door. I don’t need your fucking lasagna. In fact, I don’t ever want to eat lasagna again. It is probably the worst food in the history of shitty foods. Motherfucker.
It’s been a week since Stella’s funeral. I think. I’ve lost track of time. It has lost all importance. My days consist of drinking beer, sleeping, and…well, yeah, that’s about it. My cell phone died a couple of days ago, and I have no need to charge it. I don’t care about the texts, and I’m sick of the calls.
I know people mean well. But I just can’t find it in me to care. I’m sure Mr. Grant is wondering when I’m coming back to work. I haven’t been to work in nine months. Two months before our wedding, I went on an extended leave. I wasn’t going to spend my days working when Stella had so few days left. Instead, we spent the last nine months of her life together, striving to make every day count, to make each one special.
When I first took leave months ago, Mr. Grant reassured me that my job would be waiting for me when I chose to return. I’m grateful for that, for his understanding. But with the way I feel right now…I don’t know how I’ll ever leave this house again, let alone become a valuable member of society. I don’t need the money. Stella left me everything. I’m sure the money will eventually run out, and at some point, I will have to go back to work. Or I can just downsize and live below my means until this ache in my chest goes away, until I can breathe again without the pain that each breath brings. Every breath I take reminds me of the ones that Stella isn’t taking. Each inhale causes a new round of agony to beat in my chest. I don’t see how this will ever go away. I don’t know how I’ll ever be okay again.
When Stella told me a year ago that she was dying, I knew my life would never be the same. It’s hard to wrap my brain around the fact that it’s only been a year since her diagnosis. She died a year after her diagnosis, almost to the day. A year is no time at all. Yet, at the same time, I feel like I’ve lived a lifetime in that small space of time. I’ve loved and lost…experiencing such a range of emotions. At twenty-three years old, I feel as if my life should be over, but it’s not. Only Stella’s is.
It’s difficult. I don’t think anyone can understand what it feels like to be here in this space where, at my age, I’ve lost my wife to a horrific battle with cancer. Unless someone had gone through something similar, no one would know what it was like. I would give anything to not know this pain. But that isn’t my path. This is, and I agreed to it for better or worse.
What choice did I have really? Even if I had known what pain and guilt losing Stella would bring…I would have made the same decision anyway. No matter what, I would always choose to support her. Letting her battle cancer alone was never a choice.
Then, there’s Lily.
How can someone I love so much cause me so much pain? Or more accurately, it was what we did that I’m having a hard time accepting. I’ve tried to rationalize it. I was sad. I was lonely. I was drunk. Lily has always been my safe place, my comfort. In the moment, I wanted to feel all the sensations that Lily has always given me. I wanted to feel anything but sadness.
I know that Stella is gone, and she would want me to move on. But I’m sure she wouldn’t have been thrilled in the speed and manner in which I did so. It was deplorable and unforgivable.
Regardless of my never-ending love for Lily, I can’t even look at her right now. Even thinking about her causes a rush of guilt to run through me, so agonizing that it makes it hard to breathe.
Guilt has plagued me for so long. It was my guilt of not making Lily a priority in my life that caused me to initiate our break three years ago in the first place. It was that break that started me on this course to where I am today. Now, guilt is the only thing stopping me from finally being