Chapter 16 - The Signature
The surgery was scheduled for Friday.
Sophie spent Thursday pretending it was a normal day.
She bought groceries.
She answered emails.
She complained about traffic.
At three in the afternoon, she called me.
“Can you come over?”
I was there in twenty minutes.
Her apartment door was unlocked.
“Sophie?”
“In the bedroom.”
She sat on the floor surrounded by boxes.
“What are you doing?”
“Going through things.”
I hated the implication.
“Why?”
“Because surgery has risks.”
“No.”
“Ethan.”
“No goodbye boxes.”
“They aren't goodbye boxes.”
“They look exactly like goodbye boxes.”
She gave me a sad smile.
“Sit down.”
I did.
She handed me an envelope.
My name was written on it.
I refused to take it.
“Ethan.”
“No.”
“Please.”
I took it.
“What is this?”
“Something you only open if something happens.”
“Nothing is happening.”
“Colonel.”
I looked at her.
She almost never called me that.
“That's an order.”
Despite everything, I laughed.
“So now you get to give orders?”
“Apparently.”
I placed the envelope beside me.
Then she handed me a smaller box.
Inside was her wedding ring.
My chest stopped moving.
“You kept it.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
She looked down.
“I took it off the day we signed the papers.”
“I remember.”
“I put it back on that night.”
I stared at her.
“Why?”
“Because I wasn't ready.”
My eyes burned.
She continued.
“I wore it on a chain under my shirt for six weeks.”
“Through treatment?”
“Until the first scan.”
“Why take it off then?”
“Because I realized surviving couldn't mean waiting for you to become someone you used to be.”
I absorbed that.
“I needed to see who you became.”
“And?”
She looked at me.
“I'm still looking.”
Fair.
Painful.
Fair.
She closed the box.
“I want you to keep it until after surgery.”
I took it.
“What happens after?”
“If I wake up…”
“When.”
She sighed.
“When I wake up, give it back.”
“As a ring?”
“As mine.”
That distinction mattered.
I nodded.
The next morning, I stood beside her hospital bed while staff prepared her.
Dr. Brooks explained the procedure again.
They would try a conservative surgical approach.
But if bleeding became uncontrollable or disease was more extensive than imaging suggested, they might have to remove the uterus.
Sophie signed the consent.
Her hand shook.
Then she handed the pen to the nurse.
“I'm ready.”
I knew she wasn't.
Neither was I.
Before they rolled her away, she caught my sleeve.
“Ethan.”
“I'm here.”
“If I panic…”
“You won't be alone.”
She nodded.
Then she looked at me for a long moment.
“I love you.”
The doors opened.
I couldn't let those be the last words.
I leaned closer.
May you like
“I love you too.”
Then the doors closed between us.
