“I guess this is it, Ben,” I whisper, licking my dry lips. “I don’t know how I’m supposed to say goodbye to you, so maybe I won’t. I’ll still come and visit you. I’ll still love you, and I’ll still think of you. I’ll always have our memories.” I close my eyes and picture his face. Flashbacks hit me. The day we first made love. When he proposed. When we got married. The day we bought our first house together and moved in. He’s been the biggest part of my life, and now I don’t know how I’m meant to move forward. When loving and being with a certain person is all you know, all you want, what do you do when that person is taken away? How do you mourn and try and live at the same time? I can’t imagine my life without him. I don’t know how to live without him. Where do I go from here? He has always been my one constant. The person I turned to. My anchor. I’m adrift without him.
How do I survive this?
I remove my hand and use it to wipe the tears dripping down my cheeks. When I hear a deep voice say my name from behind me, I turn and look into familiar green eyes.
“Dean,” I say, eyes widening. I try and force a smile but fail. “You made it.”
“Course I did,” he murmurs, giving me a quick once-over, then closing the space between us and pulling me into his arms. “Fuck, Sabina. I’m sorry. I know it doesn’t mean anything, or change anything… but I’m so fucking sorry.”
For the first time since I heard the news that my husband was dead, I allow myself to cry properly. Why I break down now, in front of him, I don’t know, but it’s like with his strength here I finally don’t have to rely on my own. Maybe it’s because he said exactly what I needed to hear. As I sob into his leather jacket, the pain seeps through my pores. Dean rubs my back patiently, letting me have my moment of weakness. I’m not usually a crier. I’m the type who bottles emotions until I’m about to explode. I don’t really know how to process them well, and Dean probably will never know how big of a deal it is that he’s seeing me cry right now.
I guess it doesn’t matter anyway. I cry, and he lets me.
That’s all that matters.
It’s the best thing someone can do for me right now.
*****
I rub my eyes, groaning as the light turns on in what was my pitch-black bedroom. “What?” I snap, rolling over and burying my face into my pillow. I can’t remember the last time I left my room, and I don’t even want to talk about the last time I had a shower. All I’ve done in the last month is stay in bed in my pyjamas, listening to sad music playing on repeat. I created a Ben playlist and each song on it makes me slip further into depression, but I feel like I need this. I deserve this after the hell I’ve gone through. I need to mourn, and I get to choose which way I want to do that. I know that everyone grieves differently. My best friend, Tara, has been here trying to get me out of bed several times, and I know she’s worried about me, but right now, I just want to be alone. I don’t want to feel better. The pain is all I have right now, and it’s comforting me. It’s making me feel, and I’d rather that than feeling nothing at all. I just need some time, and I wish that they’d give me that, instead of coming to my room every day, trying to cheer me up. I don’t want to be rude to them, but I just lost my husband. How do they expect me to bounce back from that? There will be no bouncing. Just sleeping, listening to Babyface, Ed Sheeran, Sam Smith, and James Morrison, and wondering why this had to happen to me.
“I made you some soup,” a deep voice says, getting a reaction out of me for the first time in days.
I turn to look at Dean, standing there in my bedroom holding a bowl in his hands. “What are you doing here?”
I haven’t seen him since the funeral. He drove me home, helped me get into bed, and then disappeared. I assumed he went back on tour; I know he’s a busy man. He can’t exactly disappoint his fans no matter what the emergency is, which is why I wasn’t upset by his sudden disappearance. Plus, he owes me nothing. I was his cousin’s wife, and that’s it. Sure, we’ve spent time together over the years as a family, and I know him well enough, but we’re not super close. In fact, he’s never even been inside my house before, so why the hell is he here now?
“And how did you get in?”
“Tara let me in,” he says, placing the bowl down gently on the side table next to my bed. “She said you haven’t been eating, haven’t even left your room.” His knees hit the cream carpet as he looks over me. Pushing my hair off my face, he murmurs, “Eat, Sabina, now. I won’t leave the room until you do.”