Listed: Volume VI (2 page)

He
tried not to think much about what he was reading, particularly when characters
started to die. The reflections on death at the end were almost too much, and
he could barely get through Hamlet’s dying speech.

Tears
were streaming down Emily’s face when he finished the final lines of the play,
with Fortinbras's instructions for Hamlet's body to be carried away in honor.

He
had to look away again for a moment, but then he managed to ask, somewhat
casually, “So what did you think?”

She
was pale and incredibly weak, and obviously in a lot of pain, but she smiled at
him through her tears. “I loved it. It was the right one to…to end with.” Her
face twisted with another surge of grief.

Paul
couldn’t stand. He just couldn’t stand it. Every instinct in his body was
screaming at him to escape. It hurt too much. He couldn’t remember anything
hurting more.

He
couldn’t leave her, but he couldn’t answer. So he distracted himself by
checking her temperature and wiping her face again. Her fever was still
high—almost 103
⁰
—but not nearly as high
as it had been earlier.

Emily
didn’t say anything. She just gazed up at his face with an expression that
looked like understanding.

When
he was able to speak, he said, “Don’t talk that way. This isn’t the end.”

But
it
was
the end. He knew it. She knew it.

It
just was.

Emily
smiled at him but didn’t argue or respond.

She
moved around in the bed, evidently trying to find a cooler spot. “What a work
is man…what was it?”

Paul
knew exactly what the garbled question meant. “‘What a piece of work is a man!
How noble in reason, how infinite in faculty! in form and moving how express
and admirable!’”

She
nodded as he quoted the lines from
Hamlet
. “How old was he when he wrote
this play?”

 “I
don’t know. Mid-thirties or something, I’d guess.”

“Imagine
doing so much before you were forty. Writing something so true and beautiful
and…and good. Something that lasted so long. All I’ve done is my list.”

“You’ve
done a lot more than that, baby.”

Tears
streamed out of her eyes as she nodded in acknowledgement.

On
the verge of total collapse, Paul focused enough to pull the list out of the
nightstand drawer and unfold it. Only one item remained. He knew what she would
need without her having to ask, so he found a pen.

She
was too weak to hold the pen, so he positioned it in her hand and guided it as
together they crossed through the last item on the list.

They
both stared down at the worn paper—fourteen items, now all crossed off.

The
fulfillment of twelve-year-old Emily’s dreams for her life.

The
pen dropped out of her hand, and she closed her eyes with a smile. “I love you,
Paul. Thank you so much for helping me do all this.”

“You’re
welcome, baby. I love you too.”

After
a brief pause, she added, “I can’t believe you had those lines memorized.  You
really are kind of a geek, you know.”

The
amusement surprised him into a choked laugh. “Just don’t tell anyone else.”

She
didn’t reply. Paul stared down at her, and the amusement disappeared in an
instant. Something dark and heavy and awful started to rise up in his chest.

Her
body had relaxed. Her eyes remained closed. Her skin and lips were as pale as
the white sheets beneath her. She looked satisfied, at peace.

Finished
.

“Emily,”
he rasped, pushing the pen and list out of the way and grabbing her hand. “Emily,
don’t you dare give up!” His voice was rough, insistent, absolutely desperate.

She
didn’t respond. Didn’t react. She let out another long breath, and her body
seemed to grow limper. It was as if she were letting go—of everything.

Panic
swallowed him up, and he fell on his knees beside the bed, clinging to her
hand.  “Emily, baby, please don’t leave me. I mean it.”

She
didn’t even seem to hear him. Maybe she had just fallen asleep in absolute
exhaustion, but something had changed about her body, about her face. Paul was
terrified she wouldn’t wake up again.

He
fumbled for her pulse, and it took a minute before he could feel that her heart
was still beating faintly.

“Emily,
please.”

She
didn’t respond in any way. And he knew—he
knew
—she was leaving him.

The
room, the whole suite, was silent and empty around him. The future—alone,
without Emily—rose up before him like a dark, gaping maw. He couldn’t take it.
He couldn’t bear it. He couldn’t stand the thought of all those endless days of
living without her. He gripped her pale, little hand with both of his and clung
to it desperately. He might have been hurting her, but he couldn’t seem to let
it go.

She
didn’t react. She didn’t open her eyes.

She’d
always been tough, unrelenting. Years ago, she’d lectured him for cutting in
line in her dad’s store. Several months ago, she’d agreed to testify against a
powerful mob boss, when no one else was brave enough to do so. She’d fought
every battle in her short life without flinching.

There
were some fights you just couldn’t win.

He
buckled under the weight of his grief and buried his face in the bedsheet
beside her. His shoulders shook helplessly for a minute, and he strangled on
emotion he just couldn’t force down.

His
face was damp when he finally raised it, and he stared down at Emily in a
blurry, throbbing haze.

She
was dying.

With
a rough sound in his throat, he heaved himself up and got into the bed beside
her. He wanted to pull her into his arms, but he didn’t dare let his body heat
raise her temperature.

So
he lay beside her, clinging only to her hand. Her left hand, on which she still
wore his rings.

Only
a few months ago, she'd approached him with a ludicrous proposal, and he’d
accepted it because he had pitied her, having no idea that he would love her,
that he’d be remade and then broken by it.

He
lay beside her and closed his eyes, listening to her faint breathing as it became
slower and slower.

Hamlet
had believed that a divinity shaped the ends of human lives. His mother had
believed it too. It had been over ten years since Paul had believed in any such
thing, but he prayed now anyway—instinctively, in final desperation, to
whatever or whoever had any sort of power in this bitterly unknowable universe.

He
needed Emily to live, and he had no power to make her live.

She
was leaving him breath by breath.

*
* *

Paul woke up with a
jerk, his aching body jarred painfully.

He
must have fallen into an exhausted sleep on the bed beside Emily. He had no
idea how long it had been. He had no idea what day it was, what time it was,
what room this was.

He
lifted his head and stared down at her pale face.

Then
he pressed his palm against her forehead, her cheek.

She
was cool.

Terror
seizing him, he fumbled for the pulse in her neck, and he let his breath out
with a whoosh when he felt her steady pulse. Then he saw her chest rise and
fall slowly with her breathing.

She
was asleep. Her fever must have finally broken.

She
hadn’t left him yet.

***

Paul felt like he was
drugged, like he couldn’t even open his eyes.

He
fought through the dark fog of sleep until he was able to blink in the dim
light of the room. He was in his own bed in their Philadelphia apartment, where
he’d collapsed in absolute exhaustion after they’d arrived home late the
previous night.

He’d
slept like the dead for several hours, and now he was waking up alone in the
big bed.

Last
night, Emily had insisted that she sleep in her own room so he could get some
rest too. She’d been so weak after her prolonged fever and the long flight that
he hadn’t had the heart to argue with her, no matter how much he would prefer
to be close to her.

If
she’d slept with him, he would have kept waking up throughout the night to
check on her.

A
glance at the bedside clock told him it was already eight in the morning. He
couldn’t believe he’d slept so late. He jumped out of bed and hurried down the
hall to Emily’s room.

The
door was partway open, so he pushed in. He let out his breath when he saw Emily
sleeping peacefully in the darkened room. When they’d landed last night, he’d
sent Amy home to rest, and Lola, their regular night nurse, had sat with Emily
through the night.

When
she saw him, Lola got up from her chair and walked over to where he was
standing. “She’s been sleeping fine,” she said softly. “No fever yet.”

Paul
nodded, his eyes devouring the outline of her Emily’s body under the covers. He
wanted to touch her, to check on her, but he was afraid of waking her up.
“Thanks,” he murmured. “She can sleep another hour.”

He’d
made an appointment for them to meet with Dr. Franklin at ten that morning. He
was prepared to use any means necessary to ensure that they pursue more
aggressive treatments against the virus. Clearly, the initial experimental
treatments weren’t working, and they only had a very small window of time to do
anything at all. It wouldn’t be long before Emily’s fever returned, and Paul
was almost certain that the next fever would kill her.

He
went to shower and dress, and then he took his coffee and a protein bar to his
study to get through some email. He was woefully behind on his work at Simone’s,
which was not a good way to prove himself worthy of the added responsibilities
they’d given him.

He
couldn’t bring himself to care, though. It was almost impossible to think of
anything but Emily.

He
exerted all the force of his will and was able to focus enough to work through a
lot of his email quickly and efficiently. He was actually surprised by how much
he’d done when there was a tap on the office door, and he checked his watch to
see it was almost nine o’clock.

He
turned and smiled at Ruth when she came into the study with a pot of coffee to
refill his mug.

“It’s
good to have you home, Mr. Marino,” she said with an answering smile as she
poured the coffee.

“Thanks.
I’m glad to be home.”

He
meant it. The familiar surroundings were deeply reassuring. He didn’t let
himself think about how sterile and empty they would be without Emily.

“How
is Mrs. Marino?” Ruth asked. “She seems to have slept good.”

“I
think she did. She needed it. She’s had a hard week.” He sighed and took a sip
of coffee. “She’s been really sick.”

“Well,
I hope you don’t mind, sir, but I’ve been praying. I think she’s looking a
little better.”

He
didn’t argue, but he knew that was only wishful thinking on Ruth’s part. Emily
had lost more than five pounds in just one week, and she was still as white as
a ghost. She didn’t look better. She looked worse.

He
tried to smile in response, but he couldn’t manage any words.

Ruth’s
face softened. “Don’t give up, Mr. Marino,” she murmured. “Not yet.” Then, as
if she was afraid she’d overstepped her boundaries, she turned around and
hurried out of the room.

Paul
swallowed and turned back toward his computer. He breathed, tried to clear his
mind again so he could work for a few more minutes.

Before
he’d succeeded in focusing again, he heard another knock on the door. When he
turned toward it, he was surprised to see Jonathon Marks, the head of the
security firm he used, standing in the doorway of the office wearing a tailored
suit, with a newspaper folded under one arm.

Marks
was eminently professional and discreet. He stopped by occasionally to inspect
his security team, but he never bothered Paul for anything less than an
emergency. “Good morning, Mr. Marino,” he said with a polite smile.

“Good
morning.”

Never
one to waste time on small talk, Marks got down to business. “Have you seen
this yet?” he asked, unfolding the newspaper as he approached the desk.

Paul
shook his head. He hadn’t read a newspaper, watched the news, or checked any
news sites for at least four days. The world might have gone to war, and he
wouldn’t know about it.

“I’m
sorry,” Marks said soberly, laying that morning’s edition of a local paper out
in front of Paul and pointing out a picture on the front page beneath the fold.
“I don’t know how they were able to get the shot. The area should have been
secure.”

Paul
focused on the image, and his chest tightened as he saw a picture of himself,
carrying Emily to the car after their plane landed the night before. Emily
looked limp in his arms, and Paul’s broken expression was more revealing than
anything he would willingly have shown to the world. The caption beneath the
picture called him “young” and “devoted” and talked about him spending his last
days with his “brave, dying bride.”