Grief.

The price we must pay for the privilege of love.

His chest is rising and falling in time with the melodious harmony of the machines responsible for sustaining his life. His wide eyes are closed. He looks almost peaceful, with his copper hair tumbling over his forehead and the worry lines that often crinkle his temples all but gone. His hand is warm under my hand. His skin is soft under my skin. He feels whole, real, present.

But he isn't.

He isn't whole, or real, or present.

He is a whisper of himself. The tall, commanding and passionate veil that he wears is lost. It may never be found again. Garish wires protrude from him at medieval angles. A formidable neck brace imprisons him, and a spinal board restrains him. Thick, yellowish casts encase both of his crumpled legs. They are matched in severity only by the unforgiving mesh that snakes around his crushed arms.

I should have known that something like this would happen.

My story was never meant to have a happy ending

Because I've veered far too far off-plot.

Someone like me is destined to settle with a dull, but well-intentioned man who would do me no harm, but cause me no passion. Someone like me is meant to play within my boundaries, and manage my expectations accordingly. But I didn't do that. I defied destiny and now she's having the last laugh. The cruelest, most blood-curdling laugh.

She's taking him away from me.

Out in the hallway, I can hear Grace arguing with the doctors. Her voice is thick with tears, but her words are laced with rage. In the adjoining and empty room, I hear Carrick war with the lawyers. Elliot and Mia aren't here yet. They're both abroad, but they've been notified of their brother's condition and are en route.

The hospital staff don't say it, but it's written all over their faces.

They don't think they'll get here in time to say goodbye.

The reality of the situation hasn't hit me yet. I am still breathing, so it can't have hit me yet. We are alone. Me and my broken, battered and bloodied husband. I did this. I am responsible for his demise, destiny aside. I was driving the car. I wheedled and pestered, pouted and groaned until he acceded. He would deny me nothing and I knew it. I knew it and I used it.

All to drive his Audi R8.

I still don't know how it happened. The doctors say that I may have some short-term memory loss, but save for the superficial abrasions to my head, I am fine. But I can't remember. One minute he was laughing, he was carefree, he was playful Christian. His hand rested upon mine on the gear shaft, the windows were down, and the wind was in our hair.

We were love's young dream.

But then there was the screeching, grinding sound of metal on metal. Light turned to dark. His hand was no longer on mine. I couldn't see, couldn't move, couldn't breathe. The car was upside down, her wheels spinning frantically. But how did we get there? What did I do? I was looking at him. I can never tire of looking at him. Especially when his head is thrown back and he's shaking with laughter, his face alight and radiant.

It's so rare.

And now, I will never see it again. They're talking about turning the machines that are keeping his heart beating, off. The hospital staff say that he's brain dead. That there is no neurological activity. That even if there were, they believe he is severely paralyzed. Quadriplegia, they called it. Grace had paled so hard she could have been the life support patient when the doctors came and told us the news and gave their recommendations.

That had been two days ago.

She had demanded to see his charts, insisted she call in her own colleagues for a second, third and fourth opinion. Enlisted a broken-hearted Carrick to look after the legalities of keeping their son alive AMA. I can still hear the shrieks that had burst from her at the nurse who had nervously inched into his room clutching organ donation forms.

I think I will hear those shrieks until my own dying day.

Which could be very, very soon.

For the moment they turn off those machines, or the second destiny intercedes and snatches him away in the dead of night, my life is at an end. I cannot keep my own heart pumping when his doesn't beat alongside me. I will not keep my eyes open, when his close forever. I am Mrs Grey. I have been Mrs Grey for only five months and I already know no other life.

I cannot be Anastasia Grey, the widow.

I can only be Anastasia Grey, the wife.

I stare at his peaceful face and wish I could give my life for his. My heart for his, my liver for his, my arms and legs, for his. My everything for his everything. But I can't. I've asked and asked, and I can't. I call his name softly, and he doesn't move. He never does but I call it anyway. I need the sound of it on my lips. I need to speak it, to know that he isn't yet a ghost with such taboo, his name banished.

Grace's and Carrick's voices rise in a crescendo.

Each battling in their own arena for their younger son.

And all I do is sit. And sit and sit. I hold his hand, I push the hair from his eyes. I smooth his blankets, I dampen his brow with a cold wash cloth. That is my fight. That is my arena. They tell me to go home and get some sleep, but I scream when touched. I will not be removed. They will have to prise my lifeless hands from his coffin as they lower it into the ground for eternity.

My own mother arrived earlier today and pleaded with me.

Ray arrived shortly thereafter.

But I do not heed them. I love them, of course I love them. But the love I have for my Fifty is a different beast. It's an all-consuming and all-knowing adoration. I stink. I haven't left to bathe. My hair sticks to my head in a dripping pool of grease and my skin chafes against the grime of the accident that still coats me.

It happens so suddenly.

The machines that were beeping so lazily, now shriek in alarm. Their neon lights flash in warning and alarm bells above the state-of-the-art bed whir and wail. I spring up in alarm as an inhuman roar rips from my throat.

Grace gets there first.

With terror emblazoned in her eyes but professionalism dripping from her fingers, she lowers his bed and whips the pillows from under his head. Carrick barrels into the room, with my mom and Ray hot on his heels. My world is frozen. I'm not breathing and I'm not blinking but I live more ferociously and hear more than ever before. An army of medics burst through the door. Phrases like code blue and crash cart pierce the air as they converge upon my fifty's listless, lifeless form.

I'm underwater.

The pressure is unbearable, and I can't move or breathe. Everything is a watery haze of confusion. I sway on my feet. Someone steadies me. I don't know who. I cannot get close to him; my limbs are disembodied. Grace fights off the doctor who dares to remove her, and her hands compress upon his chest over and over again.

The machines yowl and yelp as anarchy ensues.

And it is now and only now, that reality really hits.

My husband is going to die.