Chapter 27

Chapter Twenty-Seven

" W hat are you doing, Tanna?" The voice has me spinning around.

"Sean?" I question. I mean, it looks like my brother. But how did he get here? And where is here? I look around the room. It's all white. As far as I can see, it's just white.

"You're not supposed to be here yet, Tanna," he says, walking closer to me.

"It's really you?" I close the distance and throw my arms around his neck. "I've missed you so much."

"I've missed you too." He holds me tight to his chest for a moment longer. "But you shouldn't be here."

"Where is here?" I ask aloud this time, while taking a step back to look around again.

"Heaven. You need to go back before it's too late, Tanna."

I shake my head. "I'm not leaving you. I need you. There's so much you've missed."

"I haven't missed a thing," he says. "Luke needs you more than I do. He needs you to fight, Tanna. He needs you back."

All the anger I've felt towards my brother for what he did, how he left me, rises to the surface. "You left. Why the hell did you leave me? I needed you and you left. Why, Sean? Why would you do that to me? To us?" I yell as my hands slam against his chest.

"I didn't. I didn't slice my own wrists, Tanna. Not willingly. I would have never left you like that. It was…"

"She's back," another voice calls out as I'm taken out of the white room and thrown somewhere else. There's a lot of noise. Machines. People everywhere.

What's happening?

"Let's get her into the OR now," I hear someone shout, and then I'm moving.

"Where are you taking her? She's my wife!" That's Luke.

I try to yell for him, and I look around but I don't see him.

No! I need to go back. I was with Sean. I need to go back. I need to know what he was going to say! What did he mean when he said he didn't do it?

My vision blurs, my eyelids get heavy to the point I can't keep them open any longer, and I let myself fall into the darkness.

"Sean, where are you?" I call out to the empty white room. I know he's here. He was here before. He has to be here now too.

"Tanna, fight, damn it," Sean says, appearing in front of me again.

"Like you did?" I throw back at him .

"I didn't have a choice. You do."

"What do you mean? What happened?" I ask him. "Tell me what happened?"

"Mom," he says, and I frown.

What would our mother have to do with this? We haven't seen or heard from her since we were kids. She left us. She chose another life.

"What do you mean Mom ?"

"I found her."

"Where is she?" Why would he look for her? She didn't want us. Why should we want her?

"No. You don't need to know that." Sean shakes his head.

"Sean, tell me what's happening! Tell me what happened to you!" I scream at him.

"You have to go back. You're running out of time, Tanna," he says, instead of answering me.

"No, not until you tell me."

"I did it to protect you. It was supposed to protect you. I didn't know… I didn't know it wouldn't." Sean steps closer and takes my hand. "I'm sorry. I tried to protect you and I failed."

"What do you mean? How does you dying protect me? It doesn't, Sean. You broke my heart."

"You have Luke. He'll do a better job than I ever could. Tell him to break out. He'll know what it means, what to do."

"You're not making any sense." I shake my head from side to side. None of this makes any sense.

"He'll understand it. Just tell him. When you wake up, tell him those words, Tanna."

"You should tell him yourself."

"Tanna, I'm sorry."

"No, this isn't real. You are not real. This is a dream or something." I turn around and look out into the depths of the never-ending whiteness.

"Go back, Tanna. You need to fight," Sean says from behind me. But when I turn back around, he's gone.

"What if I don't want to fight anymore?" I whisper to the void. It doesn't reply. So I sit down. There's nothing here. No noise, no view, just nothingness. It's kind of numbing. And, honestly, I like it. I could just stay here. I don't need to keep fighting. I'm tired.

How much should one person have to fight in a lifetime? I have no idea, but I've had enough of it. I just want peace. Why can't I find peace?

I close my eyes and a vision comes to mind. It's me and Luke. We're in his house, our house, sitting on the sofa in the theater room. He's watching crappy reality television with me while his hand is on my protruding stomach. "I think it's a girl," he says.

"Oh yeah? What makes you think that?" I ask him.

"Because earth needs more angels, and a mini-you is the purest fucking thing I can think of." He kisses my stomach. "You are an angel," he says to our unborn child.

"I think you hold me up on an extremely unrealistic pedestal. I'm not perfect, Luke."

"You are," he says. "When can we do this again?"

"Do what? Watch The Real Housewives ?"

"No, this?" He rubs my stomach. "Have a baby."

I laugh. "How about we get through birthing the first one before you try to knock me up again?"

My body is shifted to another time. A new vision. At the rink. Luke is skating with a little girl, and I'm holding a baby. A boy.

Luke skates up to me. "Hey, Mama, pass him over."

"Do not drop him, Luke Jameson," I warn as I clutch the tiny bundle closer to my chest.

"You know I do this for a living, right?" He points to his skates .

"I also watch you hit the ground a lot while earning that living," I remind him.

"Mama, can we take Sean, pweease." The little girl looks up at me with eyes so like my husband's. "I'll help."

"Okay, but only for a little bit, Aubrey," I tell her before passing the infant over to Luke.

I watch, and a smile tugs at my face as the three of them skate off together.

My eyes spring open and all I can see is nothingness again. "I have to go back," I think aloud. I want that life with Luke, so I have to go back.