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“I'm disgusting, you don't even want to touch me anymore!” She cries, the woman he adores so much cries into her hands. Pale, weak hands that had once been so soft and so gentle, now weak, shaky and already covered with sores that hadnt been there a week ago.
“No, No, that's not it! I love you, I-!” He tries to protest, his voice is still soft as it always is but it sounds so helpless - because he is. As is she, as are the doctors from what they've told him. Helpless. So he's supposed to watch the woman he loves with every drop of his blood and beat of his heart wither, not just with illness but also with bitterness? James can't do it. It makes him feel sick, though he’d never dare say that out loud, let alone to Mary’s face.
“Quit lying! It won't make me feel any better!” She sounds so sure of herself, like she truly couldn't believe that her face was still worth loving. It’d changed, of course it had, James would be a fool to try and deny it, but he also wasnt lying.
Indeed, he never expected to experience so much more sickness than health when he spoke those vows with her, and oh how he wished this wouldn't be the case. What he’d do to see a glimmer of hope of ever getting his healthy, happy Mary back - to get back the quiet and soft days spent lying in bed with his wife. It all felt so out of reach now, like his worst nightmares had all taken form and possessed the body of the woman he loves most.
Mary's body is taken over by another coughing fit, the kind that sounds dry and painful and he would have known how much it must hurt even if he wasn't standing right there and watching as she reached one hand up to hold her throat, and the other gripped the back of a chair for support. She is weak. Weakened by this sickness, weakened by the mental strain it has brought, weakened by the weight of everyone's pity and grief falling on her withered shoulders on top of everything else.
James steps forward, silently praying to whatever god is kind enough to listen to him for once that his Mary doesn't push him away or yell at him again. It seems his prayers were heard, as his hands gently find her shoulders through the thin, plasticky feel of her hospital gown, and he gets the chance not only to feel just a little bit closer to her again, but also to help her sit down.
“Please, Mary, believe me… you're just exhausting yourself..” He repeats what he feels like he’s said a thousand times now. Begging, pleading for her to listen to him. If he didn't care for the discomfort it would cause her, he would drop to his knees and continue begging there. ‘Please don't push me away, please let me be close to you while your hands are still warm and I can still see life in your eyes’ - but that would be selfish, and it's the last thing his wife needs right now.
It would be selfish to ask her to be kind to him when shes facing death's door, it would be selfish to get upset at her for yelling at him - it would be selfish and horrible of him to yell back at her or push her into receiving affection she just can't get herself to accept. Does she actually not want it or is she just pushing him away to protect herself from the possibility of his rejection? When this all started, James wouldve been able to answer that question fast and firm - but he isnt so sure anymore.
He would never say it out loud, but it has taken a toll on him too! Doesn't he deserve comfort? Apparently not, what kind of a man would ask his dying wife for a pat on the back or a shoulder to cry on when shes doing all the suffering, and all he has to do is stand there and watch?
Mary, who had finally come down from coughing so painfully, places her hands over her face again and continues crying. All of the emotions she feels - fear, anger, hopelessness, grief, and many more - are storming around in her head and making it ache even more than it already does. She hunches forward, James instinctively leans forward too with his arms loosely hovering over her like he was both too scared to touch her and getting ready to catch her should she fall.
“Mary, …i…” He doesn't know what to say. The sound of Mary’s crying had become far more frequent as of late, and it was no longer limited to movie nights where the subject of her tears was just a show of her choosing. Where James could gently pull her closer to him and - albeit awkwardly - try to comfort her about whatever it was she found so sad - or happy - that it brought her to tears. Most of the time he didn't even really know, since he was too busy admiring her face in the TV’s soft glow, melting against the feeling of her head on his shoulder, or committing the feeling of her soft hand in his to really pay attention; something she always scolded him for with that sweet, playful voice.
It all seemed so far away now, so out of reach. James still hadnt fully processed that those times are over now - that he will never get them back, that this version of Mary is the last he will see before her light fades entirely. Maybe it's the fact that this all feels too cruel to be true that keeps him from breaking into tears too, right alongside her, even when he feels the same sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach.
Oh what he’d do to just end her suffering.