"We are sorry we lost her."
"What do you mean by you're sorry you lost her?" Thomas was beyond furious. He grabbed the doctor by his shirt and aimed to punch him. The doctor merely stood, not flinching, his lazy eyes studying Thomas' fist that hung mid-air. Thomas let go of his grip, his knees flowing like water, sending him to the floor.
"They told me you are the best doctor," he muttered.
"I told her not to get pregnant!" he yelled out loud. "She knew she couldn't get pregnant. I wasn't complaining! It was just fine having the two of us. Why did she have to care? She wanted to bear my kids… (soft) so bad." He grabbed the doctor's shoes and started crying.
"Lucy... why? Why'd you leave me?" He stood up fiercely.
"Wait, she can't be dead! I want to see her! What of my child?" His eyes had a strain of hope.
"Sir, it's a premature birth, and there was an umbilical prolapse," the doctor responded.
"What does that even mean? Huh?"
"It means… the umbilical cord came out before the fetus, and there..." The doctor was cut short by Thomas.
"Is my child dead or alive?!" His eyes were red and swollen in no time.
"Your daughter's alive."
Thomas breathed out the air he wasn't aware he was holding. The doctor led him to the room where his wife's body was. He stared at her. It was like he'd been pierced with a thousand needles. It was like his feet had been placed in a bucket of ice. It was like his world was falling apart. It was like his lungs were failing him because he couldn't breathe.
"God, why? Whyyy? Whhyyyyy!?" He slowly walked to her side, his hands shaking as he picked up hers. Her Caucasian face was pale. He gently kissed her hand and bowed his head to it.
"Lucy, you've got to come back. You know how hard it is for me to breathe when you're not near. I lose myself when you have to be kilometers away from me. Lucy... Lucy, please come back." He spoke softly as he raised his head to look at her. There was no response.
"Lucy, you are only sleeping, right? Like you'd sneeze or something. The car is outside, and it's very clean. I pumped all the tires, and there's no mud on it like you always complained about. I also helped with the house chores. Everywhere's clean. I..." He nearly choked and continued, "I didn't leave any soap lather in the bathroom… and I'm not letting the pet into the house anymore. It's caged. Lucy..." His voice grew weaker and dimmer as he started to sob.
The nurses stood bewildered, sharing in his tears. The doctor's face was calm and void of emotion. Years of experience—this was one of the downsides of working in hospitals. People die every day. Those people belong to a family. Someone sent them there, hoping they'd come home someday. Some are abandoned, some are unidentifiable. Some hope to leave the hospital as new leaves if God gives them a second chance. Some have simply lost all hope of getting well again.
"Ahem. Your wife died because she had postpartum hemorrhage. That's excessive bleeding," the doctor interrupted, not knowing how much longer he could keep up his emotionless façade. He, too, had a wife he loved very much, waiting every day for him to come home.
He signaled the nurse, and they brought him the child, having cleaned her up. The baby was placed on her father's chest. He carried her.
She was small and delicate. Seeing her only made him sob harder. A tear cascaded from the doctor's left eye. He let it flow.
"Hey, Lucy. Look at our baby." The baby struggled in his arms and let faint sounds bounce out of her throat. "She's so small and beautiful, just like you, but she looks like me so much." He painfully chuckled. "Hope." He smiled.
"I'll name her Hope, because she's giving me a reason to live, and I will hold on to her like I've been holding on to you." He started to cry again, and one of the nurses took the child out of his grasp.
"Lucy… Lucy, I love you. I know you can hear me. I love you, Lucy. Please wake up. I know you are here. Please be strong, my baby girl. I need you to wake up..."
Orator:
How do you have someone by your side, and the next minute they are gone?
How do you accept the reality you've woken up to and move on? It hurts.
These are scars, emblemed hallmarks on our quintessence.
They are here today; tomorrow, they are gone. You'll never know the pain until the scene from a movie becomes your verisimilitude.
If you love them, you must learn to let go.
They'll be the brightest stars watching over you.
It hurts to be left alone with a bag of emotions you want to trade, but no one has a need for: pain, regret, anger, bitterness, neglect, confusion, frustration, and fear.
The fear of not knowing how to move on.
The fear of never getting to see them again.
The fear of abandonment.
The fear of loss.
All these emotions harmonize and wage war against your essence. You're aching with regret; if only you could have been with them a little longer, given them much more... If only you had another chance to appreciate and care for them.
No one was made to live forever on this earth.
By design, every beautiful thing falls apart.
The skies give way to the outpouring of rain and the crash of thunder.
The trees hunch their backs with aging, losing their leaves and shade.
It's okay to grow old too. That's the beauty of life. Even if they die abruptly, everything has its designated hour; everyone has a predestined time.
A time to come into this world,
A time to leave,
A time to breathe, a time to decease,
A time to love and be loved,
A time to mourn and move on.
When the time comes, let them go.
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