Its not your fault

Darling, you were always my favourite. I lived for you. Would have died for you. But somehow I lived and you died.

That fateful day when your heart beat its last, I was there, waiting by your bedside for the moment that would free you from the pain.

As I watched you fade away, I didn’t think of that truck. I didn’t think of the wedding that we had planned for in the summer. I didn’t think of how I would live with the guilt of having survived the accident. All I could think of was that golden day last summer when you took my hand in yours and danced me around the garden, smiling mischievously as I waited with bated breath, never asking the question yet asking it in every way unspoken until I finally couldn’t wait and asked it myself. I remember your uproarious laugh at having outlasted me.

And I cried as I watched you, knowing it was I who would outlast you and not wanting it, hating it, hating myself, hating that truck.

Yet here I am, at the altar, with my husband-to-be. Wondering whether this was wrong even as I watch him smile lovingly at me, wondering if his love will conquer my guilt, break the invisible shield of blame that I have built around myself. He knows. I’ve told him and yet here we are.

As we are about to exchange rings, I think I see you, my darling. You bend down and whisper, “Its going to be fine. Its not your fault. Let go.” I smile at my husband to be, the first truly glorious smile I’ve given him since we met.