Survivor's Guilt

by Michelle Arnold

  Greta couldn’t suppress her smile. “Lola’s not that traditional. How much cleavage is it?”

  “Well, nothing like you’d see at the Oscars, but it just dips a bit low in the front. I’m sure she will look beautiful though.”

  “She will,” said Greta dreamily.

  ***

  The rest of the day and much of the next day were a flurry of activity as Abi and the mothers made last-minute wedding plans. Although Greta and Abi were happy to accept that this wedding would be little more than an impromptu party, Sylvia seemed intent on making it as elegant an affair as possible, and Lola was more than happy to aid and abet her in this mission. She seemed to like the fact that Sylvia knew how to get things done, such as getting a florist to put together flower arrangements for the chapel with much less notice than the website said they required. Sylvia was accustomed to getting her way.

  The day of the wedding, Greta barely saw Abi, but Sylvia came in to give her a dry shampoo after the nurse had given her a sponge bath. Greta took off her nasal cannula – she breathed a little easier with it on, but it wasn’t strictly necessary – and Sylvia carefully applied makeup. It felt weird to have someone other than Abi do her makeup, but Abi certainly couldn’t make up her own bride’s face before the wedding, and Sylvia knew what she was doing from all her own years in Hollywood. It took the efforts of both Sylvia and the on-call nurse to get Greta changed into her new dress and transferred to a wheelchair. It was a very painful process since any movement aggravated her broken ribs, and it was made worse by the fact that she’d declined her afternoon dose of pain medication, but she wanted to be indisputably of sound mind when she signed her marriage certificate (she had, however, requested that pain meds be brought to her at dinner).

  “Just a few finishing touches and you’ll be all ready,” said Sylvia, draping the lace shawl around Greta artfully and then combing her hair again to make sure it was just so. She put a white satin high-heeled shoe on Greta’s left foot, and Greta looked down at herself sadly for a moment, wishing Jordan could have been part of the wedding wardrobe planning. He would have loved it.

  “You look beautiful,” Sylvia told her, handing her the bouquet of white roses she’d picked up that morning. “Abi is going to melt when she sees you.”

  “I can’t wait to see her,” Greta said.

  “Well, are you ready to head to the chapel?” asked Pam, her day nurse.

  “Yes!” said Greta excitedly. “Just leaving this wing of the hospital is exciting.”

  Pam wheeled her to the elevator and took her down several floors, then through a winding maze of corridors, while Sylvia walked at her side. Greta held her bouquet tightly in her left hand, eagerly awaiting the sight of her beautiful bride and the chapel where they would be wed.

  When they got to the chapel doors, Pam went inside to tell everyone she was there, and then Sylvia wheeled her in. Greta was instantly struck by how beautiful the chapel was, with its stone columns, wood-beamed cathedral ceiling, and a gorgeous rose window right above the altar. A red carpet led to the altar, with a few rows of chairs on each side, in which were seated Abi and Greta’s dearest friends from the crew of Mercy ER. She also noted Dr. Khan and Sue looking back at her and smiling.

  At the altar stood their officiant, Reverend Simmons, a round-faced African-American man with glasses and a cheerful smile. Off to his side stood Abi, and the sight of her took Greta’s breath away.

  She wore a white satin column dress with silver-colored beads forming vertical stripes. The dress was sleeveless and showed what Greta considered to be a perfectly tasteful amount of cleavage. Her braids were pulled back behind her with just a few hanging loose to frame her face, her long neck beautifully exposed. She broke into a smile when she saw Greta coming towards her, and everyone stood to watch Greta wheeled down the aisle.

  Sylvia parked Greta in front of the altar, turning her to face Abi, and kissed her on the cheek before going to sit down.

  “Are we ready to begin?” said Reverend Simmons.

  “Hold on,” said Abi. She ran to the audience and grabbed an empty chair, putting it in front of Greta. Then she sat down, knee-to-knee with her bride. “I don’t want to look down on you during the ceremony,” she explained, reaching for Greta’s hand. “We’re supposed to be coming together as equals.”

  Greta grinned at her, and the ceremony officially began. She was so entranced by Abi that she was able to forget her pain and discomfort for a while. At the end of the ceremony, it was Abi who wheeled her back up the aisle, onto the elevator, and to the activities room they had reserved for their very low-key reception. They had dinner from Greta’s favorite French restaurant, and a few people made toasts with sparkling grape juice (alcohol wasn’t allowed in the hospital). Dr. Khan and Sue remarked on how much better Greta looked than when they had last seen her and how exciting it was to see her continuing to get better. But eventually Greta found herself struggling to hold her eyes open, and Abi insisted that she be taken back to her room.

  “I might as well go change too,” Abi said when Pam pulled the curtain to change Greta back from her wedding dress to her hospital gown and reconnect her IV.

  “No,” said Greta. “I’m not done looking at you in that dress.”

  “Fine,” chuckled Abi. “But I still need to wee.”

  Greta was glad Abi was leaving the room for a minute so she didn’t have to see Greta grimace while she went through her painful outfit change. Once in her clean gown, she was relieved to put her nasal cannula back on. She gave Pam a grateful smile.

  “I’ve treated countless trauma patients, but I’ve never seen one smile as much as you,” Pam remarked.

  “I emerged from a coma to news that the woman I love loves me back,” Greta said thoughtfully. “And my happiness about that outweighs everything else.”

  “I’m glad you have her, then. Call me if you need me.” Pam left, leaving the curtain drawn. Abi came out of the bathroom not long after.

  “Well, here we are on our wedding night,” she said, sitting down in the bedside chair.

  “Yes. And we’re not naked,” Greta remarked. “In my fantasies, we were always naked on our wedding night.”

  “You fantasized about this?”

  Greta smiled. “Yeah, a few times.” Her fingers reached for Abi’s exposed collarbones and, watching her face for permission, traced a line to the exposed flesh between her breasts.

  “We’ll shag ourselves silly when the time comes,” Abi promised. “Right now, you’re not cleared for physical activity, and I’m not going to do anything to hurt you.”

  “And I can do very little to pleasure you in my current condition,” Greta sighed.

  “I don’t mind. Just knowing we’re gonna do it later is exciting enough for me.”

  Greta’s fingers drew lines up and down Abi’s cleavage. “Can I see you naked? Just for a minute?”

  Abi chuckled. “You wanna see what you’re getting?”

  “Yes, please.”

  “Okay, I guess I can give you that as a special wedding night treat.” She stood up and slowly unzipped her dress, letting it drop and pool around her feet. Underneath she was wearing a specially-shaped bra, and Greta watched hungrily as she unhooked it and let it drop. Next she hooked her thumbs inside her panties, and with a seductive little shimmy, pushed them until they fell around her ankles, then stepped out of them. Now naked, she turned this way and that, striking dramatic little poses. “You like what you see?” she asked.

  “I do,” Greta breathed. “Oh Abi, I really do.” She reached out with her good hand, and Abi came closer, allowing her to trace firm abs and soft breasts. “You’re the sexiest human being I’ve ever seen.”

  “Really?”

  “Yes,” Greta said without hesitation, her eyes moving up and down Abi’s long, lithe body and thinking about all the things she would do if she could. And she would do those things, as soon as she was well enough – which, unfortunately, would not be anytime soon.


  “All right, I’m starting to get cold,” said Abi. “Can I get dressed now?”

  “You may,” said Greta reluctantly.

  “I know it’s not the wedding night you fantasized about,” said Abi, pulling on a sweatshirt and sweatpants. “But we can still have fun cuddling in bed and watching a movie on TV.”

  “And making out,” Greta suggested.

  Abi laughed. “Yeah. And definitely making out.”

  16

  Over the Threshold

  “Here we are, home sweet home!” Abi put the car in park and looked over at her wife, who was gazing up at the house from the passenger seat. They had been married for all of three days, and Greta had finally been discharged from the hospital. Her chest tube was gone, lungs still inflated, and she was breathing well without oxygen. She still had weeks of therapy ahead of her, but it was time to get back some semblance of normal life.

  “I feel like I’m waking up from a long dream,” said Greta, her eyes shining as she took in the familiar surroundings.

  “Yeah, I know what you mean,” said Abi. Even for her, it felt like a lifetime had passed since she’d last spent more than a few minutes in this house. For Greta, who had had an entire block of time largely wiped from her memory, it had to be surreal.

  “I never imagined when I left this house how different my life would be when I returned,” Greta said, smiling at Abi. “I left with a broken heart, thinking you would never love me, and I’m returning with you as my wife.”

  And you left able to walk, dance, and do yoga, and you’re returning in a wheelchair, struggling to do the simplest tasks in physical therapy. Abi knew Greta would never say that though; she was focusing on the positive with all the patience of a saint.

  “I left here thinking you were probably dead, and I’m bringing you back very much alive,” Abi said quietly. “That’s what matters most to me.”

  “I hope a lot of the other passengers are going home now too,” Greta said. “I wish I had a way to find out about them.”

  “You’ve got enough to worry about already,” Abi reminded her. That she still hadn’t told Greta the truth was weighing heavily on her, but she couldn’t bring herself to do it. Imagining that her fellow passengers were recovering nicely just like she was seemed to matter to Greta, and Abi did not want to crush that image. She would tell her when her hand was forced; until then, she would keep changing the subject.

  “Here comes Janet!” said Greta, watching as Lola emerged from the house with Greta’s new home care nurse. They’d had nurses come to the hospital room for interviews, and Greta had picked Janet because she put so much emphasis on the emotional needs of someone in Greta’s situation. Abi had begrudgingly accepted that a nurse was necessary. When she had pictured taking Greta home, she had imagined just herself with Greta, the two of them finally getting some privacy after two weeks in hospitals. She wanted to take care of Greta herself; she didn’t need some stranger getting between them. But the hospital had made it clear that they weren’t planning to release her to her home unless she had a full-time nurse there to care for her, and Abi did want to take her home, so she was trying very hard to accept Janet.

  “All right wifey, let’s get you out of this car,” said Abi, getting out and going to the trunk to get the wheelchair they were renting from the hospital. She’d had to contact the city to get a special handicapped spot marked off and reserved in front of Greta’s house so they would have room to load and unload her wheelchair. She set the wheelchair up, and Janet lifted Greta from the passenger seat into the chair while Abi held it steady. “I’ll get her in,” Abi promised. “I may not be able to carry my new bride over the threshold, but I can certainly wheel her over.”

  Lola held the door open while Abi proudly wheeled her wife down the newly-built ramp, into the house, and down the hall to the kitchen. “Oh, everything looks so beautiful!” Greta gasped.

  Lola chuckled. “It’s exactly the way you left it. I’ve been bringing in the mail and watering the plants every day, making sure the house doesn’t look empty.”

  “I’d forgotten how much I love my house,” Greta said. “Oh, it’s perfect! And Abi, now you’ll be living here too!”

  “Yeah, I guess I will. Quite a change from my other address,” Abi noted. “I never thought I’d be living somewhere this posh.”

  “You’ll need to move your things over and change your mailing address. And your mother…well, I have plenty of bedrooms. She can live here too.” Greta smiled at Lola, who lit up.

  “Oh, Greta, that’s so sweet of you!” Lola gushed.

  “Do you really know what you’re getting into?” Abi muttered, bending down to Greta’s ear.

  “Can she afford to stay in that apartment by herself?” Greta whispered back.

  “No,” Abi muttered begrudgingly. She stood up. “We can make all the arrangements later. Right now I just need to get you settled in.”

  “It’s my house. I’m already settled in,” Greta reasoned.

  “But you’re going to be living in it a bit differently from how you did before, and that’s going to take some adjusting,” Abi pointed out. “Speaking of which, shall we test out the lift? It just had a tune-up.”

  “Of course!” said Greta.

  “We’ll take a quick trip to the third floor,” said Abi. “Just the two of us.” Feeling grateful for the wide doorway with French doors, Abi easily wheeled Greta into the breakfast room, where the elevator was located. She opened the door and wheeled Greta on, pushing the button for the third floor.

  “It feels strange not to be taking the stairs,” said Greta with a smile as they rode up. “The beautiful staircase is one of the things that sold me on this house.”

  “You’ll get to use them again in time,” Abi promised. She opened the door to the third floor and wheeled Greta out, just barely squeezing through the doorway into the master bedroom, which was clearly not designed to be wheelchair-accessible. “I bet you missed your bed,” she said.

  “I did,” said Greta, staring longingly at the beautifully-made king bed with its pile of silk pillows. “You’ll be sleeping in this bed beside me tonight.”

  “And every night from now on,” promised Abi, planting a kiss on Greta’s ginger head.

  “It’s so good to finally be home,” Greta sighed. “It feels like a hundred years have gone by. Can you take me back downstairs, so we can get lunch?”

  “Of course,” said Abi. “Mum went grocery shopping so we’d have a full fridge to come home to. I’ll make you a sandwich.”

  Back downstairs, they found Lola and Janet talking and laughing like old friends. Ignoring them, Abi got busy making sandwiches for herself and Greta.

  “Why are my silver candlesticks out?” Greta asked when Abi wheeled her to the kitchen table to eat.

  Abi looked at the candlesticks. “I guess they’re still out from when I was preparing for that candlelight dinner we were gonna have when your plane landed in New York. I thought I’d left them in the dining room, though.”

  “I brought the dishes down and put them away after Abi flew off after you, but I couldn’t figure out where the candlesticks went, so I just set them on the table,” admitted Lola. “I think I got distracted. There were just more important things to worry about.”

  “I had the whole dining table set,” Abi said wistfully. She closed her eyes, remembering the image on television of Greta’s plane crashing, Abi’s hopes and dreams going down with it.

  “Abi, are you okay?” Greta asked.

  Abi snapped back into focus, looking at Greta’s concerned face, taking in every detail. She was alive. She had made it. Abi’s most desperate prayer had been answered.

  “I’m okay,” she said. “Now that you’re back home, I’m okay.”

  “Were you remembering?” Greta asked.

  “The crash, yeah. I was afraid I was losing everything.” She looked down at her sandwich. “I’m never going to get that image out of my head, of the plane g
oing down.”

  Greta put her hand on Abi’s. “But I’m here now. I’m home with you, and I’m all yours, forever.”

  Abi looked up and smiled. “Yeah. You made it.” She squeezed Greta’s hand.

  “It was horrifying,” said Lola. “I didn’t know what to do but pray.”

  “It was all over the news at the time,” Janet chipped in. “Everyone was talking about it. It was such a bad crash.”

  A sort of sadness seemed to settle in Greta’s eyes. “I’m sure not everyone was as lucky as I was,” she murmured.

  “Well, lucky’s relative,” said Abi. “If you ask me, lucky is when your plane lands at the airport with no problems. Lucky is when your plane doesn’t crash.”

  “But compared to anyone who didn’t survive the crash, I am lucky,” reasoned Greta.

  “Yeah,” said Abi, clearing her throat and noticing Greta had finished her sandwich. “Would you like to move someplace more comfortable? Maybe watch TV or something?”

  “I’d love that,” said Greta. “But first I need to use the bathroom.”

  “I can help you with that,” said Abi, jumping up from her chair.

  “Abi, that’s Janet’s job,” Greta said gently. “Why don’t you go upstairs and find something to watch on TV for when I get done?”

  “But I can help you in the bathroom. You’re my wife, after all.”

  “Yes, but Abi, we still haven’t properly consummated our marriage,” Greta said patiently, causing Abi to feel the blood rising in her cheeks. “I don’t want our first intimate encounter to be you helping me in the bathroom. I had nurses helping me in the hospital, and Janet will help me here.”

  Flustered, Abi stood back while Janet wheeled Greta off to the nearest bathroom.

  “You’ve got to learn to let go of some things,” Lola told her.

  “I just feel weird having someone else take care of my wife at home,” said Abi. “At the hospital it seemed normal, but I thought once we got home, I would be the one to care for her.”

  “You take care of her in lots of ways, Abi, but I think she wants you to be more of her equal. She wants you to be the person she has fun with, not the person wiping her bum.”