Luke couldn't quite accept the quiet of night at the hospice. He thought that it should be in some small way like the hospital, where every hour of every day was busy saving lives. Here though, saving lives was a long forgotten dream. They were in the business of letting lives slip away peacefully and without fanfare.
The cancer that had appeared suddenly last year, spotted at a routine doctor's appointment had ravished her. Her body was frail, weak and almost unrecognizable. Her dirty blonde hair was long gone; replaced by an ever-rotating collection of hats. All her clothes hung off her, and for the last week, she's been swaddled in blankets, unable to get warm.
The doctor had warned them that this night would be the end. It was time to say goodbye, though Luke wasn't ready. He really couldn't ever be ready his mind reasoned. She was a part of him. He'd never be complete when she was gone, but she'd never really be gone as long as he held on to himself.
Her breathing had gotten noticeably shallower in the last hour, and he knew it was almost time.
"Grace, honey." He padded over to where the other love of his life, the first love of his life was dozing in a chair with their son on her lap.
Grace painfully opened her eyes. It was always a wrench pulling yourself from sleep into what felt sometimes like a waking nightmare. She shook her son lightly to wake him and one he was lucid enough to stand, Luke took a hand from each of them and led them to say goodbye to Cait.
Eight years old was too young to die, but then was there ever really an age at which death lost its sting for those left behind. The dark circles under everyone's eyes paid testament to the enormous strain of the last year, of the pain of watching a bright, vibrant child wither and die, eaten from the inside. The worst part was the utter helplessness though. It was pure and total hell to watch your child in such complete pain and to know that you had no power to prevent it. For all your understanding of the science behind it, you couldn't make it better.
Cait had never totally lost her spark though. Even to the last, before she's succumbed to unconsciousness four days previously she'd been herself. Her mother's daughter to the last, she'd had a weak mini-rant about the hospices' refusal to exchange the light bulbs in the hallways for energy saving models. She'd snarked that "just because she wouldn't be around to see it, didn't mean she wanted the planet to go to crap."
Luke had died just a little at that moment, and then he'd scolded her for cursing.
James, at only ten, was showing maturity beyond his years. He let go of his parents' hands and walked forward to the bed. He kissed his sister on the cheek and left the room. He'd told Luke that he didn't want to see the very end, and that was ok. Aunt Joan was down the hall with Grams and Grandpa, and he'd be fine there.
Luke wrapped his arms around his wife's waist, and she leaned into him with a heartsick weariness.
"Almost time," he whispered to her.
"Yeah." An errant tear slipped down her cheek. "You know Joan was telling her all about the people she'd meet. She told her about that kid Rocky, and Adam's Mom and my Mom, and Judith."
"She'll have people to take care of her."
"I know."
"I love you Grace."
"Love you too."
The shallow breathing was slower now.
The kids were Jewish. Grace's faith had grown stronger since her mother's death. But at that moment, Luke couldn't help thinking of a prayer he'd said every night as a young child, before science had become his religion. 'Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep. If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.'