Kneeling on the bed between her wife's legs, Lena brushed her fingers over the fresh, purple scar that disturbed the otherwise perfectly smooth skin. She lingered there, memorizing the feeling of each bump and valley, careful to keep her touch light. Stef watched as she barely touched her lips to the healing wound and then laid her forehead against her wife's bare stomach, her eyes closed tight. Stef reached down and smoothed the hair on the back of her head, feeling Lena's tears drop onto her belly.
"Sweetheart, it's okay. I'm okay," she assured Lena, unsure what her wife needed in this moment.
Lena sighed deeply before lifting her head to look at Stef, tears in her eyes. "I know. I'm sorry. It's just… every time I see the scar I'm reminded that there is a bullet inside of you. That something so small almost took you away from me. And that thing that almost killed you is still there. It's now a part of you and knowing that…" She paused, searching for the right words. "It just brings the terror back like it's happening now. And when I realize it's over and I don't have to feel that fear anymore… I'm so grateful that I still have you." Guilt flooded through Stef. She knew it was going to take time for Lena to get past the trauma but this was the first time she'd spoken so openly about how she felt and Stef realized that her wife's healing was going to take a lot longer than her own. As her physical wound healed, Stef's ability to cope grew stronger. As her body healed, as she regained her strength and mobility, every day she felt more like herself. But Lena didn't have the physical landmarks to help her progress. And, Stef thought, perhaps her own healing was hindering Lena's. At least when Stef was home and Lena was taking care of her she'd known she was safe and sound. But as she got closer to being back at work, back to where Lena had no control over what happened to her, she realized that Lena was probably struggling to keep from panicking.
"Come here." She opened her arms, reaching for her and then enveloping her in them. Lena weighted her to the bed, burying her face deep in the crook of her neck. Stef hugged her tight, as though the closer she held her the more pain she would relieve. "I'm so sorry," she whispered. Her voice felt clogged in her throat, overwhelmed by the sudden understanding of how much her wife was hurting. "I'm sorry for putting you through this." She lightly stroked Lena's back, soothing her. "I would give anything to change it but I can't do that. And I can't change the fact that my job includes risk. But I promise to be more careful. Being with you and our family… that is more important to me than anything."
Lena took a ragged breath. With her face still nuzzled against her neck, she drew in the scent of Stef – her partner, now her wife, the mother of her children – and tried to memorize its indescribable familiarity. The fear that there might come a day when she wouldn't be able to smell it filled her with anguish and she felt just as she had the night Stef had been shot.
In the hospital as she sat beside Stef's bed, watching her every breath to be sure she was alive, Lena had been desperate for that familiarity. Everything was drenched in the antiseptic stench of hospital and it was enough to make her stomach churn. But finally, when she'd leaned up to kiss her sleeping partner's forehead for the hundredth time, she had caught the lightest scent of shampoo. She had carefully pressed her nose into her hair, inhaling deeply; feeling for just a moment the warmth of relief. It had been a long, draining night but nothing in comparison to the following evening when she had gone to bed alone.
Lying on her side of the bed, Lena had buried her face in the empty pillow beside her. It held Stef's scent so strongly and what had offered comfort the night before now brought an endless string of terrifying possibilities. Stef was safe in her hospital bed and that made Lena all the more aware that eventually she would be going back to work. She would never be free of the fear that there would be a next time and that they were only allotted one free pass. Even once their daughter had come to sleep in the bed with her, her mind ran a constant loop of the life she would live if she had to face the rest of it alone.
Lena dreaded that there might come a time when not only would she have to go to bed alone but that this scent would have faded from the sheets, and she would struggle to remember it and panic. That she would start using Stef's shampoo even though it would make her hair uncontrollable and frizzy. That she would spray Stef's perfume onto one of her tattered white tank tops and sleep with her nose in it. She feared there would come a day when none of Stef's clothes would smell like her anymore and she would eventually have to wash the sheets and each thing that added to how Stef smells now would never smell like her because she wasn't there to mix them all together just so. There would be no more blonde hair to pull from the shower drain. The uniforms hanging in their closet would grow dusty. Eventually she would have to box them up and taping those boxes shut would bring a finality she could never be ready for.
Now, as she laid wrapped in Stef's strong arms on their wedding night, she tried to push away those fears and be grateful for their second chance. She leaned back to look down at the beautiful woman who stole her heart with some terrible jokes and a smile that could melt the coldest of hearts. Stef reached up to wipe away the leftover tears from her face and Lena leaned in to her hand as it cupped her cheek.
"I know you have to go back to work but do you have to be out in the field? Can't you get a desk job at the station?" She tried to ask casually but her voice shook, giving her away. Stef smiled sympathetically at her but shook her head.
"You know I'd go crazy sitting at a desk all day." As she spoke Lena dropped her gaze, her lips pressing together tightly, showing the disappointment she wished she didn't feel. "Oh, my love," Stef sighed, pushing the hair away from Lena's face and urging her wife to look at her. "I'm sorry. This is who I am. My job is part of me. I'm not going to make any empty promises about the future because there is always a possibility of this happening again. I wish there wasn't. I really do. But what I am going to promise is to never take our family or you for granted again."
"You've never taken us for granted," Lena whispered.
"I have. I've gotten comfortable and let things go because there is always tomorrow. But from now on I am one hundred percent here, one hundred percent of the time. And that started today. It started with our commitment tonight. You have all of me, Lena. My heart most of all." Stef took Lena's chin in her fingers to draw her back down. She kissed her wife with breathtaking tenderness; trying to kiss away all of her fear and ease her aching heart. The world fell away. Nothing existed but the two of them and they spent the night loving each other in a way they never had before. As their bodies entwined in the moonlight, so did their souls, and though neither of them believed in heaven, they were sure that for just one night they had found it here on earth.