The Color of Heaven

by Julianne MacLean

  If I had assignments or papers to write, he took me to the library, sat next to me and worked on finishing his own book while I studied or researched.

  I won’t say it was easy. I had no interest in anthropology while he was sitting across a table from me, looking more handsome and appealing than any man had a right to be. He was quite a distraction, and if I wasn’t simply marveling at how attractive he was, I was worrying about that tumor in his brain and dreading the operation and everything he would have to endure before he recovered.

  Or what if this was it? I wondered miserably. What if he didn’t survive and these were our last days together?

  Was he afraid? I was, but I couldn’t let him know it. Whenever my thoughts ventured into those disturbing territories, I took hold of my heart with a firm hand and redirected my thinking. A simple smile from Matt was usually enough to calm me. That’s when I realized I could hide nothing from him. Somehow he always sensed when I was afraid. His gaze would lift from the pages of his notebook. In those moments he would kiss my hand or my cheek, and reassure me without ever speaking a word.

  We were connected to each other. We always would be. No matter what happened, I knew that nothing about our relationship would be brief.

  I dreamed, on the fifth night, that I was walking through the forest at dusk. An owl hooted somewhere nearby. A thick layer of amber-colored pine needles carpeted the ground, and I could feel them snap and break beneath my feet as I meandered through the trees. I could hear the whispery rush of the sea from somewhere beyond my little grove. I could smell the saltiness, feel the chill of a fog bank rolling in…

  Everything was still all around me, and suddenly I grew frightened. I felt very alone.

  Then I heard a terrible roar behind me and thought it was an animal. I whipped around just as a cold ocean wave crashed into me, lifted me off my feet and carried me out of the woods.

  I’m not sure how the dream ended, but I think I must have drowned. I woke up in a panic, gasping for air.

  Matt picked me up at lunch hour the following day, and I told him about the dream.

  As soon as I mentioned the wave that swept me away, he looked at me sharply and pulled over onto the side of the road.

  He sat staring straight ahead, gripping the steering wheel, tapping his thumb on it. Then he slid across the seat and pulled me into his arms.

  I had always known that Matt was a spiritual person, but on the surface he appeared tough and masculine to the rest of the world. In high school, because of the way he dressed and smoked and drank, most kids were afraid of him.

  But when I told him about my dream, he broke down in front of me and wept into my arms like a child who had become lost and was just found.

  I’m not sure how long we sat there in his brother’s car, but I remember very clearly how I held him and kissed the top of his head and stroked his hair. No matter how tightly I held him, however, I couldn’t seem to get close enough. I loved him with such passion. There are no words to describe it. I would have died for him that night, if it would have taken away his pain.

  At the same time, I knew he wouldn’t have let me because he would have done the same for me. It’s why he was crying. He knew my dream was a product of my fear. He was facing death, and therefore, so was I. He was mourning the fact that I had to share his pain.

  “I’m so sorry,” he said. “I didn’t want to take you with me into this. I should have stayed away.”

  “No,” I told him. “It would have been worse if you’d stayed away, because my life would have been consumed by regret – the regret of not being with you. Thank God you came. Otherwise hell would have followed me forever.”

  That night, after dark, we found a deserted country road outside of town and parked for a while. We climbed into the back seat, kissed and took off some of our clothes so we could touch each other. He asked if I was still a virgin and I told him I was, but I didn’t want to be. Not with him.

  He insisted that we should wait, because the future was so uncertain.

  I agreed, but very reluctantly, and only for the time being.

  Chapter Forty-two

  Sometimes life can be impossibly cruel. I know that now. I discovered it in those days leading up to Matt’s surgery, when we didn’t know if it was the beginning of our life together or the end.

  But that’s life, isn’t it? For all we know, each day could be our last. What matters most is the appreciation and gratefulness we should feel for each precious day we have with one another.

  I lived more passionately in those five days with Matt than I’d lived my entire life. His pain was my pain, but the corresponding joy was immense. We were one, and that closeness, that connection, is what brought me closest to heaven.

  Love is our greatest achievement. Don’t ever forget that. Don’t squander it. Seek it. Experience it. Savor it every day that you can, because you never know when a rogue wave might sweep you away.

  “What if I choose not to have the surgery?” Matt said to me one afternoon while we were sitting by the lake on campus, watching the rowers.

  “What do you mean? You have to have it.”

  He leaned back on an elbow and looked out at the water. “No. The doctor gave me a choice. He said that if I have it, there’s a fifty percent chance I’ll die on the operating table. If I don’t have it, I could live for a whole year.”

  “Six months to a year,” I reminded him, because every minute counted.

  He glanced across at me. “The surgery’s in a week, which is making six months look pretty good right now, if I knew I could spend it with you.”

  “Of course you could spend it with me,” I said. “I’m not going anywhere, no matter what happens, but I don’t think that’s the right choice. The surgery could cure you completely. We have to try.”

  He nodded and tossed a small pebble into the water. “I know. I just thought I’d mention it.”

  I inched closer to him and laid my arm across his hips. “I guess it is something to consider. But don’t ask me to give up hope. Right now there’s a good chance that in a month’s time, that tumor could be gone and you could be making plans for the future.”

  He thought that for a moment. “If I do get my future back, I will do whatever it takes to get you to marry me.”

  I chuckled softly while a warm glow lit up my insides. “You wouldn’t have to do anything too difficult. I’d marry you tomorrow if you asked.”

  He gave me a sexy look. “I thought you weren’t ready to be Miss Suzie Homemaker.”

  “That was before. Things are different now.”

  Carefully, he studied my eyes. “Because I might die?”

  “No,” I firmly replied. “Because you’re here. Everything was wrong when you were gone from my life. Now it feels right again.”

  He reclined onto his back and watched the clouds roll by. I, too, lay down and looked up at the sky.

  “It does feel right,” he said. “I don’t ever want to be apart from you again, Cora. You’re like… the other half of me.”

  “I don’t want to be apart from you either, which is why I want you to have that operation.”

  He took hold of my hand and squeezed it. “Okay.”

  Then suddenly, he squeezed it so hard, I cried out in pain. I jolted upright, just as his whole body began to seize.

  “Matt! Are you all right?”

  But he couldn’t answer me. His eyes were rolling back in his head as he convulsed. I screamed for help, and people came running.

  The seizure stopped before the ambulance arrived, but Matt didn’t regain consciousness until he reached the ER.

  He was admitted and kept overnight while the doctors communicated with the medical team in Chicago to determine whether or not he should be released. There was some talk of airlifting him back and doing the surgery right away, but the following morning, when his vitals improved, they told us he could go home, but that he shouldn’t get behind the wheel of a car because there was a high likeliho
od of more seizures, which could occur at any time without warning.

  Matt’s brother, Gordon, who had come to the hospital that morning, gave me the keys to the car and told me to do the driving from that moment on.

  I went to see my professors in the afternoon, explained my situation, and told them I would be gone for a few weeks. They were exceedingly helpful and gave me advance reading assignments and papers to complete while I was gone, and told me to come back when I was ready.

  Matt and I left for Chicago the following day.

  I didn’t tell my parents.

  That night, we checked into a roadside motel, and I wondered what my parents would think if they knew where I was or that I was about to share a bed with Matt, after breaking up with Peter only a week ago. To me, it felt like a lifetime.

  I knew I would have to confess eventually. I just wasn’t ready to talk about it yet, or defend my decision to put everything aside for him. They simply wouldn’t understand. No one would.

  Matt carried our bags in and set them down at the foot of the bed.

  “I wonder if this is some kind of test.” He shrugged out of his leather jacket and tossed it onto the chair. “I’ve worked hard to be a gentleman so far, and God knows you deserve nothing less, but I can’t sleep on the floor tonight, Cora. I want to be close to you.”

  Immediately, I wrapped my arms around his neck. “That’s what I want, too. No one knows we’re here. It’s just us. You and me. As far as I’m concerned, the rest of the world doesn’t even exist, so we can live by our own rules.”

  He held me tight, then pressed his lips to mine. I felt like a woman, not a girl anymore. He was my mate, my partner, my great love, and nothing had ever felt so right and so real. I had no doubts about anything, and as I unbuttoned his shirt and slid my hands across his warm, muscular chest, all I wanted to do was give everything to him and take everything I could in return.

  Our passions escalated quickly. Within seconds, I was kicking off my shoes and pulling my sweater off over my head.

  Matt ripped his shirt off and eased me down onto the bed. His body covered mine in a wild frenzy of desperation. He kissed me fiercely and thrust his hips forward, cupping my behind in his hands and pulling me closer, almost roughly, but never hurting me.

  We still wore our jeans, which was the only thing stopping us from making love. He unhooked my bra and caressed my breasts, kissed my neck tenderly, told me he loved me.

  “I love you, too,” I whispered. “I’ll love you forever.”

  Everything about him aroused me. I wanted him with a fire that defied reason.

  I had never been able to give myself to Peter. This was why. Matt was the one, and nothing could have held me back from this. Nothing else mattered. I didn’t care how much time we had together. All I cared about was this moment in his arms, our bodies pressed together in love. I wanted to give him everything.

  He unbuttoned my jeans and slid his hand down inside, and I climaxed almost immediately.

  His open mouth smothered my cries, as I fumbled with his belt and tried to push his jeans down over his hips.

  “No,” he whispered into my mouth, shaking his head and eventually rising up onto his hands and knees. “I don’t want to do this, not yet. I want to marry you.”

  I blinked up at him in a bewildered haze of arousal and confusion. “I don’t care about that. Please, I want to be as close to you as possible. Tonight.”

  Brow furrowed, he stared down at me. “I can’t do that. We need to wait. I don’t know what’s going to happen.”

  Cradling the back of his head in my hand, I pulled him close for another soul-reaching kiss. “I don’t know either, which is why I want to make the most of every minute. Please make love to me. I want you to be the one.”

  My heart was pounding like a hammer. All my nerve endings quivered with a feverish need to give everything to him, but in the end, he would not give himself to me in return.

  A heavy tear fell from his cheek to mine, and he sat up on the bed, raked his fingers through his hair, and shook his head. “I can’t. Not until I know for sure that I’ll be around to be with you forever.”

  I sat up too, wrapped my arms around his neck, and told him that I loved him.

  But I wanted more. I wanted so much more.

  Chapter Forty-three

  I rose from the bed, opened my suitcase, and went into the bathroom to change into my nightgown and brush my teeth.

  While the water poured in a hissing rush out of the faucet, I sat on the edge of the tub and quietly wept. They were not tears of misery, however. I was expressing a strange mixture of emotion – something I had never experienced before – a simultaneous mingling of rapture and sorrow.

  On one hand, I was afraid for the future. On the other, I was euphoric. I loved Matt with every fiber of my being, and I knew that he loved me, too. It was the most beautiful thing I had ever known.

  A short while later, I returned to bed and watched him go into the bathroom. He closed the door behind him.

  I lay quietly, listening to the shower.

  Sometime before dawn, Matt rolled on top of me and kissed my neck.

  “I love you,” he whispered, and I immediately wrapped my legs around his hips and pulled him tight against me.

  I could feel his arousal through the thin fabric of my nightgown, which was now bunched around my hips.

  Again, he stopped and pressed his forehead to mine, shut his eyes and shook his head. “This is difficult.”

  “It doesn’t have to be,” I replied. “Let me ask you this… If I wasn’t a virgin – if Peter and I had made love – would you make love to me now?”

  “Yes.”

  I sucked in a breath. “Then please… It doesn’t matter what I’ve done, or haven’t done, in the past. I want you to be the one, no matter what happens. I know the risks. Please, don’t deny me this. If you do, I’ll never forgive you. I’ll regret it for the rest of my life.”

  “Me, too.”

  While he spoke the words, his hand was already sliding up my thigh, pushing my nightgown out of the way.

  Quickly, before he changed his mind, I shoved his pajama pants down over his hips and thrust my pelvis forward.

  It was all very natural and easy after that. There was some pain, of course, but I welcomed it. I was so happy that night, I can’t possibly express it. He made love to me slowly and gently and it was the most amazing experience of my life. It was everything I imagined it would be.

  I loved him so much.

  I will never regret it.

  Chapter Forty-four

  Matt and I stayed in his Chicago apartment for three days before the date of his surgery.

  I won’t describe those days, except to say that we enjoyed each other immensely and made the most of every moment. We laughed and cried, watched television and played cards. We went out to eat and ordered in.

  He showed me the box of manuscripts he had hidden away in his closet. I read his short stories and the novel he had finally finished. I made him promise to submit it to a publisher when he recovered, because I was quite certain it was the greatest novel of all time, though I admit that I may have been biased. Everything about Matt was perfect in my eyes. To me, he was a work of art, but I suppose that’s how love feels.

  I called my parents as well, and told them everything.

  Well, almost everything. There are certain things you just don’t share with your mother.

  I let them know that Matt would have the tumor removed on November 17 at 6pm.

  My mother then told me that Peter had come to the house to ask about me. He was very angry. They couldn’t blame him, and they did their best to talk him through his pain.

  I apologized to my parents, but told them it could be no other way, because Matt was the one I loved.

  In the end, they wished me well and promised to pray for him.

  On Sunday night, Matt was admitted to the hospital so they could run tests and prepare him for the su
rgery, which would last approximately six hours.

  On Monday morning, a nurse shaved his head. He couldn’t eat or drink all day, and he had to have X-rays and blood work.

  Gordon arrived around noon and told us he would stay in Chicago as long as we needed him while Matt recovered.

  Their father called shortly after Gordon arrived and spoke to Matt for a few minutes. He wished him luck and promised to visit him the next day.

  Privately, I thought of their mother and wished she were alive to be here with us at Matt’s bedside, but she had been gone a long time.

  Matt mentioned her when he hung up the phone. He looked at Gordon and said, “I really miss Mom.”

  Gordon nodded and said, “I’m sure she’s here.”

  We all sat very quietly.

  Later, I flipped through the pages of a magazine while the nurses puttered about. It was all an act of course – the way I sat so casually. I had no interest in the magazine. My brain was on high alert, listening to everything, watching everything. My heart was burning with terror and dread. I couldn’t eat or drink either.

  Why was this happening? I wondered bitterly. All I wanted was for Matt to be healthy, to come out of the surgery with a positive prognosis. I wanted to spend the rest of my life with him. I would have sacrificed everything – my family, my education – in exchange for the success of that operation.

  It was not up to me, however.

  I knew it, even then.

  Fate had its own designs, and part of that design was about to knock me flat on my back. An hour before Matt was scheduled for the OR, the most unexpected thing happened.

  I look back on it now with gratitude. At the time, however, I was concerned.

  Chapter Forty-five

  Sensing that Gordon needed some time alone with Matt, I rose from my chair and offered to get us each a cup of coffee.

  A moment later, purse in hand, I went to the elevator and pressed the button. As the doors slid open in front of me, I took a step back, for I found myself staring into the eyes of the man I had just jilted.