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Pain was blinding, and no matter how many times you said that you understood what it was, the universe found new ways to reach out and take your heart in its sharpened claws and squeeze it until it felt like it was taking your last breath away with it. Pain was being stabbed in the gut and slapped in the face, your heart broken and left behind for the snarling universe to step on, laughing at your misery as it took your heart far away from you. Out of reach. Taunting you for realising how close it had always been.
But you couldn’t live without your heart. You refused to. It was your lifeblood, your soul, the thing that pieced you together. Who were you without your heart? A skin suit that was walking around empty, a deep depression painting a fake smile on a cracked facade, a hurt that went bone deep, a weariness in all your muscles. You won. You lost. Why did it hurt so much? This wasn’t the first time you had walked around with your heart left somewhere far behind. But this time felt so much worse. Who were you without your heart? Without him?
Grief was a funny thing, in the months that followed. You felt yourself retreating more and more into yourself, even as your family, the ones that were left, stared at you in concern and tried to get you to come out of your shell. All you knew was pain. The painkiller was out there, relief had to be found. You stared into deep tomes like they might hold the answers. You already knew they didn’t. You’d already read every book, already gone through every spell. But you weren’t giving up. Not without your heart, your missing piece, not without him.
The weather changed and the new year passed, holidays came and went. They tried to get you to move on. It’s what he would have wanted, they said. He would want you to live. You don’t look at them when they say it. What is living without him, you want to scream. You never do. You still haven’t figured out if it’s them or the universe you want to scream at. (It’s not. You know who you want to scream at. You want to scream at him but addressing the thing you never did, for leaving you with that goodbye).
Love was more powerful than pain or grief. Pain and grief were weighed down by love but love was the reason to keep going past the mountain of depression that weighs heavily on your shoulders. Everywhere you look you see him. A bedroom rearranged again (remember the first time you did that before you cast him out again, still the scared little boy who wouldn’t let himself be happy?). Two chairs in a Batcave. A favourite movie you watched together. A mixtape. It’s a gift, you keep those. You’re my gift and I want to keep you, please, please, please.
You say it now, in the words between prayers. Purgatory, on your knees. You got the words out before he could. He never let you say the last words. He saved them for himself. You want to hate that he said them and you didn’t. But how could you when they are the most precious things and you didn’t think you could have brought them forth into this world? The angel was always braver than you. Even if he left it too late. Even if you both left it too late. You wish it wasn’t too late. It can’t be.
Time is meant to heal all wounds. Time doesn’t heal this one. You get up, you check on your kid (his kid, your kid, you raised that kid together he was yours), you feed your dog (your Miracle you called him, thinking only of blue eyes and trenchcoats and wishing that you were a lucky one who might be allowed just one more miracle). Time makes you angry. Time makes you determined. Time makes you reckless. You have something to live for but it’s hollow. It’s missing the most important thing. It’s not truly living until it is with him.
They tell you that you shouldn’t do this, that it might not work, that he wouldn’t want you to go off and be stupid. You think of a fight outside a diner, yelling on the street. It hadn’t been out of jealousy, you try to reason but you realise now how much you looked like a married couple. How many times you had and just never acknowledged it, even as the universe screamed at you. It’s time to scream back at the universe. You want it, you want him. You never said it but you have a husband to save.
Darkness comes slowly, then all at once. You see blue eyes full of love and tears before they are stolen. You see the darkness of the world without his bright light. You see the pain of a world without knowing that he has your back, a smile you somehow need to seek out to feel something settle in your chest. Darkness in the real world is a thick smog to fight through. But darkness in the in between isn’t syrup. It’s just grey and sinew and you’ve cut through that before to get to him. You can do it again.
He dragged you out of Hell after you broke and promised you that you were still worth saving. He was a soldier and you made him question his place. He rebelled and fought, he trudged up darkness and died with scared eyes and a black ooze smile. You held on to his coat. He died for his son and you burned your heart with him. He was your much needed win when he came back to you, screaming until the entity holding him relented. The entity was never going to cope against your twin screams, dragging him from his Hell.
Peace is a relative concept. You thought you had stopped looking for it years ago, a distant dream that never seemed to get any closer the longer that you kept going towards it. But now you know. Peace is this. Peace was always going to be this. He’s still an angel, still your angel, the way that he has always been. Claiming him feels nice. You hear the echo of it from Heaven and Hell, across the years. He was your boyfriend first. The one who’s in love with you. Boyfriend. In love. Saying it, owning it: that’s your peace.
He kisses you good morning, a smile on his face like he can’t quite believe it, months later. You check in on your kid, together; you feed your dog; you visit your family; you study and hunt; you make dinner and have date nights, curled up on the same sofa like being apart would hurt; you look at houses and plan a future, together, together, together. He laughs and it settles something in your heart, his arms looped around yours like he needs to catch up on twelve years of affection. You don’t mind. You love it. You love him.