Four years. Four years since he lost the love of his life, four years since his heart shattered into a million pieces, four years since he was left alone to raise their daughter.
Aria hadn't been feeling well, she hadn't been feeling well at all. The twenty-five year old didn't think anything of it at first. She had given birth to her little miracle Natalie Grace Fitz two months ago, and Aria was to busy worrying about her daughter to worry about herself. Ezra noticed subtle changes in his wife, and confronted her about her condition.
"Aria honey, you look a little pale to me." The concerned husband said on multiple occasions.
"I'm fine Ezra, don't worry about me." Aria would always say.
Ezra would sigh in frustration before giving his wife a gentle kiss on the lips. He'd give into his wife's wishes, and turn the other cheek. It wasn't until Ezra came home from work to see Aria vomiting blood that he knew something was seriously wrong.
"Aria, how long have you been throwing up?" Ezra asked as he scooped his small wife into his arms.
"I'm fine Ezra." Aria said as she wiped away the tears that were streaming down her face.
"No Aria, you're not fine! You haven't been yourself for months!" Ezra exclaimed.
"I'm just tired from the baby, that's all." Aria told her husband with a sniffle.
"You've lost weight Aria, and there are bruises all over your body." Ezra said with a sigh.
"Don't worry about me." Aria said softly.
Ezra was done giving into his wife. She needed help, and both of them knew it.
"Get your coat, we're going to the hospital." Ezra told Aria sternly.
"But Natalie..." Aria started to say.
"Natalie will be fine with your parents for a few hours." Ezra assured her.
Little did the young couple know, Natalie wouldn't just be with her grandparents for a couple of hours. Once Ezra told Aria's doctor all of her symptoms, several tests were run on her.
"If you don't mind Mrs. Fitz, we'd like you to spend the night at the hospital." Aria's doctor told her gently.
"But my daughter..." Aria started to say.
"She doesn't mind." Ezra said interrupting his wife.
As Ezra was saying this, Aria let out a tired yawn.
"Sweetheart, why don't you close your eyes?" Ezra suggested.
Aria nodded, and within minutes she was sound asleep in the hospital bed. Ezra used this opportunity to pull the young doctor aside and ask him a few questions.
"What's wrong with her Doctor Chance?" Ezra asked the man terrified.
"Mr. Fitz, it doesn't look good." The doctor told Ezra softly.
"W-what do you mean?" Ezra asked as tears began to form in his eyes.
"I can't be sure until we finish running all the tests, but it looks like your wife has chronic pancreatic cancer." Doctor Chance told the husband gently.
"Y-you can cure her though, right?" Ezra asked as he began to shake violently.
"Sir, it's a terminal cancer." Doctor Chance said sadly.
"N-no, you HAVE to cure her. We have a little girl at home who needs her mother, and I need her just as much." Ezra said as he began to sob uncontrollably.
"I'm sorry Mr. Fitz." Doctor Chance said as he walked into a nearby hospital room.
Ezra ran into Aria's hospital room and cried over his sleeping wife. The sound of Ezra's sobs caused Aria's hazel eyes to flutter open. It was very rare for Ezra to cry in front of her, so Aria knew that something was seriously wrong.
"E-Ezra?" Aria stuttered.
"What do you need sweetheart." Ezra asked as he wrapped his arms around his sickly wife.
"Will you take care of Natalie?" Aria asked as tears began to stream down her own face.
"Of course I will, don't you worry." Ezra said as he stroked her dark hair, which would all be gone in a few weeks.
Aria lived for another six months. She spend every waking hour with Ezra and Natalie, and tried to ignore all the physical pain that she was feeling. Ezra would sit by her hospital bed and read his wife some of her favorite books and poetry.
"Ezra, can you do me a favor?" Aria asked one evening while Ezra was reading to her.
"Anything love." Ezra said as he forced a smile.
"Can you pick up Natalie from my parent's house? I don't think I'm going to be here much longer." Aria said seriously.
"What do you mean?" Ezra asked as tears began to spill out of his blue eyes.
"I'm tired." Aria told him softly.
"You just need to take a little nap, and you'll be fine when you wake up." Ezra said as bravely as he could.
"Not this time Ezra." Aria said as she shook her head vigorously.
"Oh Aria!" Ezra said as he began to sob uncontrollably.
"Sh-sh, it's going to be okay." Aria said ask she wrapped her arms around her hysterical husband.
"How can you say that? I'm going to have to live the rest of my life without my other half." Ezra said furiously.
"I'll always be with you and Natalie, I promise." Aria said before giving him a gentle kiss on the forehead.
Here he was, sitting with his dying wife and sobbing. Letting her comfort him, when in reality it should have been the other way around.
"I'll get Nat now." Ezra said before kissing his wife and running put of her hospital room.
When Ezra returned to the hospital with their daughter, Aria immediately took the little girl and smiled at her.
"Mommy loves you so much." She whispered to her daughter
Ezra took a seat next to the two most important girls in his life and wrapped an arm around Aria.
"You know how much I love you, right Ezra?" Aria asked softly.
"Not as much as I love you." Ezra said with goofy smile.
"That isn't possible." Aria said with a small laugh.
Ezra responded by giving his wife a kiss on the lips. She smiled at him before her eyes began to close. The machine attached to her body began to beep, and Ezra knew that he'd never see Aria's beautiful hazel eyes again.
Line Break
It's been four years since that fateful night. Ezra works at Hollis, and spends all of his free time with his five year-old daughter Natalie. She is Daddy's little princess, and his reason for living. The little girl looks like a carbon copy of her mother, and seeing her brings Ezra great joy and great pain.
"Hi Daddy!" Natalie says as she runs into the living room with Ella following close behind her.
"Hello princess! How was school?" Ezra asks as he picks up his daughter.
"It was great." The adorable five year-old says with a smile.
"Thanks for picking her up Ella." Ezra tells his mother in law gratefully.
"It wasn't a problem, you know that I'm always happy to help." Ella says as she leaves the house.
"Daddy, guess what, guess what, guess what?" Natalie asks excitedly.
"What?" Ezra asks with a chuckle.
"Mrs. Petty is taking my class to see a show in New York!" Natalie exclaims.
"Really?" Ezra asks as his face falls.
"Really! All you have to do is sign the 'mission slip and I can go!" Natalie tells her father happily.
"I think you mean permission slip." Ezra says amused.
"Why don't you sign it now?" Natalie asks as she holds the paper out for her father to see.
The though of Natalie being so far away from him makes Ezra feel sick to his stomach. Ezra promised Aria that he'd take care of their daughter, and if anything were to happen to her, Ezra would never be able to forgive himself.
"I have a great idea! What if I took you to the zoo instead?" Ezra suggests.
"No Daddy, I want to see Annie." Natalie says as she shakes her head stubbornly.
"Nat, I don't know if I feel comfortable having you so far away from me." Ezra confesses.
"Daddy!" The five year-old whines.
"I promise I'll make it up to you! I'll take the day off of work, and we can do something special together." Ezra says with a smile.
"You never let me do anything fun." Natalie mutters angrily.
Ezra is what you'd call an overprotective father, but can you blame the man? Natalie is his whole world, and he can not break his promise to Aria.
"Natalie, please have a good attitude." Ezra begs.
"Maybe if I had a mommy she'd let me go." Natalie says with a sigh.
"Natalie Grace Fitz, you did have a mommy and she loved you very much." Ezra says as he tries to hold back tears.
"Then why don't you ever talk about her?" Natalie questions.
Ezra is taken aback by his daughter's question. The reason he doesn't talk about Aria is because it hurts way to much.
"You're not going on the field trip, and that's final." Ezra says sternly.
"Why don't you let me have fun? Do you not love me?" Natalie asks softly.
"How could you even think that? I do everything for you, and you accuse me of not loving you!" Ezra screams.
Natalie stares at her father shocked before she bursts into tears. Her daddy never raises his voice at her, let alone scream at her.
"Natalie..." Ezra says as his eyes soften.
"I hate you!" Natalie screams as she runs into her bedroom and slams the door.
As soon as Natalie is out of sight, Ezra begins to sob uncontrollably. His little princess, and his reason for living hates him.
Line Break
Ezra lays in his bed and stares at a picture of him and Aria on their wedding day.
"Oh Aria, I wish you were here with us." Ezra says as he kisses the picture.
As he is saying this, a sobbing Natalie enters his bedroom.
"What's wrong princess? Did you have a bad dream?" Ezra asks as he scoops the little girl into his arms.
"No Daddy." Natalie says as she shakes her head.
"What's wrong?" He asks her concerned.
"I don't hate you, I love you so much!" Natalie says as she wraps her arms around her father.
"Baby girl, I love you more than you'll ever know." Ezra tells his daughter truthfully.
"Can I sleep with you tonight?" Natalie asks her daddy hopefully.
"Of course you can." Ezra says as he carries her to his bed.
Natalie's eyes dart over to the picture of her parents on Ezra's nightstand. The father gasps when he realizes that he didn't put the picture in his drawer.
"Mommy." Natalie says as she points towards the picture.
"How did you know that?" Ezra asks in amazement.
He never leaves pictures of Aria lying around the house. If he did Natalie would ask questions, and Ezra can't handle talking about his lost love.
"Sometimes when I go to Grandma and Grandpa's house they show me pictures of her." Natalie explains.
"Oh." Ezra says in response.
"She's really pretty Daddy." Natalie says with a yawn.
"You look just like her." Ezra says with a sad smile.
"What was Mommy like?" Natalie asks her father curiously.
Before Ezra can stop himself, he bursts into tears. Ezra holds his daughter close to him as he sobs uncontrollably.
"Daddy why are you crying? You never cry!" Natalie says concerned.
"I'm so sorry Nat. I'm sorry that Mommy isn't here to take care of you, and that you're stuck with me. I've been a horrible father to you." Ezra says through his tears.
"No! You're the best Daddy in the whole world!" Natalie argues.
"I'm sorry that you don't know anything about Mommy. I loved her so much, and talking about her makes me miss her." Ezra says with a sniffle.
"It's okay Daddy." Natalie says as she stares at her father.
"It isn't okay. You deserve to know that your mother was smart, kind, beautiful, strong, brave, and she loved you more than anything in the entire world." Ezra says as some of his pain begins to melt away.
"Really Daddy?" The five-year old asks in amazement.
"Really honey. Even while she was sick, Mommy was always smiling. She was a better person than I am, and I still can't believe she chose me." Ezra tells her truthfully.
"Did Mommy hurt when she died?" Natalie asks Ezra.
"No, the doctors gave her lots of medicine. We were both in the room with her." Ezra says as he strokes his daughter's dark hair.
"Really? I don't remember." Natalie says as she tries to think back to that day.
"That's because you were so little." Ezra tells her.
"I know it sounds crazy, but sometimes I feel like she's watching me." Natalie says as she stares into her father's blue eyes.
"I believe you, I hear Mommy's voice in my head all the time." Ezra says with a slight smile.
"Wow." Natalie says in amazement.
"Before she died, I promised Mommy that I'd take good care of you. You're so much like Mommy that if anything were to ever happen to you, I'd feel like I lost her twice." Ezra confesses.
"Is that why you don't want me to go on the field trip?" Natalie asks as realization washes over her face.
"Yes, but I was wrong. You need to live your life, and I can't keep holding you back." Ezra says with a sad smile.
"I don't have to go." Natalie says to her dad.
"I want you to go." Ezra says as he shakes his head vigorously.
"Really Daddy?" Natalie asks as her face lights up.
"Really, but first I want to give you something." Ezra says as he scurries out of bed.
A few seconds later, Ezra comes back into the room with a jewelry box.
"What's in there?" Natalie asks curiously.
Ezra opens the box to reveal a diamond necklace.
"It's beautiful!" Natalie exclaims.
"I bought it for your mommy when we started dating. I think she'd want you to have it." Ezra says with a teary smile.
"Can you put it on for me Daddy?" Natalie asks him hopefully.
Ezra nods, before putting the necklace on the little girl.
"You look so beautiful." Ezra tells his daughter truthfully.
"Thanks Daddy." Natalie says as she gives her father one of her sweetest smiles.
Ezra stares into Natalie's hazel eyes and realizes that they're exactly the same as Aria's. For a minute, Ezra feels as though Aria is in the room with him and their daughter. Her presence is so strong that Ezra can almost smell her perfume. For the first time In four years, Ezra is at peace.
I'd like to dedicate this story to anyone who is fighting an illness, or anyone who knows someone who has died of an illness. Remember, everything always happens for a reason.