Afterward, he’s wrapped around my back like he always has to shield me from my fears that lurked in the night, but this time there’s no separation from a cocoon of blankets wrapped around me, and only his warm skin against mine. And that’s when he first said it.
“World without end, and beyond my last breath, I will love you, my sweet Isla.”
Mamá is weeping louder now. Papá’s footsteps are pounding the floor. Joaquin is shouting our address for the third time. I’m still holding Malachi’s cheeks. We’re still hidden behind my hair, and tears are trickling down his temples from his half-lidded eyes that still haven’t strayed from me.
“... I will love you.”
At that, his lips close, and his eyes start to slowly blink.
“I know,” I murmur, becauseI do know.For all my life, I’ve known. And it’s only now, after going to hell and back, and landing right back in a whole different version of hell, that I know it never changed. “I know you will, butcariño.This isn’t that. This isn’t your last breath. You’re still breathing.” I release his cheek to press my hand to his chest. “See? I can feel it.”
But even I can feel how shallow it is, and even I know that even with eyes half closed, he can see right through me.
He says nothing else, so I do.
“I love you, Malachi.”
As though a weighty burden lifts off of him, a quiet breath drains from his lips, and he lowers his eyelids. And this is not how any of it was ever supposed to happen, but there’s nothing I can do about it, so I lay my cheek on his chest. His heart thumps slower than it should, and I plead with the only words that matter.
“I love you,amor.I love you. World without end, I love you, too. I always have, and beyond my last breath, I always will.”
I don’t know if he can hear me. But, if our lives have done nothing else for us, they have stitched a soul connection. A thread that bound our hearts together across time and distance, and misunderstanding and anger, and even fleeting, unfounded hate.
In the end, that thread tangled and stretched, but it remained intact. And it’s that thread that assures me, even if he can’t hear me, he knows.
TWENTY-TWO
MALACHI
Present
IT IS A BLINDING white room. Not a single shadow, and no way to tell which direction the light is coming from. As though light simplyis. It’s also saturated with static silence aside from a single sound.
“Malachi.” Her voice is light and feathery, sing-songing my name like she did when we were tiny children and she wanted my attention. “Malachi. Malachi. Malachi.”
I turn in an attempt to decipher where she is, but just like the light in the room, her voice isn’t coming from any specific direction and seems to be part of the atmosphere itself.
“Isla?”
“Malachi. Malachi. Malachi.”
“Where are you, little Isla?”
“I bet you can’t catch meee…”
I smile and lurk forward, making a big show of searching for her like I used to when we would play hide and seek. She was always very bad at hiding, but I pretended to have no idea where she was.
“Where, oh where, is little Isla?” I call into the shapeless white space.
Her response is a musical giggle that seems to originate from my chest, causing a searing fire and biting pang that causes the serenity of the space to falter.
“I bet you can’t find meee…”
She giggles again, and the pang in my chest radiates with a dull, cold ache. Nevertheless, I continue to slowly step and creep along as I search for her.
“I don’t see little Isla. I can’t find her. Where is she?”
Despite the game I continue to play with her, despite her giggles, a foreboding sense of anguish begins to seep from my chest through the rest of me because I know I failed, and my failure has cost me the one thing I love more than anything else.
