"Serene, I fold my hands and wait..." Liz thought to herself. Turning thought to action she laid her delicate white hands in her lap, straightened her slender shoulders and tried to relax her face until she felt she looked serene, if even she didn't feel that way. Her mind skipped back three years to the time she first heard that line. Aiden had that lovely romantic streak that allowed him not only to enjoy poetry, but to always know exactly what to say and when to say it through verse. "Waiting" by John Burroughs was his response to Liz's indicision toward accepting his proposal. "No wind can drive my bark astray, nor change the tide of destiny...What is mine shall come to me." Liz said agreed to be his bride not an hour later.
A sad smile flitted across her face as she thought of that night. Aiden had never waited for anyone or anything. He charged through life getting what he wanted, how he wanted it, when he wanted it. That's how he had won her. Swept her right off her feet and told her it was pointless to refuse -- her would win her if it took him 'til next Tuesday. Aiden had confidence to spare. Liz never thought of him as cocky though many of her friends had -- he was just very confident. And he was right, she couldn't resist him, they were married that Monday.
Now she found herself surrounded by unfamiliar uncertainty. The other faces in the room were frightened, anxious, worried, and incredibly sorrowful. The thought suddenly struck her that not a soul in the room knew what change the tide of destiny had wrought in their lives that day. Not one person knew what the doctor would say of their loved one.
Her grey eyes turned toward the long, white double doors. They had ceased to exsist merely as hospital doors, they had become instead the veil that hung between life and death. Her beloved Aiden lay just beyond that veil and she could do nothing but wait to see if a scrub-clad angel would deliver him safely through to the land of the living and her arms.
As a green-capped surgeon's head came into veiw just beyond the white doors, Liz felt the room grow smaller as the people within it collectively gasped and sat forward, each certain that they would be the next to cry out in sorrow if the news were bad or in joy if there were still hope. She closed her eyes for a moment and tried to steady her breathing and her heart. When she opened them again, the surgeon stood before her like God's own blood-spattered messenger.
Before he could say a word, before she could even registar the expression on his face, another verse sprang to her mind. "What matter if I stand alone / I wait with joy the coming years / My heart shall reap what it has sown / And garner up it's fruit of tears." Her heart swelled and she felt comforted as the surgeon's gentle hand took hers and lead her through the veil.
Short
Created on 8-7-07
Views(147)
Story Rating G
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