Heather's Heart

Heather had one of those hearts that connected to everyone. Even losing half of her right foot to a riding lawn mower at age five, she held no bitterness; her heart probably only got bigger. As seems true to all hearts an innate capacity to love more and more people, still Heather had a way of helping those she loved turn and better love those around them. She’s younger and shorter than I but somehow has always possessed a certain independence that surpasses my own. She may not know it, but she worked miracles. This is the story of Heather’s miracles.

Ten months ago, my life couldn’t have been better. The “holiday season” was just beginning and love was just pouring out everywhere. I was living with my boyfriend of three years, Wayne, whom I’d met Halloween night a little over three years before. We’d just had an awesome Halloween anniversary of sorts, dressing up as Mr. and Mrs. Smith. That worked well since Wayne’s even better looking than Brad Pitt and, well, I’ve got long hair and big lips. So I was up swirling in some rose-colored clouds starting into the holiday season (hoping this Christmas might finally be the one where two lives became one!).

Trouble started when I was out shopping with my best friend Mary. Guilty of being card-holding, wallet-drooling shop-aholics, we allowed ourselves only window shopping, but at least we did it together. We passed by a storefront stuffed with ostentatious wedding gowns and stopped to ooh and ahh. Mary put her hands around my arm like a three year old that wanted candy.

“Let’s go try some on, Em. I swear we won’t buy even a bead, but we’ve never just tried any on before! We’ll pretend you’re getting married.”

“What? Oh no, you know I’m a terrible liar.”

“It’s not lying,” she coaxed in her softly faded Australian accent. “It’s pretending. And you’ve got a great imagination and a great, long-time, handsome-if-somewhat-husky boyfriend whom you’d like to marry, so it won’t be far from the truth at all. Come on.”

She dragged me toward the door marked “pull” before I could protest. And we all know I didn’t really want to protest. I wanted to pretend.

“Good afternoon,” the lady tagged Alice said brightly, pins hanging carefully between her lips. She was kneeling on the floor at the hem of a beautiful cream dress when she looked up. She placed a measuring tape over her shoulders and pushed her glasses up her nose. She opened her mouth and let the pins drop into a magnetic pin cushion. “How may I help you?”

“My dear Emily here is getting married in March.” I swallowed as Mary continued. “We want to try on some dresses. Is it okay if I try some on, too, just for fun?” Way to make it to the point, Mary.

“You know, dears,” said sweet Alice in an accent . . . I’m guessing Irish, “I don’t care if neither of ya’s gettin’ married. It’s been a few hours since anybody came through, let’s have ya try on any dress that ya like.”

Mary clapped like that three-year-old again and I smiled in relief to not have even to pretend. Alice smiled wisely.

“Okay dearies, come to the mirror here and I’ll measure ya.” It wasn’t a job for Alice and we were happy to oblige to her every direction for the rest of the afternoon.

Mary, who looked perfect in any rags, looked heart breaking in every dress. How she wasn’t taken was a mystery to me. I knew the entire history of past boyfriends that she couldn’t seem to keep more than a couple months, and I knew her favorite and least favorite foods, movies, music, books, movie stars, hairdos, everything. I already had three sisters, but she was like the sister I got to choose, even though we really were divinely put together anyway.

***
When I met Mary, we were both in a helpless secondhand store, both trying to quell scaling desires to be in a bigger, more expensive store buying fancier, more expensive things, both pushing carts overflowing with mostly clothes we didn’t need. We pulled up to the dressing room about the same time and selected our first eight items to try on. I peeked over to Mary and basically saw my reflection, although much more petite. We had similar tastes in our first eight selections; the biggest difference obviously being size. Her size zero five foot-two frame made me feel like an ogre, even though I’m only a size eight in most styles. But it’s the two inches over six feet that usually gets the most attention.

She smiled when she caught me looking at her cart. I think right then I should have known she was reading my mind; I’ve learned that look since.

“It looks like you and me have a bit of a shopping problem,” I joked.

She smiled again, with a quick puff of air through her nose. “Problem, eh?” I heard her accent right away, even the way she was trying to lose it. I could tell. “A disease. A tragedy. An epic epidemic of lies to ourselves: ‘I need it’.”

“Yeah,” I laughed at her dramatics. “It’s so true.”

“Okay, well, come let’s try all this stuff on. We’ll tell each other how good we look and then we won’t buy even a zipper.” I just loved how zipper sounded like ‘zippah’. That was the beginning.

We left the store not a penny poorer, but a perfect friendship richer.

I knew she hated being foreign. She didn’t want anyone to know she grew up Australian much like I didn’t want people knowing I grew up Mormon. “People treat me different when they know I’m Australian,” she’d said. I replied, “I know…. Good thing I knew you were a shop-aholic before I knew you were an Aussi.” She smiled.

I knew she got just about anything with her smile. I knew just about everything about her, except for her family. I knew her “mum” was dead only because she revealed that one night when she was super drunk and uber-depressed about a bad break up. Anything else about her family was locked deeper than trust and farther than inebriation could open. But if she wasn’t going to say, I wasn’t going to ask. She seemed to want to just squeeze into my own eight-person family and I was fine with that.

***

The dress that Mary was in now was $1800.00. On her body its value seemed to go up. She twirled and swayed. I watched Alice watch her and suddenly wondered if Alice had any daughters or if she was as daughterless as Mary was motherless. Their smiles matched, though, as if this moment couldn’t have existed without the completing smiles.

“Okay, I love this one the best. Your turn, Em! Go on, get dressed.” She didn’t look at me but pointed to the dressing room, staring at her reflection and posing.

The first dress I tried on was sleeveless. I knew my mom would hate it but it was gorgeous. But still, it managed to make even me look stumpy. Next I tried a $2000.00 gown (dream on!) by Maggie Sottero. I didn’t tell anyone, but I already knew about this dress. It was the dress. It even had slight sleeves so Mother would be satisfied, but what I loved was how it made me look long and slim and feel like a magnificently comfortable bride. I lifted the gown as I took two steps to stand in front of the mirrors. Still in her favorite dress, Mary pulsed with joy.

“Aaah! Made for you! If Wayne were here, he’d be on his knee on the spot.” She teased, but I could tell she was sincere, too. I looked and tried to see what she saw. I stared.

“He won’t marry me,” I said, more honestly than I could pretend. “No matter what dress.”

“Em! Don’t say that! Just because he’s a blundering oaf, doesn’t mean he’s an idiot! He would be an idiot if he didn’t marry you. You are—“ she paused and hopped up the steps to put her tiny arms around my cinched waist, “the most perfect woman I’ve ever met.” She smiled into the mirror and into my furrowed eyes. Blast that girl, I couldn’t help but smile back.

“What time is it?” I asked abruptly.

“Oh! Dinner!” Mary grabbed the dress at her knees and lunged off to the dressing room like a cowgirl.

“It’s 4:25, my dear,” said Alice. “You really do look beautiful in that dress. This Wayne will come to his senses or you’ll find someone else and you’ll be glad because he’ll have better sense. I know that’s what they all say an’ it never helps, but it’s absolutely true. Absolutely true.” She knelt down again to hem and hum with pins in her mouth.

“Sure,” I said. Why was I getting break up advice when I’m nowhere near a break up? And Wayne isn’t an oaf, I thought. But then I smiled and went to take off the dress. An oaf and an ogre…

Walking to the door we said farewell to Alice.

“When you girls get on to truly be gettin’ married, come back here and I’ll get ya the perfect weddin’ package, okay?”

“Yes, Alice,” said Mary for us both, reaching out for Alice’s hand. “You’re the best!” I smiled my goodbye and we ducked into the rainy afternoon toward my car.

As usual, Mary put her hands around my arm and pulled herself close as we walked. I didn’t normally take to blatant affection or closeness of women, but that’s just how Mary was. But she seemed less energetic now. Was it the rain? My cloudy mood about Wayne after the sunny dress demo? I noticed something was off.

“How are you doing?” I asked casually. Just then she kind of tripped over her feet, half yelping and then laughing to cover her fall.

“Mary,” I laughed hesitantly. “Are you okay?”

“I’m – I” she held her arms to her chest. I put my hands on her shoulders and turned her to me to make her stop walking forward.

“What’s wr—” her head rolled forward and she went limp under my hands. I lunged to hold her from falling, easing her to the ground in disbelief. “Mary?”

Now I yelled. “Alice! Alice, help!” She heard me and came with surprising agility, dodging through the rain.

“What happened?” she called as she ran.

“I don’t know! She just – she seemed faint and I asked her how she – she put her arms up like this and -- what do we do?” My words came impossibly slower than my frantic thoughts.

“I’ll call an ambulance.” Alice turned about and joggled back to her store in a rush. “Check to see if she’s breathing and has a pulse!” she called back.

I shook my head and widened my eyes, hoping to bring back any first aid and CPR memories. I knew her neck was fine so I propped it nose-up and put my ear to her face, looking at the rest of her body. Her skin was so pale. Tears from my eyes started to drop like the rain onto her face.

“Mary” I said prayerfully. I saw a slight rise of her small ribs and started breathing quickly, maybe as if to do for her what she could not on her own. “Mary, can you hear me?” I put two shaking fingers on her Adam’s apple and slid them to the groove of that side neck muscle. I thought I could feel a pulse, but it was so faint and my imagination was pulsing so wildly I couldn’t tell.

“Mary,” I said now like a trained nurse, “listen to me.” I pushed my blue cardigan under her head so it would stay put. “You’re alive and you’re fine and I’ll kill you if you die, so just keep breathing.”

I knelt by her feet and lifted her legs into my arms. If her heart was struggling for blood then it wasn’t doing any good in her legs, right? Elevate the feet? That was taught in first aid somewhere….

It seemed like hours before I heard the sirens, but Alice could have been back only a few minutes when the paramedics arrived. That’s when I really lost it. Like when you scrape your knee, and you know you’re fine, but then mom asks if you’re okay and you break down? The presence of the ambulance made it too real, surreal, and it rained harder, and people gathered, and it felt like a funeral somehow and I got up to motion people on their way, wiping hot tears from my chilled, dripping face.

My cell phone rang. “Mom? Mom!” And then I couldn’t talk at all. I sobbed through her “honey? Honey what’s the matter? Emily what happened, are you okay?” All the while her voice flooded with emotion like the gutter filled with rain and I only added to the stream with flowing tears.

After trying to start the mouth motor with a bunch of stuttered “I, I, I,” I managed, “Mary. Fell. We’re going. To. The. Hospital!” I heaved sobbing breaths between each word.

I was watching Mary be put on a gurney and I didn’t hear whatever Mom said. The paramedics motioned me to join them in the ambulance and I walked toward them. Or maybe I drifted, or Alice pushed me. But I got to the step and realized my mom was still on the phone.

“Oh, Mom, I gotta go – oh, shi—”

I slipped on the step, hit my head on the open truck door and I fell, breaking my fall with my left arm on the curb’s edge. Searing pain in my forearm was the last thing I remember before my head smacked the pebbled ground.


Head pain was the first thing I recognized waking up. Tears were already gliding down into my ears and hair before I remembered Mary and then I opened my eyes and saw where I was and saw my mom and started really crying.

“Emmy. Oh Em, are you okay?” My mother’s presence was comforting but still incomplete. Her question sobered me surprisingly. I calmed my breathing.

“I don’t know, you probably know better than I do how I am.” I felt tired. Does the body rest when it’s unconscious or is it just on pause? The aches, the memories, the questions all came to the front of my senses.

“Sister?” It was Heather. I turned my head to the other side of the bed.

“Heather!” I breathed. “What are you doing here?”

“I was going to surprise you at dinner,” she said sadly. “I am so sorry.”

“Sorry? Wait, Mary…what about Mary? Why are you saying sorry?”

“Oh, no no, no I’m sorry, Mary’s fine! Oh Em, she’s fine and awake and smiling and everything. I just meant I’m sorry I brought bad luck with my surprise.”

“Oh Heather, that’s nonsense,” said Mom. “This isn’t your fault, it isn’t anyone’s fault. Emmy, sweetheart, Mary has a heart condition and she's just had an episode. It actually looks like you got the worse end of the deal for the day.”

She looked me over. So, so did I. I moved my toes and flexed my ankles and legs with no discomfort.

Mom caught on and quickly listed my injuries before I found them out the hard way. She’s a nurse herself, so she named all the medical versions of my body parts and I only understood because she pointed to the areas as she spoke.

“You fractured two ribs on your left side, shattered your left forearm, dislocated your left shoulder and have a slight concussion. And a scratch on your left temple from the ambulance door. I guess that’s a good door to injure yourself on if anything, since help would be near by. And I guess it’s nice that all the injuries are on one side.”

Sometimes mom thought some things were comforting that I did not.

“Em, you look pretty beat up,” said Heather. “Can we do anything for you?”

I closed my eyes and sighed. “Mary’s okay?” They didn’t say anything and my eyes shot open again with an accusing glare.

“You said she was fine! Is she okay?” Mom’s mouth searched for an answer and I looked to Heather. She didn’t look at me.

“WHAT is going on? Tell me now!

Heather took a characteristically deep breath, sighed, and commenced the explanation.

“Mary’s heart is really weak. I didn’t understand all that the doctor said, but since we aren’t family I guess we wouldn’t get the whole story anyway. But her heart isn’t really going to get better this time, I guess. She looks fine on the outside, just a little tired, but what’s on the inside counts this time, and, well, each beat is counting down to the end unless she gets a transplant.”

“How long does she have? Why didn’t she ever tell me this!” My blood sped hotly through my body. “What’s the fuh—effing point of this stupid life if the best people get the worst hearts and die? Why wasn’t she resting? I would have made her stay home and—”

“Em, I think that’s why she didn’t tell you. She didn’t want to be treated differently. She wanted you to be real around her and she was just being herself. We all feel really bad about it, but we can’t change anything. I’m so sorry, sister. We all love her so much. We are praying for her.”

I grabbed at the blanket with my fists and cringed from the pain that caused, then clenched my teeth to try holding back the rising tears.

“Why pray? You said so yourself, we can’t change anything, prayer can’t change anything.” I knew they expected me to say as much and I knew they would reply.

“Well, it can change our hearts—” I knew she spoke figuratively, but it stung all the same. I let out a sob and turned my head toward the Mom side of the bed. There were too many people in this room.

“I think I want to be alone now.”

“Em, I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean—” Heather said timidly.

“Now,” I said curtly.

I didn’t want to be mean. Just alone. They quietly left the room and soon I cried myself to sleep. Can’t change a heart. Not even one that deserves it.


When I woke next it was to Mary’s voice. “Emily?” She had five small fingers in my right hand and I squeezed them softly.

“Mary, why didn’t you tell me?”

“There’s lots of crap about me I haven’t told you,” she shot at me. “I have a rubbish heart. We’re all gonna die. Should I put a sign on my neck that says ‘don’t come near, don’t get to know me, I’m just going to die, it’s not worth it’?”

“Oh, stop. Mary, but we did so many things that must have been so bad for you…for your heart.”

“So I have to stop living my life just because my heart might quit sooner than later? So it’ll quit and that will be it. I’m not sitting at home for it to quit. I’d rather die mid-jump into the Grand Canyon than at home in bed. Or in a hospital.”

I noticed she was in a wheelchair. A pouch of fluid hung above her on a portable hook, a clear tube connecting to some vein. Her eyes were bright but her skin still looked faded.

“I’m mad at you. I’m sorry, but you’re my best friend and now I have to think about the rest of my life, growing old without you, finding another maid of honor, a babysitter for my kids, someone to call up and vent to—”

“Emily! You talk like I’m the only person you know! You’ve got a mom and sisters, an amazing family that loves you…and prays for you.” She split her beautiful face with an ironic smile. “They pray for me, too. I think that’s kinda cool, don’t you? I don’t think anyone’s ever prayed for me before. They’re really churchy people, do you think it will work?”

“Don’t ask me that. I don’t pray, no one’s listening. We can only do what we can do and then we die. Prayer can’t change anything.”

She was quiet and looked at our hands. “It could change our attitude maybe?”

“Are you being serious? I don’t know if I feel like being serious.” I sighed.

“I think I’m serious. I guess sometimes I do think about dying. I know I can’t stop death, but what if something’s there after? Should I try to get to know it before I get there? Is that possible?”

“It’s not possible. No one could really know anything beyond what’s here and now. They might guess, but they couldn’t know. How could they know?”

A nurse came into the room.

“Excuse me, Miss Murphy?” Mary turned her head toward him. “You need to take your medication. And you need to rest. I’m here to take you back to your room.”

“I’m talking to my friend Emily here, uh, what’s your name?”

“Andrew.”

“Andrew. Emily, Andrew. Andrew, Emily. Emily is my best friend and I have probably a very short time left alive to talk to her, so if maybe I could take that medicine later, that would be very great.” She smiled, but neither Andrew nor myself were going to buy it. Andrew was already moving behind her chair.

“Mary,” I said, “take your medicine so that we can talk again later. Take her away, Andrew.”

He smiled. “I’ll tell your doctor you’re awake. He has news for you.”

“Thanks.” I guess. News? Whatever.

My doctor said I was free to go home. I asked if I could just go up to be with Mary and he ordered for me to take some pain medication and rest at home and when I felt stronger, in maybe a day or two, that I could come during visiting hours.

I was assisted in dressing my body and wheeled tenderly to the front of the hospital where my mom and Heather were waiting for me. I stood and walked, my top half limping—if that’s possible, and got into the van. We drove home in silence.


I called Wayne and got his voicemail.

“Hey babe. Sorry I haven’t called in a couple days. You probably heard I was in the hospital, so…yeah. Well now I’m out. My mom brought me to her house so I’ll come by later to see you. I miss you! I’ve got this huge cast on my arm and that’s in a sling and there’s a brace around my chest…well, anyway I’ll be seeing you later. Love you.”

No missed calls in three days. Well, Mom must have called him so he didn’t worry, didn’t need to call. But if he had been in the hospital, I would have been instantly and constantly at his side… I got a new worry, in my stomach. Oh, Wayne. Not after three years.

Mom drove me to my place that afternoon. I didn’t see Wayne’s car in the lot. My heart crept closer to my stomach. Inside the apartment, all my suspicions dissolved…into more tears. His stuff was gone. All of it. Even the love seat we’d picked out together. I leaned against the bar counter and stopped experiencing all the vital symptoms of life: heartbeat, breathing, thinking. One word from my mom, though, and they all picked up with impossible speed.

“Honey--”

“Did you call him, Mom? When I went into the hospital?”

“He—I called, he didn’t answer. I left a message.”

“Oh, PERFECT!” I lost it. “He got just the chance he needed, then: three Emily-free days to pack up all his SHIT (I yelled it as loud as I could since I couldn’t hit or throw anything) and leave me. Me. Three years! Asshole.” I was so tired.

“Mom, take me back to your place tonight. I’ll come burn this place down tomorrow.”

“Oh Emmy.”

“Let’s go.”


A week went by where I only slept and cried. I couldn’t eat. Anything that a heart usually helped promote—health, appetite, desire, living—I didn’t do. I couldn’t do. Worse than ribs or forearms or heads is breaking the heart. Is having the heart broken. Twice. In one week. I just wanted to go see Mary and spend as much time as I could with her. But I couldn’t move. Muscle or spirit.

Heather came to my room like a nurse to a sick bed, every day convincing me to eat, helping me sit and get up so I could go to the bathroom. She didn’t say much, for which I was grateful. I didn’t want to hear anything nice, soothing, condoling, helpful, hopeful or religious, especially religious. God couldn’t exist, not now. For sure not now. At least not for me. For everyone else, fine, maybe he cared, but not for me. Obviously not for me.

“Emily, it’s been two weeks, it looks like skin and bones is all that’s left of you. You need to get out.” Mom opened my window blinds and I squinted from the brilliant haze of sun and snow.

“It snowed?” I pulled the blanket over my head. I would have liked to roll away from the window, but that would have been onto my left arm and shoulder.

“I don’t work at the hospital today and I’m going to church now. Would you like to come?”

“No.”

“Everyone from the ward would love—“

“Mom, no.”

“Okay. Well when I’m back we can go to the hospital and see Mary. Can I do that for you?”

I peeked from the blanket and nodded. “Yes. Please.”

“Everything for your shower is in the bathroom, can you get there and wash yourself without breaking any more bones?”

“Wow, I’m not so clumsy as that I hope. Yeah I’ll be fine. See ya in three hours.”

“Okay honey. Call if you need anything.”

“Mom?” I couldn’t go on stubborn like this forever.

“Yeah sweetie?”

“Thanks,” I muttered.

She went to the door to let herself out. “Love you, Emmy.”

I smiled briefly under the covers; she knew I loved her, too.


The greatest project Heather did on her weeks-extended Thanksgiving stay was for me: to go to my apartment and pack all my things up and get them transported to Mom’s house until I knew what I’d be doing next with my life. Who does that? Packs for someone? A whole house of stuff!

I gave her a tender, one-armed hug when she left and said, “I am grateful for you, Fethy.”

“I am grateful for you, sister!” She said as only she does. “I’ll be back for Christmas. It won’t be a surprise so I won’t bring any bad luck, okay?”

“Oh boo. None of this was bad luck! Shit happens. Oh, sorry. Crap happens.”

She smiled. “I’ll see you in a month, sis. I expect you to be all better by then!”

I spent every non-working hour with Mary. It was really easy to do since where I worked was across the street from the hospital. She slept a lot and so I read and wrote a lot. And thought. About dying. Not my own death, but about dying in general. All the Mormon doctrines stirred faintly in my mind, but I seemed to be fuzzy on a lot of the answers. But anyway, no one could really know about death, or beyond death. It’s not like anyone came back to say—oh wait, Jesus did. Well, but he already knew everything anyway. Whatever, that thinking made my head hurt.

“Hey, Em,” Mary gathered my eyes from inside a book. “Don’t you have anything better to do than be here? Isn’t there a world outside this hospital or has the end come already?”

“It’s over, yeah. We’re the last two alive, actually.”

“Not for long, though. My heart has, what, two weeks maybe three weeks of beats remaining? What will you do when I’m gone, the only woman left on Earth?”

“I could give you my heart if you like,” I said, maybe too seriously. “I mean, it’s broken, but if you’d like to live, I’d rather not live without you. You could have mine.”

Mary’s teasing smile vanished and her lips pouted.

“That’s a terrible thing to say. Your heart’s not broken, it’s just fine! You keep it! At least you have a soon-to-be husband/oaf to take care of it. You have a lot more—”

I don’t usually express emotion very obviously, but Mary is much too good at reading me and she knew without me having to say. For which I was grateful. I didn’t feel like crying just now. Not over a stupid man that doesn’t want my tears or deserve my love. More like he took my love and only left me with tears. Jerk. Stupid, stupid jerk. All this Mary could read.

“He’ll die a horrible death, dear. Don’t worry.”

And that’s all she needed to say. I laughed. I laughed like I hadn’t laughed in months. I hadn’t laughed, actually, for a whole month. I laughed until I cried and she laughed and cried with me until a monitor alarm started beeping and we both kind of freaked out. But a nurse came and it stopped after a few moments even though she couldn’t figure out why it had started. Mary smiled at me; we’d had our laugh. It was fine now.

Then one afternoon I came to her room and Mary had changed completely. Actually, physically she was the same: pale skin, all bones, lovely face. Her eyes, though. Usually bright, today they were cross, confused, fearful. Before I could even ask she spoke.

“Emily,” she didn’t look at me. “You can’t come visit me any more. I’m ruining your life, you need to go do normal things and just let me die. Just think of me as already dead if it helps, but I can’t have you come here any more and I won’t let them let you in to visit me. Please,” she choked back tears, “don’t come here any more.”

I didn’t know what falling down an endless tunnel felt like before that moment. No explanation, no conclusion, seeing nothing and reaching out but getting nothing, never knowing when to expect the moment when you’d hit bottom; never sure there would be a way out.
There were no words. I could tell she meant it. The pieces of my heart broke again. I don’t remember how I made it home.


Every day after work I still went to the hospital. I went to the cafeteria to sit and stare at a bowl of tapioca that I never ate, always hoping that somehow Mary would sense I was there and change her mind and not freaking die before I’d get to see her again.

My imagination concocted dozens of reasons and explanations for why she really threw me out, for why my life was pure shit, for why life had no purpose in general, for why my parents were splitting up after 28 years (yeah, more good news), for why men grew tired of perfectly reliable and loving women without warning and without balls, slinking away when she needed him most. I guess that all men did, even God. What was His strategy? Take everything away so I have nothing left to lose? Was that happiness? Having nothing to lose? Screw that. I want everything to lose!

The cleaning lady came to wash the floors so I knew it was time to leave to go to bed to not sleep so I could get up and go to work for another day.

As I left I stopped just for a moment to consider a cup of coffee. I guess I’m glad I didn’t because then I didn’t spill hot coffee all over me when this great sloth of a man threw open the door right as I reached it, slamming it into my left, yes my left, arm and shoulder and lancing me to the floor, on which I slid quite some distance since it was newly wet with mop water.

At first I couldn’t believe my luck and laughed as whatever just happened replayed in my imagination. Then the shock passed and the pain set in.

“Oh, dear God!” Came a thick Australian brogue. The sound could have soothed my pain had the pounding not been so extreme. There’s just something about that accent…but I squirmed, breathless, in the mop water and people began to gather.

“Should we call a doctor?” he asked.

“Oh no, that would take too long,” I said. “Call for an ambulance.”

His eyes sprang even wider, but in the shape of confusion. He must not have expected sarcasm with my first words of reaction.

“This one’s already broken, this one’s probably been re-located once again, and maybe I broke a couple more ribs. But other than that, I’m fine. I’m not seeing stars.” I looked at the cleaning lady and said, “but I am seeing an Australian kneeling at my right. Is that real?”

She nodded and twisted her eyebrows. Then she shook her head and put up the ‘caution wet floors’ sign.

The great Australian at my side spoke again.

“May I help you up?”

“Well, you did help me down. It would only make sense.”

Suddenly I was entirely in the air, supported by his arms. Luckily I was already used to heights because he must have been six-foot-four.

“So where can I take you?”

“Good grief, I can walk, ya know.” But I didn’t want to get down just yet. “I was headed that way before I got sent back this way.” I pointed to the door out. He passed through it, very gracefully this time, and kept walking.

“Now where.”

This couldn’t seriously be happening, right? I was dreaming. I closed my eyes tight and shook my head to open them again. The Australian still awaited direction.

“My car is parked out on the street. I’m going home.”

He carried me in a silence of substantial awkwardness. He cleared his throat.

“I’m, uh… I’m really sorry about my carelessness back there. Are you sure you’re not…more hurt?” He looked at my arm.

“My body is fine. My pride is a little bruised ,I guess. Oh, and my heart is broken. But you didn’t do that.”

“No, I wouldn’t do that, that is for certain.”

My mind paused. Whatever that meant. But we were at my car about then, so I told him he could put me down.

“Are you sure you can drive?” he asked fatherly.

“I must have gotten this car here somehow, right?”

“My name is Kyle,” he stuck out his hand. I didn’t see the point of introductions. On his other hand I also didn’t see a wedding ring. Girls notice these things…But whatever, I wouldn’t see him again. What were the odds? He was obviously very Australian, with a tan like that in Utah in December. Plus, from now on I’d be watching doors a lot more closely, so running into him would be less likely, and less painful.

“Emily,” I said and put my hand in his. He gave it a quick shake and let go. I reached in my coat for my keys. “Um, thanks for…the lift.” I added.

“I’m so sorry. You sure you’re okay?”

“Fine. Thanks.” I unlocked my car and he was still there. “So, well, have a good night, then.”

“Right. Good night, Emily.”


But I thought wrong. I still went to the cafeteria every day and sat in the corner behind my tapioca, but I saw that Australian man every day. He never saw me, though; he always just came in, grabbed a piece of fruit and a muffin and left again out that villainous door.

I knew he wasn’t a doctor since he’d offered to call one after he mowed me down with the door. But everything I observed about him told me nothing about what he was doing at the hospital every day. I guessed he was just a visitor. One actually allowed to see his sick friend, a friend that was practically family.

It had been a week now since I’d seen Mary. I figured she was still alive because I was certain I would be the first notified of her death. I don’t know. Maybe they’d check the recent phone calls from her phone and see they were all from me so they’d call me back first. I’m a dreamer, I think stuff like that. It was now also one week from Christmas. In two days I wouldn’t have to work at all and I could spend all day in the cafeteria. Whoopie.

Five days from Christmas, I didn’t sleep in even though I didn’t have to work. Even though I had nothing to live for, I made a special effort this day. I had an uncommonly positive feeling about the day. Maybe I would get to see Mary today. Maybe she would change her mind. I put on nice clothes, “church clothes” as they say, did my hair, put on makeup and even perfume. I did more in one day than I had in a month and a half. And all one-handed.

When the nurse at the counter still wouldn’t let me go back to see poor Mary, my heart and my lungs and my soul breathed out a sad sigh and I took the elevator back to the cafeteria. I walked cautiously through that door and luckily looked up. Looking down and charging purposefully forward was that tall Australian again…Kyle wasn’t it?

“Kyle?” I tried.

“Emily!” He halted. “We meet again. Our lucky doorway. Hello. How are you today?”

“Hi. I’m fine.”

“You look beautiful. Did you go to church today?”

“What? No. I don’t go to church. Why do you ask me that? Are you Mormon?”

“Um, well, I was just asking. I know a lot of people go to church around here. Sorry to assume.”

“Oh, it’s okay. I’m actually Mormon. Well, I think I still am. I don’t know. I was baptized when I was eight like everyone else.”

“Oh? Does everyone get baptized at age eight then?”

“No, I mean, my siblings were, before me. I grew up Mormon. But I stopped believing that stuff years ago.”

“Huh. Well, you must have come here all dressed up for some reason. Surely not just to see me?”

I laughed. “Oh, that was my only hope. No, I came to see a friend. But she’s…she’s sleeping. So I figured I’d just wait down here.” Uh oh. He read right through my terrible lie.

“Okay then. My friend is sleeping, too, actually. Mind if I join you? We’ll keep each other company until our friends are awake. Sound good?”

“Yes, I’d like that.”

I got tapioca and ate it as he told me all about Australia and his job as a magazine journalist. I oozed with jealousy seeing my own life’s fantasies being fulfilled by a stranger. He tried asking questions about me, but I deflected them as much as I could, using short answers with seamless transitions into new subjects.

After some time he had to go. He asked if he could see me again.

“We might run into each other here again, sure.”

His face already said what his mouth then spoke, “You are just full of non-answers, miss Emily. Well, let me help you out. I’ll give you a subject. If I see you again, we’ll talk about this Mormon church you no longer believe in. I have a feeling you could have a lot to say about that. Be prepared, yeh?”

He had a smile that I was sure got him anything. That reminded me of Mary. That reminded me that I was sad.

“Okay sure.” I painted on a smile. “It was nice talking to you, Kyle.”

“No, it was nice talking to you. I did all the talking. Next time it’s your turn.”

Next time was actually the next day. I hadn’t prepared anything. I already knew what to say about Mormons and Mormonism. It’s a nice little place for the goody-goody weirdos to gather and talk about Jesus and judge each other and those they’ve cast out and not let in yet. That was all I’d say and that would be enough. We sat down at a table and he spoke first.

“I guess maybe first I should tell you that I’m Mormon, too.” He tried not to smile.

“You’re kidding me. I thought you were Australian.” Mental hand slapping against the forehead. Oh, what a thing to say.

He laughed loud enough for the whole cafeteria to shake a bit. I shrugged my shoulders and slouched, hoping to shrink from view.

“I mean, I guess…I mean. Oh, I’m retarded. I really just didn’t peg you as a Mormon. Sorry.”

“Yeh, there are Australian Mormons, believe it or not. We’re not all kangaroos and dingos down there; we’re people, too, you know. With minds and beliefs and hearts…” I covered my blushing face with my right hand. “And we also have a sense of humor.” He nudged my elbow so that it dropped off the table and showed my face again.

“I’ve actually been living in Colorado for a little over a year now, for work. I met a girl—she actually looks kinda like you, only shorter. Huh, just noticed that. Wow. Yeh, you really do look alike, you two. You could be sisters.”

“Well I actually do have a sister who lives in Colorado.”

“Oh, that would be too much. Her name is Heather.” He stopped. Probably for the look of incredulity on my face. “Heather Fields. I thought it was the most beautiful name that it had to be made up.”

“I’ve thought the same thing, too. A beautiful name for an equally beautiful girl, though she hasn’t had much luck with fields…”

“So she is your sister! Emily Fields. Well, that’s nice, too. What do you mean she hasn’t had luck with fields?”

I told him about the time she lost her toes to the lawn mower in the field next to our house. He was a little grossed out about her toes flying out over the grass, but the conversation kept going on about Heather. It was pleasing to hear how everyone he knew that knew Heather out in Colorado just loved her and were so impressed with her. It felt good to be her sister, though no one would perceive us as alike except for our looks.

“You shouldn’t be so hard on God, you know.” He said randomly.

“What?”

“Well, I’m guessing you have observed a lot of unfortunate things happen in the church, that people do to one another. But that doesn’t mean God’s behind it. If Jesus wouldn’t do it, then it’s not of Him. People make mistakes. God doesn’t.”

“God also doesn’t answer prayers sometimes, and that makes us make a lot of mistakes.”

“Hmm. I can see what you mean.” He sipped at his hot chocolate that couldn’t possibly be warm anymore.

“So…” I wanted to change the subject quickly. “Did you join the church for a girl?”

“Oh, no. Your sister invited me to a fireside. It was musical and she figured I would appreciate it. I don’t know why. Maybe because I always had that camera around my neck so she figured I appreciated the finer things of life. Well, I actually did go—and yes, at that time, it was more just to go since she asked me—but I got hooked. It ruined me. Okay, not really. It ruined the old me…which was necessary in some ways. I couldn’t have done that on my own, so I know there’s a power in the church. And I know that it doesn’t come from the people in it, but from the Spirit behind it, and from the atonement it’s built on. I wasn’t an easy fix for God. But He did it. And look at me now.” He spread his arms and his smile out wide to his sides.

I smiled and suddenly, I was melting and melting inside. “Look at me now” I repeated, looking down at my spoon. I imagined what I looked like then. I hadn’t eaten in months, I hadn’t prayed in years; I was a lot more broken than I could ever admit.

I didn’t realize I was crying until Kyle reached a hand to my cheek and brushed tears away with his thumb. A stranger posing as my friend. It was sweet of him, but I, I—

“I should go.” I stood up and pushed back my chair. I got a slight rush to the head and leaned against the table. He stood and reached out to assist me. “No, I’m fine. I’ll see you later.”

“Emily,” he said. “Mary talks in her sleep sometimes. . .” He paused and I froze entirely. “I don’t think she has much longer actually. She’s really stubborn, I think we have that in common. But I think she needs you. You’re the only…real family she has. I will take you in to see her tomorrow, okay?”

I couldn’t say anything. I think the word for how I left the hospital is fled. I fled to my car. I drove for hours. I drove nowhere; I drove dangerously, I’m sure. I don’t remember. I couldn’t see much through my tears, my swelling eyes, my convulsing sobs.


Of all places to park, I pulled up to a curb on a street alongside the Salt Lake City temple. I always loved that temple. Its indestructible strength and beauty reminded me of God. Of course I’d never met Him, but I thought of Him as a temple. Only, one that was personable and loving, open and always listening and answering.

That’s what I thought back in the day. But then I just…doubted. I wondered could it really be possible, a being like that? And that made room for trouble. And I got into it. And I didn’t want to admit that I needed out of it, or wanted out of it, so I blamed the church and pushed God away. He couldn’t be where I was, anyway. I found a man that had made me feel happy. That was Wayne. I had found Mary and she…she completed me. We were so different, but we were perfect. And thinking of her dying. Well it meant I would die, too. At least, a piece of me would. A piece that could never be replaced, never heal or grow back.

Like Heather’s foot.

Whoa, that was random. Why would I think of that just now? Heather had never complained that she had lost a piece of herself that she could never get back. Did she ever wonder why? Why her? How was she always so damn positive and faithful about everything? What was it that she always said? ‘Nothing happens for nothing’? Something like that.

Where was that kind of faith made? I needed some. I looked at the temple, its glowing spires reaching to heaven. They reached and they reached, but they could only reach so far. God would have to come the rest of the way.

“God,” I prayed at long last. “I don’t think I can even reach all the way right now, and no, not because my shoulder is busted and my arm is broken. I think I forgot how to pray.” I must have sounded like a real winner. “I’m so broken I can’t be put together again,” I said.

The ridiculous nursery rhyme of Humpty Dumpty then popped into my head. What? I thought. I’m going crazy. ‘All the king’s horses, and all the king’s men, couldn’t put Humpty together again.’

In my mind then, as clear as my own voice came this imaginative conclusion:
“Let the King through, came the call of the crowd
He is the one with power endowed
He will take all the pieces into His hands
Put them together, as He understands.”

I smiled in spite of myself. What an imagination. I pressed my forehead into the steering wheel and pushed all my broken pieces into His Hands with the little faith I imagined I had, and prayed and cried myself to sleep.


An urgent tapping noise woke me.

“Miss, Officer Brady. Miss, are you all right?”

I was slouched over and pinned between the door and steering wheel and it felt like I’d broken my neck to get that way, but somehow I peeled myself upright and squinted toward the cop. I tried nodding but my neck was stuck.

“Yeah,” I croaked. No doubt I looked like a smashed toad; mascara stains down my face, swollen eyes, car upholstery pattern pressed into my skin. Woof.

Amazingly, the cop just nodded and walked on. Oh, just a traffic cop. Fine. As long as I didn’t have a ticket – nope, all good. It was seven in the morning. I had three missed calls. Two from Mom, one from Heather. I would see mom in a few minutes, I called Heather.

“Hey,” I said. “Is it too early?”

“Sister! No, I’m up,” she chimed. “Guess who called me last night?”

“Um, I don’t know. Why would I know?” I laughed.

“My friend Kyle! He said that he ran into you at the hospital and apparently you’ve made quite the impression on him.”

“Actually, he did run into me, making quite a solid impression himself.”

“What? He didn’t say anything. What happened?”

We talked for the whole forty-minute drive home and laughed about Kyle and about all the drama that was him becoming Mormon in a short month. Then we reminisced about Christmases past, laughing until our sides hurt and our smiles ached.

“I’ll be driving up either Tuesday night or Wednesday day.”

“Wednesday day, duh. Roads are bad enough during the day. No surprises, just come Wednesday day.”

“Okay,” she laughed. “You sound good, Em. I love your laugh. I’ll go visit Mary with you when I come, K? We’ll keep her cheered up for Christmas. She has to have one more Christmas!”

“Yeah, okay Feth. Thanks for talking; it made the drive go faster.”

“Drive from where?”

“Salt Lake,” I said. “I cried myself to sleep looking at the temple.”

“Oh, Em. You’re going to make it through all this. God can really help, too. He’d like you to ask Him to, though. He doesn’t want to barge in uninvited but he wants to help. Always.”

“I know.” I was surprised the preaching didn’t bother me this time.

“You do?” Her voice popped. “Oh that’s good,” she tried to sound unexcited.

“You can gloat if you want, Fethy. I think I had a break down moment last night and I’m done wrestling God. He won. Don’t get your hopes up for church right away, but God and I, we’re speaking again.”

“Gloat! Oh Sister! I’m so happy for you. And for God. Imagine all that time He didn’t get to talk to you! What if I didn’t get to speak to you for that many years! I would be so sad!” (Yes, she does speak with that many exclamations.)

“O-ho-kay, Sis. Well I’m home now. I’ll see you Wednesday night. Love you.”

“I love you! Oh I’m so happy. Okay, see you Wednesday, Sister. Muah!”

I wouldn’t tell Mom quite yet. I’d just let her find out. She likes figuring things out on her own. But some of the pieces were beginning to rejoin. I told Mom I wasn’t feeling well and asked if she had some Tylenol PM. I took three pills and slept all day. I think a reunion with God was all I could handle for this day; Mary would have to be the next.


In the Cafeteria the next day I sat right by the door. I’d made myself up again, this time for him, yes. I may have been broken, but I was still a female…But he didn’t come. For hours. I began to dread that he wouldn’t come at all. But that would mean that he was gone, and that would mean Mary was dead. No! Not yet.

I bolted out the door and into the elevator. I willed the beastly contraption to go faster and impatiently pressed the floor button again and again. When the door finally opened I rushed to the desk but stopped when I saw Kyle pacing in a waiting area. I walked toward his tall, anxious frame.

“Kyle?” He looked up. Without warning he took me into his arms and let out a long breath. “Oh no," I said, "please no. Is she…?”

“The doctor says she has a day left.” He let me loose but kept his hands on my shoulders. I placed my hands on his elbows, unsure of what else to do. He was proving to be an openly affectionate man.

“One day.” I repeated. I closed my eyes and watched seconds tick by on the back of my eyelids. Could the count down actually be under a day?

The doctor came out.

“She’s awake and fine for now. You can go in and see her if you like.” He eyed me, probably wondering what wing of the hospital I’d wandered from.

Kyle and I walked to the room that held our precious Mary. She was awake, but her eyes were heavy and tired. When she saw me with Kyle she wrinkled her brow. The heart monitor rhythm sped up, too.

“Mary, please don’t be mad that I’m here. I can’t stay away any longer.”

“Kyle told me you have come every day since I told you not to.”

I looked at Kyle, kind of jealous that he’d had the time with her, and grateful he’d spoken of me, kept me alive in her.

“Yeah, and I’ve been praying for you. I bet he didn’t know that.” Kyle looked sideways at me and then back at his sister.

“I stopped praying for me,” she said.

“Why?” I puzzled. “I didn’t know you’d started, but why stop?”

“Well, because one night I realized what I was really praying for: for someone else to die so that I could live. How selfish is that? I’ve lived a good life. Why should anyone else have to give up all of life’s opportunities just so I could have a few more decades on Earth? Do I deserve that more than someone else? I can’t ask for that.”

We were all quiet for some time.

“Why did you tell me not to come see you, Mary? I needed you.” I confessed.

Kyle spoke this time for her.

“That’s my fault,” he said. “I found her and she was upset that I finally did. She knew I wouldn’t leave her side and, since she hates me, she didn’t want you to have to be around me every day…and I probably would have sent you away myself, unknowingly. I worry too much about her. That’s why I’ve been looking for her for so long. I got lucky and finally found her house, but not her, unlucky when I found her in the hospital. I’m glad I ran into you…literally. I should have allowed visitors. I’m sorry.”

“You hate him?” I asked Mary. “I think he’s delightful.” His lip tipped upward briefly and I blushed.

“I knew you would. I know he’s delightful and I didn’t want you to like him. But I hate him for controlling my life like he was my father. They are both so over protective because of my mum. They didn’t want me to live, all so I could just stay alive, so I ran away. That was five years ago.”

“You haven’t seen Kyle in five years? Wow. Well either you’re good at hiding or he’s a terrible detective.”

“Both,” they both said and smiled that easy smile.

“But don’t give up yet, Mary,” I encouraged. “Christmas is just over a day away. Stick around for the holidays, yeah?”

“One day is all he said I have left. I’ll do my best.”

We didn’t talk much, because she was tired. But I held her skeletal hand and just basked in her presence. Even only half-alive she was still a positive charge for me. I didn’t go home. I stayed in the bedside chair all night and Kyle snored softly in the neighboring empty bed he’d offered me. I’d declined. I wasn’t tired.

Wednesday was similar. Kyle ‘fetched’ the breakfast. Mary moved food around on her tray but didn’t eat. I pestered her, and I would to the bitter end, to eat and get her strength. She surrendered, but still she couldn’t eat much and every effort exhausted her. She slept a lot, off and on.

My phone rang and it made both Mary and I jump. I grabbed it and slipped into the hall.

“Heather, hey. How’s the drive going?”

“Oh, okay. The roads are pretty scary! But I’m coming along fine. Just stopped for gas. How’s Mary. I had a feeling I should just call and see how things were going.”

“She’s tired. The doctor said she had one day left. That was yesterday. So, I’m just staying here every minute with her and Kyle.”

“Oh, tell him hi for me! Em, that must be so weird. I don’t know what I’d do if I knew my best friend was dying. It’s impossible to prepare for goodbye, even when you know precisely when it’s coming.”

“Yeah, no kidding. Will you go to Mom’s or will you just come straight to the hospital?”

“Well, I just talked to Mom, actually. She’s at the hospital, too, so I’ll just come straight there. I’ll call you when I’m closer, K? Tell Mary to hang in there! I’m praying for her!”

“Oh, she said something about that. She said she stopped praying for herself. She doesn’t want someone else to die so that she can live. I can understand that. What a hard thing to live with.”

“Well, but if she will live life to the fullest, she may just get a heart. She would make the most of every day.”

“Yeah, she always has.”

“Jesus died so that we could live,” Heather thought aloud. “He loves us a lot.”

“Can he really let us suffer so much, though, and then die?”

“There are worse things than death. And sometimes death makes some things better. Suffering ends, hearts soften and people draw closer to that Being that created them. God has an interesting way of moving all the pieces.”

“He’s the only one that can put them all back together again,” I smiled to myself.

“Yeah, totally. Keep up this attitude, Em. I like it!” She made a stretching noise. “Okay, I better get back on the road again.” She sang the last part.

“See you soon! I love you.”

“Love you more, with all my heart! See you!” She hung up.

I turned my phone to silent and went back into the room. It was the last I would hear Heather’s voice.


“Alice came by to see me, did I tell you that?” Mary said when she woke once.

“Alice?” I asked.

“Irish Alice, the wedding dress fairy lady.”

“Oh really! That’s funny.”

“She gave me a pin cushion in the shape of a heart.” She pointed to the bedside table. “It even has pins in it.” Her laugh was weak and spacious.

“She didn’t seem one for a tender approach to things.” I pushed a few stray pins deeper into the cushion. “How funny.”

Sometimes when Mary slept Kyle and I walked through the halls and talked. Time ticked away. I was beginning to need him already. If Mary had to leave I would need backup. He could become my new best friend. We walked with matching steps.

“Kyle Murphy, paging Kyle Murphy. Please return to your sister’s room immediately.”

We ran. We found an anxious doctor with a layered clipboard standing at the door. He approached us with pen and board extended.

“A heart just arrived and your sister can have it,” he said to Kyle. “We need you to sign here and we will begin the transplant immediately. The surgeon is already getting ready.”

Kyle looked at me with hurried concern and it seemed I stared into his eyes for eternity. I didn’t move. I wouldn’t be a part of this choice. I couldn’t. He signed.

We followed the doctor and a couple nurses to Mary’s room. She awoke as they mobilized the bed.

“What’s happening?” She spoke, her eyes still closed.

“There’s a heart,” Kyle told her.

“Someone died? Just before Christmas? Oh no.” She seemed like she spoke from inside a dream.

“Young woman, car accident, severe head trauma. Nothing we could do,” said the doctor. “She was an organ donor and…” he paused. “Actually her mother works at the hospital here. She bravely gave us the go-ahead. A really sad moment.”

Mary’s eyes shot open and blazed with knowing into my own where I stopped dead on my feet. She rolled away quickly and out of sight as they turned a corner I could hear her call my name; she may have started sobbing. Kyle saw I wasn’t following and stopped to return to me.

“Emily,” he worried. What’s—?”

He stopped because something behind me caught his attention. I turned, not of my own effort though…like a ballerina in a music box. A nurse with bright scrubs covered in blood was walking briskly in our direction.

“Oh, Mom,” I gasped. “Mom, no! No, no, no!” The word kept cascading from my mouth as I fell to the ground, to my knees; no support left in my exhausted soul, I crumbled into my mother’s arms, pressing my form to the last blood of Heather’s heart.

Mother and sister we cried until our heads were completely crammed with pain, our eyes entirely drained of liquid and our hearts empty of grief. I felt like a great stone, emotionless, useless except for weighing things down. Mom wanted to change her clothes, so she went home. I refused to leave.

When Mom left, Kyle returned from his respectful distance and silently put him arms around me and pressed his cheek to my head. I held his middle and let lifeless tears soak into his shirt. We stayed that way, and I fell asleep waiting for the doctor to come again.

That Christmas I spent the whole day listening to the beep of my sister’s heart in my best friend’s body. She had received the gift of life this year. No one can give or receive more than that.




* * * * * *
Six months later, Mary and I walked down a familiar pebbled sidewalk. She held on to my arm and squealed with excitement. We pulled open the door and were greeted by a knowing, motherly smile.

“Okay, so which one of ya’s will be lookin’ to get my perfect weddin’ package?” Alice looked out from behind a row of dresses.

I raised my sparkling left hand a bit and Mary pushed my elbow to make it shoot high into the air.

“This one, right here,” she proudly announced. “With my brother! Bring out a dress with sleeves, Alice. These Mormons will be getting married in a temple!”

Alice brought out my dress, the dress.

“Don’t forget a dress for me, too,” Mary said. “Just for fun. You only live once.”

We all smiled.

Mary had one of those hearts that connected to everyone.