"A Day Like None Other" cont.
NOON
"I believe that children are the future. Treat them well and let them lead the way. Show them all the beauty they possess inside..."The song came over the speakers of a radio at the nurse's desk, almost as if a message. A horrible reminder of the potential life that was nearly half over. My daughter, Blossom, appeared older now than both her mother and I. Her once lustrous black hair had a streak of white just above her right eye and shallow wrinkles lined her eyes. She stopped growing, which was a small blessing but now we could only accompany her as her body withered.
HOW IS THIS FAIR? WHAT KIND OF CRUEL POWER IS THIS? These questions echoed in my mind over and over and over. Was her life a punishment for something I did wrong? Where did the blame fall if it wasn't mine to bear?
Blossom slept for slightly longer periods now. Five minutes. The table we once played checkers on now sported carry-out containers of food, pizza boxes, and trays of desserts. Food was the easiest thing for us to try to share with her. Everything else took too long. Heck, even the time spent reading from a book to her or watching a movie with her ate away at the time we had. What book was good enough for that? What blockbuster movie could we view that was worth the equivalent of decades of her life?
Krystal Fae returned with gizmos and gadgets, crystals and talismans that she waved over Blossom as she slept. She verbally said little, but her stoic face told my wife and I all we needed to know. There wasn't a miracle cure on the horizon for our daughter.
My father and mother stood next to my wife's bed, holding each other in a distraught embrace. One of them bumped a medical chart and knocked it to the floor. The crash sang in the room like a death knell, unexpected and surprising enough to force a startled scream from my wife. Blossom rolled over and opened her special eyes to the room.
"Who are you? Are you another one of my doctors?" Blossom asked Krystal Fae.
Krystal nodded. "You can say that? I'm Krys. How do you feel?"
"As well as can be expected, I suppose," Blossom replied. "You're different than my family and everyone else in the hospital, aren't you? You're kind of like me."
Raising an eyebrow, Krystal smiled. "You're very perceptive. What can you tell me about your condition?"
Blossom listed a series of pseudo-scientific terms, phrases, and jargon I'd never heard before. Whatever she said seemed to impress Krystal.
"That's quite an impressive understanding you have. You are an extremely bright girl, aren't you." Krystal said before turning to me and my wife. "I think we may have an opportunity here that I didn't expect. Her ability to absorb knowledge and skill from others may have given her an understanding on the sciences and what-not needed to cure her. Her mind is, and I say this with all humility, on par with my own. If we work together, she and I might be able to come up with an effective treatment for her accelerated aging."
I felt my wife's body clench as I heard her gasp in astonishment. For the first time since Blossom was born, I felt hope swelling in my chest. Even my parents let a shared giggle of relief escape from their lips.
Everyone in the room seemed overjoyed at Krystal's announcement. Everyone except Blossom. She simply shook her head as she swung her legs out from under the covers. "I'm sorry, Krys, but I can't do that. There is a chance, but you and I both know it's a slim one. You might be able to spend a day trying to solve this problem, but if I tried to do that with you, it would be at the cost of the rest of my life. I'd rather spend my remaining time with my family, if you don't mind. I hope you can understand that."
The silence in the room was deafening. Even Krystal was speechless.
"No," my wife finally said. The words came out slowly from her. Painfully. Desperate for our daughter to reconsider. "You have to try. You can't just give up."
"I'm not giving up, Mom. I'm choosing what is important to me." Blossom stood and crossed over to the bed my wife rested in. She sat down beside her and shared a warm, loving, confident smile. "Our time together or gambling that she and I might be able to solve an unsolvable problem. I want my time to be with my family if that is all I am guaranteed to have."
I wanted to yell at her and order her to do what her mother wanted. My heart begged me to say whatever it took, but there was another part of me that was proud of her. I don't know how it happened, somehow my little girl had become a strong, resilient person who knew what she wanted and was unafraid to speak her mind. As much as I disagreed with what she said, I knew she said it because she felt the same about us as parents as we did about her. There was love in her heart. What parent wouldn't want to see that in their child?
10PM
Blossom hadn't gotten out of bed for fifteen minutes. Her weary eyes remained closed for longer than ever before as she slept, the white mane of hair sprawled out over her pillow and the stuffed tiger next to her. Older in appearance that my parent by decades, she reminded me of the old lady in Driving Miss Daisy. It took me a moment to put together that the woman's name was Miss Daisy. I hadn't slept in over a day, so I forgave myself the ignorance.
All I could do was watch Blossom as she slept. I couldn't take my eyes off of her as I wished for so many things I wanted but knew I would never see.
In her sleep, that ancient face smiled. I caught my jawline mirror the movement on my own face. She was peaceful. She looked happy. We couldn't do much more for her in this all-to-short day, but I think we did manage to bring her happiness.
Still recovering from childbirth less that 24-hours ago, my wife fought the desire to sleep in her bed. Her cheeks were swollen and eyes red from her tears. We both knew, but wouldn't say to one another, that the time was close. Our Blossom would soon fade away. I chose to think of it that way.
I couldn't bring myself to use the word die.
How could my daughter leave us so soon? She was meant to have so much more. A lifetime of happiness and boys and parties and homework and driving lessons. A wedding. Children of her own. Accomplishments to be proud of.
And powers. These Morphons which caused her condition were supposed to give her powers to become a cape. A member of BADGE who worked with Director Nova and she would help save the world.
I put my face into the palms of my hands, overwhelmed by the thoughts of what should have been. I tried to push the tears back. To hold them back from pouring out of me once more, but I couldn't. I was as helpless as she was when she first arrived at the beginning minute of the day.
"Daddy," a frail and weak voice brought me out of my despair.
I looked at her tired face and saw contentment there. Contentment, and something else in her mysterious eyes.
"It's ok, Daddy. It's the end, but the moments... been..." Her eyes drooped closed as her last words failed to pass over her lips.
"No." I reached out and took her frail hand into mine. I pinched my eyes closed and tried to force time for just one minute longer. "No. Not yet."
A warmth grew in my palm. It got hotter, hot enough to blister my skin. I pulled away as I opened my eyes, and found myself forced to squint at the bright glowing light emitting through my daughter's paper-thin skin.
POP! With a rush of air, Krystal Fae was suddenly in the room behind me, despite the fact she had left several hours ago to continue her research. "Her body. It's changing. The cells are morphing into something new. Something--"
My daughter's body disappeared, replaced by a luminescent, floating figure made of dazzling starlight with glistening gossamer wings that floated up from the bed, through the sheets that covered her. "DADDY?! What's happening to me?"
Krystal Fae stepped up beside me. "I think the caterpillar has become the butterfly. You're human body was meant to be temporary. That's just a guess right now, I'll need to do some tests to be sure."
"But she'll live?" I asked. I couldn't fathom what happened or what this apparition before me might be, if this was still my daughter and she wasn't dying, I could live with that.
Krystal brought out a small technical device out of a pocket and studied the data running over its screen. "I think so. Her matrix is stable as far as I can tell."
My heart skipped several beats as I rushed to my wife's side. She stared dumbfoundedly at our daughter's new body as I hugged her tightly, happier than I could imagine.
With her typical aplomb, all my wife finally spoke. "I'm really glad she waited to do that until she came out of me."
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