stay with me,” she murmured when she saw his skin start getting paler. She remembered watching some medical show and started to put pressure on the entry, and leaned over to press her lips to Matt’s. He returned the kiss as best as he could, and then met her eyes.

“You’ll be okay,” he whispered to her, reaching with his other hand to hold hers over the wound. She let out more strangled cries when he slowly started to close his eyes.

“No! You can’t leave like this, Matt!” She screamed, putting all of her weight on the bullet hole in his chest, not letting up as she tried to resuscitate him by giving him CPR. But nothing Elise did could save Matt. His eyes had already closed, and though his heart was still beating, the pulses were getting slower with each second. He knew that he was going to die, and in those last few seconds of his life, his eyes unable to open so that he could see Elise’s face just one last time before he left, he prayed like hell that God would watch over his family when he was gone.

-x-

Elise felt like she was watching life through a series of still frames after Matt had died. She was numb to everything and everyone around her. She didn’t sleep at night, and she couldn’t sleep during the day. Matt and Carissa had Dylan and Madison staying at their house while the funeral plans were arranged by a few of their good friends and his parents, who were just as devastated by the loss as she was.

It still hadn’t sunk in completely to Elise, though she knew that today, it was finally going to be real for her. She would never get complete closure over his death; not when he’d died so needlessly, not when he hadn’t been done with his life yet. Today, he was being laid to rest, and it killed her a little inside each time she thought about it. She hadn’t been able to leave her house, and she knew she looked like a wreck. She hadn’t eaten in days, and she’d barely been able to function enough to shower and feed the dog. The only thing keeping her grounded now was knowing that eventually, she needed to pull herself together. If not for herself, then for their children. Dylan and Madison still didn’t understand that their father was never going to come home.

She hadn’t been able to explain to them what it meant that their father was dead. Neither child had ever had anyone around them die before, and even the dog was still alive. The concept of death didn’t exist in their world, and Elise had felt broken as she tried her best to explain to them that he was in a very long sleep, and that he wasn’t going to wake up. How did you tell a four-year-old little boy that his father had broken his promise to come home? How did you explain to a three-year-old little girl that her Daddy was never going to tuck her in again? Elise just didn’t know.

She heard a knock on her bedroom door and looked up from the edge of the bed to see Matt’s mother standing there. In just the past few days alone, the woman looked as if she’d aged ten years, and the smile on her face was obviously false. “Dear, we need to leave for the…” She started, before cutting herself off with a shaky sigh. She still couldn’t think of her son; her invincible, tough-as-nails son as dead. “We need to leave now.”

Elise nodded, biting her bottom lip as she stood up. She’d dressed in a simple black dress, and there was no effort put into applying makeup or doing her hair. She’d been doing her best to simply get dressed, let alone make herself presentable. She didn’t care what others thought of her. Hell, she didn’t even know if she cared about herself right now. Matt was…He was gone, and that was all she could think about. Never again would he hug her, or kiss her. She’d never welcome him home after a tour again, and she’d never wrap her arms around him after he’d had a long day. They wouldn’t grow old together, and they wouldn’t be there together to see their children grow up. Elise was all by herself in that now, and she felt more alone now than she ever had in her life before.

The drive to the church was short, and Elise just went through the motions of having people give their condolences on her loss. She put a small smile on her face, but everyone there knew it was fake, and they would return the smile with a sympathetic look and offers to be there if she ever needed to talk. As grateful as she was to be surrounded by friends, she couldn’t think of anything but the fact that Matt’s casket was sitting in a small hallway at the front of the church. It was open, but she couldn’t look at his face. She stayed by the casket, unable to leave his side for these last few moments that she was able to be there by his side, just like she’d always promised him that she would be there for him through their entire life.

When the time came to close the casket, a fresh stream of tears started to pour out of her eyes, and she stopped the funeral director from closing it so that she could look upon his face just one last time. She didn’t want her last image of him in her mind to be one of the way he looked in death, but she needed to see him to truly believe that he was gone.

He looked as peaceful as he ever had laying inside the casket, his hazel eyes closed forever and his hands folded over his chest. She almost expected him to open his eyes and crack a joke, telling her that it had all been an elaborate April Fool’s joke or something, though she knew that wouldn’t happen. She smoothed her hand over the material of his tux once before she leaned over to press a small kiss to his cheek before turning around to make sure that no one had brought Dylan and Maddie to see their father like this. She didn’t want them to go to bed tonight with the image of their father’s dead face in their minds. She wanted them to remember him the way he had been in life. Brian placed his hand reassuringly on the small of her back, and she turned to give him a small, appreciative smile before hugging him tightly.

The casket was closed, and Brian led Elise to the front of the church to take her seat in the front pew. Dylan and his sister were already sitting there with Matt’s father and one of his other friends, Dylan sitting between them and Madison on her grandfather’s lap. She took her seat and dabbed her eyes one last time, knowing the attempt to stop the tears was futile as the haunting sound of an organ started to sound throughout the church.

Elise heard the words that the pastor spoke throughout the service, but they didn’t really sink in. His friends took turns saying nice things about him, reminiscing about moments they’d had together and good times they’d shared, before his sister got to the podium to speak her final words about her brother. Elise knew she was expected to speak, but she couldn’t find the words, and when she moved to stand in front of those that were gathered in the church, all she could do was sob and look at his casket before Brian had helped her to sit in the pew again.

When the time came to take his body to the cemetery, Brian left him alone so that he could carry the casket along with his other friends, and she was instead supported by Carissa. Dylan and Madison were oddly silent the entire service, not knowing what was going on. Madison had asked her grandmother why her Daddy wasn’t there and why everyone was crying, and it had only caused Elise to cry harder as her parents-in-law helped her back out to the car. She held Dylan tightly in her lap while holding Madison’s hand, not wanting them to be far from her.

The same kind words were spoken over his plot of ground at the cemetery, and Elise stood as tall as possible as she watched the pastor pray over the casket before reciting Psalm 23. Elise had no idea what the words were supposed to mean, but she found odd comfort in them as she listened to the pastor’s words. She felt more tears forming in her eyes when his casket was being lowered into the ground, and it was only then that Dylan spoke up, tugging on his mother’s dress.

“Why are they doing that to Daddy, Mommy? He hasn’t woke up yet! They can’t do that to Daddy! Stop them, Mommy! He hasn’t woke up!”

At her son’s words, Elise’s throat closed as she dropped to her knees, pulling her son tightly to her body as she hugged him. She didn’t say anything; unable to find the words to speak as she tried to soothe him best she could. He didn’t listen to her, continuing to sob more erratically as the casket was buried.

“We’ll be okay,” she found herself repeating Matt’s final words into her son’s ear, smoothing her hand over her head. She herself didn’t believe the words, but she wanted the little boy to believe them more than anything. “Shh, it’s okay, Dylan. We’ll be okay.”

There was nothing else that Elise could say as she looked at her son. Over the last four years, she’d gained an entirely new world. She’d been blessed with the most amazing man she ever could have married, and she’d had two beautiful children with him. Before this past week, Elise had believed that fate had a hand in everything that had brought her and Matt together. Never before that night in Vegas had she been the type to do one-night-stands. And never before that morning she’d found out she was pregnant with Dylan had she ever thought she’d want a family. But fate had proved her wrong, and the stars had all aligned to bring the two of them together and create a beautiful life together. But the stars lied.