A new beginning

As I watch them lower her casket six feet into the ground I cannot feel anything I knew this coming but it didn’t make it any easier. This is a perfect day for something like this it’s raining and it’s ice cold but when is it not when you live in Pittsburgh?

The weather is always like this eight months out of the year that horrible slushy snow is a staple for being here. The kind that turns gray and black if you step on it too much. Allie, My Allie I love her so much and to watch someone you love turn into a decimal of the person they once were eats at you. It eats that you down to your core until all you can think about is that. Cancer took you at only 26 years old I feel like our lives were just beginning but like water to a flame we were extinguished. I need her in my life and God has taken her away from me. I know that it is selfish of me to think because leukemia takes children every single day. Cancer in general rips people from their families mothers and fathers from their children children from their parents so it should be no surprise that it didn’t spare my girlfriend either. Cancer doesn’t care if you’re rich or poor it doesn’t care if you lead a healthy life before you were sick it doesn’t care who you leave behind it’s a vicious cycle that just comes and takes what it wants from you and ultimately and unfortunately for most it takes your life.

She steadily got worse and the treatments stopped working but she never gave up hope. She told me that I was her miracle and that she wouldn’t know what to do if she didn’t have me. I wish I could tell her now that she’s the one that saved me that she made me a better person she saw me when I was absolutely nothing and wanted to love me anyways so it’s crazy when someone sees the best of you when you can’t see it . I'm standing here I can’t even cry;I can’t even let myself feel because if I do I don’t know how I’m going to make it stop. I just keep telling myself I have to make it back to the house. I just have to get through what they’re trying to call a celebration of life for her where I have to go and smile in these peoples face. While they tell me how sorry they are that I lost her. Never forgetting to tell me that everything‘s going to be OK. The lies that people tell each other when they lose somebody they love it’s like I’m branded; branded with the pain that’s flowing throughout my body.I can’t even think about the things that I’m going to have to doing again.

Next week going back to work it is so daunting to even think of, but I found out that she left a will that she wanted to be talked about right after with me and her family. She knew I would not be coming outside for a week. God how I wish that It made a difference I don’t care how much money that I receive I don’t care what I could get out of this if I can only just have her back just to kiss and hold her one more time, just to hear her laugh but I have to go because it’s where she would want me to go why do we do the things for the people that we love even if it hurts us and even if I refuse to go it’s not going to change the fact that she’s not going to be at home waiting for me sitting on the couch with our dogs.

Telling me that she ordered us Chinese food so I don’t have to come home and cook after I’ve been cooking all day not going to be there to help me make a random desserts at 1 AM when I get a hankering for something sweet talking to be there to wake me up for my nightmares that shake me down to my core that only her touches my brings me back to reality it’s not going to be there for the little fight about stupid things like who is the better character in Harry Potter or how marshmallow and peanut butter sandwich is the best snack that you could have.

I have to suppress those memories of her shoving them pushing them down as far as they can go because if I don’t I’m going to think about everything and it’s going to break me to the point where I don’t think that I can come back she wouldn’t want this for me she always called me her rock so I can’t fail her now. Walking back to my car now in a daze I’m glad that where we have to go for this it’s only 10 minutes away to her family’s house thank God that her parents like me in the beginning they did it they didn’t understand us or anything about me and her but then they see the way that I looked at her when she wasn’t looking.

The way that I looked into her eyes and I knew that she was the one when you see love like that you can’t deny it it’s tangible you can grasp it in your hands. It took a lot warming up and after about the first year they finally accepted me for me they seen how good I was for her and what they didn’t know is how good she was for me how many people can say that they met their other half at such a young age I was 20 years old and my heart was put on fire by somebody and now seven years later I don’t know if I’m ever going to get that back I’m sitting here thinking all this as I drive as I pull in to her parents driveway I admire the house but I might be seeing the last time it’s a two-story home farmhouse style wraparound porch with blue shutters open floor plan when you go in very homey and welcoming and yet it’s the last place that I want to be.

I walk in the rain is still falling behind me and I think about how I don’t want to deal with this but I have to. I get past the doorway going to the living room there is about 10 or 15 people or so but the one that turns and looks at me is her mom. “ Annie I’m so happy to see you” she says to me in a rush as she walks up to me and hugs me I’m stiff at but this is the woman that I’ve known for years. If anything she’s a second mother to me and she needs me she lost her daughter today so I can’t be like that to her.

I gave her a good hug squeezing her tight as she starts to cry laying her head against my shoulder but another moment in my life that I’m just not going to feel. I can’t feel I’m saving that moment until I’m alone tonight when I lay in our bed wishing she was there to hold me like I did many of times especially towards the end.

When her body was slowly becoming frail when she went from a 200 pound goddess to 120 pound whisper of the woman I love a shadow of who she used to be this is going to kill me I pushed to the back of my mind and then I walk into the room to see a lawyer there that took care of all of her final arrangements. Her sister walks in she has cinnamon colored hair and she’s caramel complexion she’s medium built top-heavy it’s beautiful angelic green eyes she looks so much like her sister that it sends a shooting pain directly to my soul when I look at her.

She was the first person to support us there is many nights that Crimson would come over to our house while Allie was there attempting to cook us dinner. Which is hilarious but in the beginning before I taught her how to cook she was terrible. Though when you spend years with a person and you learn so many things from another you grow with each other. Crimson would come in and she would make the salad while I would make a steak and potatoes and Ally would pour us wine and we would laugh and cut up and She would come sit in my lap and wrap her arms around my neck just smiling at me I never knew that with a person that I could feel so complete.

She comes up and hugs me I am so sorry little mama she whispers in my ear I have to keep suppressing those tears because I can’t let them fall I replied to her I’m sorry to you little one this is going to be a hard one but we’ll get through it. I honestly don’t know how I’m giving advice I feel like I’m falling apart so the war begins inside me right as the lawyer starts talking we are all gathered here today to go over Ally Jamison’s final wishes. He goes over a few things giving them to various family members and I’m just in and out of listening. I just can’t fully be here for this finally he gets to me and says Annie’s there’s something very specific that she left for you here is a little black book that she left and it will explain everything.

I walk up to him in a daze my hands shake as I grasp it I thank him for quietly I look at the small leather book and run my hand over it then I take my book and I put it in my purse so when I get home I can sit down and read it I can’t deal with this much longer so I take my leave and say goodbye her parents and her sister then I hop in my car and I make that 20 minute drive home. We have a beautiful house in Edgewood that we restored it took us three years to get our house perfect, but we did It.

I pull up and all I feel is dread I drag myself out of my car get through the door out two dogs are waiting. We have a Pitbull named Charlie and a Shih Tzu named Oreo they both ran up to me and for a second I just petted them and felt happy. “come on guys let us go out to the backyard “I say. they runoff in front of me barking we built a fence in our backyard so we can just let the dogs run free.

So many nights we would sit on the back porch just talking to each other about each other‘s day I sit on the porch and I watch them play I pull out the book my hands are shaking so bad but this is something that I have to do I open it and it starts off as a letter. “ my dearest Annie if you’re reading this that unfortunately that means that I’m gone I’m crying as I write this letter but fortunately you’re out getting me my favorite ice cream because it’s one of the few things I can still eat I want you to know that I love you more than anything you have made me so happy you’re my angel if anything you kept me healthy longer just by being here and loving me I wish that it was enough when I got my diagnosis I was so worried that it was the end for us and for me at that point we’ve only been together for two years I didn’t think that you would want to stick around with somebody that would be battling that but you did you showed me that you love me more than anything in that you were exactly what I needed being with you made everything perfect I know that I’ve been battling for a long time and I know that things aren’t getting much better but you still have so much hope in me you still cherish me and love me even though my hair is gone even though I’ve lost so much weight even though the chemo is making me so sick I know that you’re afraid because we talk to the doctor today and said that I was going to stop the chemo that there’s nothing left to do you and I both know baby that’s not getting me anywhere now here are some things that I want you to know enclosed is the deed to the house I was fortunate in my life I paid the house off completely for you my life insurance policy is in your name because you’re the only person that was there for me and the only person I trust the policy for me is worth $20 million take that money and be happy honey it’s going to be a long time before you feel like just being again but I’m giving you the opportunity right now to do whatever you want that money is yours to do with what you will. so quit your job go to Italy for us and never let go of that beautiful heart that you have no matter where you are I will always be with you one day I want you to find love again and when it comes knocking on your door don’t be afraid to open it now I know this is going to be hard for you but The local boarding company I explained to them the situation so when you go there they’ll know who you are I pay for a month of boarding for both of our babies go out and enjoy life now you know that PS I love you as one of my favorite movies so there’s going to receive a few letters coming for you so sporadically but no matter what know that you are the love of my life and I cherish you always with love your Ally”

I finished reading that and all of the tears that I was holding back are pouring out of my face I just lay there right on my porch and I cry screaming into the distance asking God why he punished me why did he take the love of my life away and in shock that she left me with something so big I have to do this I have to make a stand so I get my dogs inside and I go to my room I don’t leave my house for another week I have so many missed calls text messages everything all I do for a week is get up let my dogs out order food from the takeout and repeat I think about what Ally wanted me to do I think about going somewhere because I’m stuck in this rut holding the pillow that she laid on because it has her smell she wouldn’t want this for me I can’t stay in this house forever so I do the first thing I quit my job it wasn’t going anywhere anyway.

I drive down the road and stop at this antique store and see a little black bull figurine it reminds me of Ally my country girl with a city heart so I buy it. I will keep this with me close. The thing I truly want to do is write and I can do that from anywhere I take our babies to the local boarding place the next day after I get the money part finagled she had it so it went directly into my bank account I went and signed the paperwork they needed and it was decided it would be released to me in a few days I got on that plane Italy 3 days later with tears falling down my face I look up to the sky and say Allie this is for you and with all my love in my heart I’ll go on this Adventure that will be a new beginning for my life thanks to you. I know you will always be there I look off into the sky and as my plane sores off in the wind I feel happiness towards A new beginning.