I Fell in Love with Hope(89)

When the doctors gave their discourse about Coeur’s disease and how fast and aggressively it had progressed, they gave his heart an expiration date. As if it was a fruit slowly rotting.

A year they said. A year and then Coeur would need another. Even then, he was at risk of a multitude of attacks, infections, and other things Coeur had no interest in knowing about. What he heard was that he’d have to remain in hospital for observation for a while, which made him smile– morbidly from his doctors’ perspectives.

“Can I go now?” he’d ask, over and over.

Eventually, his father told him to just go on and take a walk if his doctors thought it was fine. He roamed with purpose, searching the halls, sneaking into an elevator he had no right to access, and working floor by floor until finally, he collided with a strange, running creature.

“Oh my god!” he yelled. “I’m so sorry!”

The first thing Coeur ever gave me was an apology.

The second was a story to unveil.

He spent the rest of that day in a turmoil of emotions. Neo hadn’t forgiven him. He wouldn’t for some time. But when Coeur was finally able to confront his own ignorance, time and friendship wove his and Neo’s paths back together.

Coeur kept his letters. He kept it in his possession along with his story for an entire year. Because, as it turns out, Neo didn’t need a grand confession. He didn’t need to be swept off his feet or entangled in a forbidden romance.

Tonight, Coeur has all the animation of a corpse. He lays in his bed hooked to an ECMO machine. An eternal pump keeps his blood flowing while he is confined to a bed. His senses are dulled by medicine. He cannot walk or stand or eat, yet he is content.

Neo lies beside him, his head on Coeur’s shoulder. They read books they’ve read before, listening to songs they know by heart. Neo points to certain passages, rousing laughter from them both, humming to the tunes.

When Neo writes, Coeur shuts his eyes, pressing his nose into Neo’s messy hair. He hugs him round the waist. The melodic pen strokes bring him peace.

Their story is almost finished. Given the state of things, Neo reads Coeur the full manuscript in a day. Coeur’s eyes never leave Neo’s face as he does.

“What do you think?” Neo whispers.

“I think the world is going to weep for every word you write.”

“That doesn’t sound like a compliment.”

“It’s your first review.”

“It’s my only review.”

“You should quote me on the inside of the cover.”

“To my Coeur,” Neo mocks, “For making fun of this manuscript before it was even finished.”

“Perfect.”

“Good. I’m keeping it. You sappy French man.”

“I’ve been meaning to ask, did you secretly learn to speak French for me?”

“No.” Neo frowns. “I secretly learned French so you and your mom couldn’t talk behind my back anymore.”

“My mom likes you more than me,” Coeur laughs.

“Well, I know that now.”

Neo’s head dips, their laughter mixing. Coeur sits up and cups his face so that he can keep looking at it. They touch noses, their chuckles fading.

“Our story’s just begun, Neo,” Coeur whispers.

“Don’t start.”

“It’s just the beginning. It is,” Coeur presses on. “You have so many stories left to read and so many left to tell.”

Coeur slips one of his letters into Neo’s lap, the first one. The one that is too long, ridden with mistakes, and so utterly imperfect that Coeur cannot fathom a truer confession of love. Neo unwraps it with care, smoothing down the paper. He reads it aloud, at times, stopping to gather himself as his jaw aches.

Kindness and Resilience were born in the bodies of two broken boys and all they ever wished for was more time to be together.

They are not a tragedy.

They are a story of love and loss.

When Neo finishes the last sentence, Coeur smiles. Their silhouettes connect in the dark. Coeur caresses Neo’s high cheekbones, his perched nose, and his lips that have smiled for him more times than he can count. He admires his favorite color pooling in Neo’s eyes and he cannot imagine that he would want to be anywhere else.

—

The surgeon described the procedure to Coeur’s parents multiple times. Coeur’s mother is talking to him now as they inject Coeur with sedatives for the operation.

Neo, Hikari, and I aren’t allowed in, so we wait outside. Right now, Coeur’s brothers are each taking turns talking to him. His father holds up his old swimming varsity jacket, talking about something or other as Coeur falls under the medication’s spell.

His mother is the last to see him off before his stretcher is led into the hall. When they tell her it’s time, she struggles to let him go. Coeur is her youngest. Her baby. And she must relinquish him to strangers to have his chest cut open, and his heart replaced.

Once they wheel Coeur into the hall, Neo stands. He approaches the stretcher.

Eric asks the nurse to give them a minute.

“Neo,” Coeur says, a bit too loudly. He smiles deliriously as Neo leans over him, taking his hand.

“Hello, my Coeur,” he whispers. “How are you feeling?”

“So great,” Coeur says. “Drugs are so great.”