word. Tootsie wondered if God had given Gloria a beautiful singing voice in the next life. She closed her eyes and said a silent prayer that God would let Midge breathe easy and run and play when she got beyond the pearly gates.
Memories played through Tootsie’s mind in living Technicolor as she lay there beside her oldest friend, holding her hand as she tried to breathe. The three of them had been inseparable from her earliest memories. When Gloria died, she and Smokey had been stationed in Germany, and there was no way she could come home for the funeral.
Midge’s eyes popped open. “Gloria is here!”
“Honey, Gloria has been gone for years. Remember she had that brain aneurysm?” Tootsie said.
“I know that,” Midge whispered. “But she’s right there at the end of the bed.”
A cold shiver made its way slowly down Tootsie’s spine. Suddenly, she realized how lucky she was that Smokey had simply sat down in his chair after Sunday dinner and was gone when she went to wake him up to watch the ball game with her. He hadn’t had to suffer like this. One minute he was there; the next he was gone. The shock had been almost more than she could bear, but she wouldn’t have wished him back if he had to endure what Midge was going through.
Sissy came in with two pills. “Time for the pain medicine.”
“Don’t want it. Gloria has come for me.” Midge’s voice was barely a whisper now.
“Don’t be silly. You know what the hospice nurse said. If you let the pain get away from you, then it’s twice as hard to get it under control.” Sissy held them out to her.
Midge shook her head. “No. I want a clear head when I go with Gloria.”
“Okay, but tonight you’re going to hurt,” Sissy fussed.
“Tonight I’ll be in paradise.” Midge squeezed Tootsie’s hand.
Who did Smokey see just before he went to sleep that Sunday afternoon? Tootsie wondered. Was it one of his old army teammates, or maybe Luke’s father, who was his youngest brother? She hoped that when it was her turn to go, it would be Smokey who was in the room with her.
I’ll be there for you, darlin’. His voice was so clear in her head that she turned to see if he was with her now.
Midge drifted off again, and Tootsie let her mind wander back to the girls. Was Carmen out chopping more wood again? What would happen if she swung wrong and got a cut? They didn’t even have a vehicle to get them into town unless they drove the motor home. She wasn’t sure if Luke had even left the keys so the girls could use it in case of an emergency. She was so busy worrying about Carmen that she didn’t realize Midge had taken her hand away until she caught movement in her peripheral vision.
She jerked her head around to see Midge stretching out her fingers and then closing them, as if she were holding someone’s hand. Then with a slight shudder, she took her last breath. Midge’s hand fell back to the bed, and Tootsie covered it with hers.
“I guess you and God really did have an agreement,” she whispered as she slung her legs off the side of the bed. She found Sissy sitting in the kitchen washing a few dishes.
“She’s gone,” Tootsie said.
Sissy sucked in a lungful of air and let it out slowly. “Is it wrong of me to be relieved?”
Tootsie wrapped her arms around the younger woman and said, “No, darlin’. She’s at peace now, and I really believe that Gloria came to usher her out of this world. She was holding my hand until the last minute, then she reached out toward someone and took her last breath.”
Sissy began to sob. “But that don’t make giving her up any easier, does it?”
“Whether it’s sudden or a long, painful journey, it’s never easy to let them go.” Tootsie cried with her. “Let’s go sit with her a few minutes before we call the funeral home.”
Sissy clasped Tootsie’s hand in hers, and together they went into the room and sat in a couple of folding chairs beside the bed.
“She looks so peaceful,” Sissy whispered. “Like she’s just sleeping.”
“She didn’t fight going,” Tootsie told her. “Have you made arrangements?”
“She did all that two months ago. No funeral, just a graveside service. That’s to be tomorrow morning. She hated the idea of embalming, and she wanted a plain wooden box. I’m to