As a honeymoon Nick took me to Ireland where I showed him all the things that made up my family history. We were so in love and more than once we over heard someone saying it was beautiful to see two young people so meant for each other. For two weeks we lived in nothing but that love.
Finally we had to go home though. Nick needed to go back to work and I still had a few things left undone.
Time passed slowly and for that I was thankful but as that time passed my spells seem to come more frequently. The headaches, the dizziness, the weakness. It was all stronger and more often. I never mentioned it to Nick though. I wasn’t dying. Not yet anyway and I didn’t want to scare him into thinking I was. My time was coming though. I felt in inside of me. In my heart, in my body, in every move I made. It was coming.
We spent our days apart most of the time but every once in a while I would sneak into the studio and watch him with the other guys. I had done my research on the five men the world knew as the Backstreet Boys. For the most part they were very honest and open with themselves. They didn’t hide much from the millions of people who loved and admired them. I saw tiny things in them though that the world had never had a chance to imagine. Things like the complete and utter devotion Nick had towards Kevin. Perceived as night and day because of the age difference between them, in truth they had this undefined bond, a true need for the other to be young and to be an adult. I saw the way A.J. watched Brian’s humor as if trying to absorb his ability to make other smile. I watched Howie interact with his family as if they were the only ones who truly understood him. He had an insatiable need to keep the memory of his sister Caroline alive as if he were afraid the world would forget the gift she was.
So many precious little things I noticed. I wanted to share them all, but more importantly I wanted to share them with Nick’s child. The more time I spent watching him, learning him, and loving him the more I wanted a child to combined all the wonderful things between us. I knew the thought scared Nick though. He was still young, possibly not yet emotionally capable of being a father. I knew that and I understood that. More importantly I knew he was scared of raising our child without me. I didn’t want to ask him to do that, but I didn’t want him to ever forget either.
I lay awake at night in his arms and I wondered how long he would remember the things I had taught him after I was gone. Time had a tendency to fade the things we weren’t constantly reminded of. Would he forget all my gifts without our child to remind him?
“What are you thinking?” he whispered, pulling me closer as we lay in bed late one night.
“I’m wondering how long any of this will last once I’m gone,” I answered, looking up into his blue eyes.
“Why do you talk like that when you know it upsets me?” he asked, turning away.
“Why do you always turn away from a truth we can’t change?” I countered.
“You’re the one always talking about now, about this moment, about never thinking back or ahead. So why do you always talk about the end, about what will happen afterwards?”
“Because I’m facing the fact that all that will happen and I want to know that all this, today, you, me, us, that is all lasts even after I’m gone, Nick,” I said, touching his shoulder as he lay with his back to me. “Don’t turn away from me, sunshine.”
“What do you want me to do, Riley? Can you even have a baby?” he asked, looking at me.
I pulled back and looked away. “I doubt it. Not with the symptoms my body goes through and because I don’t know how long I have. I probably couldn’t even get pregnant,” I said, suddenly scared of the end had had so willingly come to accept. I didn’t want to die.
“Then baby why is this such an issue with you?” he asked, pulling me close to him.
“Because I want to know some part of me is here for you to see and feel and remember. Because I want to know I left some part of myself in this world. Because I want to know I had this single last dream that hasn’t come true yet, Nick,” I said, looking up into his blue eyes with my violet ones. “Why are you fighting it so much?”
“Because the more you talk about what will be after you are gone to more it hurts to think of not having you hear. Why can’t you be content with me, Riley?”
“Because you are my life, my breath, my every moment, Nick. But you can not be a physical part of me that will live on. You can’t have my eyes and my sense of humor combined with your smile and your hair.”
“I don’t want kids, Riley,” and with those words he turned over and refused to speak to me again that night.
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