Chapter 26- Zest

Author's note: Thanks for reading! Please review if you can!

I can't believe it, but this is the final chapter for Take a Chance!

This chapter takes place almost immediately after the last one, owing to the importance of how it concluded. I left it ambiguous for cliffhanger reasons, but it will become immediately clear what has happened.

The entire chapter will be from Ty's perspective! If you've read Lock and Key, you'll remember that I wrote that story from Ty's POV. It's been a while since I've done that, but I hope that I capture his voice well!

Again, thanks for sticking with me through the ups and many downs. Your reviews make my day when I see them! Your support means a lot, so thank you so much!

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Ty yawns and stretches. He hasn't slept so well in months. Usually he was kicked awake by Bay. She was a particularly violent sleeper. He never told her though. There was no point bringing it up when she couldn't control it, even if it did bother him.

He looks at her and feels warm. She was everything. Everything he'd always dreamt of but never let himself hope to happen. The fact that it had usually leaves him speechless. Fuck, what did he do to deserve such love?

The sun was barely creeping up. It was time for his walk on the beach and bike ride along the path that took him over the craggy hill where he would look out at the waves crashing against the rocks below.

Once upon a time, he wouldn't have noticed the beauty and goodness of natural around him. Bay had shown him how to truly see it. In his long life, there have been few things that have had such a profound impact upon him as that has. He sees things differently now and it was all thanks to Bay.

Art has always made him uncomfortable. Happy, but uncomfortable. He feels out of his element. He understands so little and that scares him. It was so far out of his comfort zone that he might as well have been living on Pluto. Being surrounded by all this art constantly pushed him beyond his comfort zone for reasons he couldn't understand. It was beautiful, but he just couldn't understand it. But that didn't matter- he could see so many beautiful things because Bay had pushed him out of comfort zone for most of his life.

He would never stop feeling guilty about the time he'd pushed Bay to climb that tower and break out her comfort zone, only to result in her breaking her ankle and terrifying her. Bay pushing him out his comfort zone has resulted in good things. She is so much better than he could ever hope to be, but he tries hard for her sake.

She was curled on her side, facing away from him and looking as peaceful as ever. Careful not to wake her, for hell hath no fury like Bay woken up before 10am, he eases out of bed and dresses silently.

Glancing over his shoulder at Bay, he smiles. He loves her so much that before she came sneaking into his life, wearing sunglasses and an ugly hat perched in her Beamer, he didn't know what love really was. He does now, and she and their children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren remind him of it every day.

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The sweat drips down his back as he slips in the house. Stepping into the kitchen, he expects to see his wife seated at her stool and taking in the good light of midmorning, or at least smell her coffee like he always did when he got back from his morning ritual. He likes those days the best because it meant that they could share a nice bath together. It is peaceful.

But he doesn't. The house is silent and still smells like the lemon-scented cleaner they'd used last night. There was no sign of his wife anywhere.

Frowning, he sits in his stair climbing chair that Bay had insisted on buying since his heart problem had been discovered a few years ago and slowly ascends to the top. Perhaps she was just sleeping. They'd had a particularly busy Sunday after all.

When he gets to their room, he sees that she hasn't moved in the hours that he's been gone. That was not at all like her. Bay would always wind up in the middle of the bed after he left for workout. She quite enjoyed starfishing in their king-sized bed.

He reaches out to brush her cheek and his hand snaps back quickly and sharply, causing an instant rush of pain to flood his body.

She was cool to the touch. Not abnormal, especially in the last few years, but something about the unnatural stillness of the room set off his well honed tactical senses.

"Bay?" he cautions, shaking her gently.

Her head lolls and for the first time, he can see that her eyes are blankly open. He then sees the blood that mares the cheek that was pressed against the pillow, which is so bloodied that he's immediately sent back to when he was in a combat position all those years ago. The memories make him dizzy in their intensity.

"Bay!"

This can't be happening. This can't!

He grabs the cordless phone and rings for an ambulance. He's so panicked that he can only manage to breathlessly choke out their address.

She wasn't. She couldn't. She'd promised that she'd never leave him. Never!

He keeps shaking her, no longer able to see her face through the tears that have blinded him.

"Honey?" he whispers. "Please, please, please!"

He drops his head to her chest. He can't hear if her heart is beating over the sound of his wildly pounding in his ears.

Chest. Heart. CPR. He could do something. She would make it, he knows it!

He swears that he sees her eyes move wildly, looking terrified because she can't breathe.

He drags her from the bed and onto the floor, ignoring the cracks in his joints.

He presses on her chest frantically and breathes into her mouth, then presses on her chest again.

"No, no, no, no! Please, please, please," he says through sobs. "Come on! Breathe! You're stronger than this! Breathe!"

There's a pounding on the door, but he doesn't go to answer it. He won't leave her. He'd promised that he'd never leave her! He never breaks his promises.

Feet pound on the stairs and he's gently pulled away from Bay. He sags into the reading chair, which is covered in Bay's clothes. Even now at 83 she still made a mess. He's told her too many times that he was her husband and not the maid that she'd had back in the Kansas City Kennish household. She never learned.

Everything that's happening before him is blurry and muffled, as if he's opened his eyes underwater while playing Marco Polo with the kids.

He's detached as Bay is placed into a black bag and onto a stretcher. He doesn't hear the words of the paramedics. The last thing he remembers before passing out is Bay being taken away from him.

She'd lied and broken her most important promise to him- she'd gone and left him alone.

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10 Months Later- September 2079

Ty sits on the reclining deck chair by the pool and watches as the sun sets, dyeing the water of the pool gold and orange.

Today was the first birthday he'd spent apart from Bay since he'd turned 18. She'd been in his life in one way or another for all the birthdays after that, from when they first met the day before he turned 19 to when she'd taken him bowling for his 87th.

He misses her and he is so lonely. His children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren were all alive despite bouts of cancer, serious infections, heart attacks, and accidents. As great as they were, they just weren't Bay. They'd had a lovely lunch together, but no one could fill the empty space left by Bay.

It was hard being alone. He used to like the quiet, but now it just unnerves him. Every little creak or groan makes him jump, just like it did when he was freshly back from being in a combat zone in his 20s and 30s. He'd underestimated how much of a calming presence Bay had been for him despite being an anxious person herself.

His nightmares had returned with a vengeance and he hasn't had a goodnight's sleep since she died. All he can see when he closes his eyes is her empty expression and whiter than white skin. He can hear her calling out to him, crying and asking why he'd left her there to die alone.

He knows that logically, she'd died hours before he'd left from a ruptured aneurysm. They'd told him that she had died almost immediately, likely sometime between 1am and 3am. Even if it had happened in the middle of the operating room, there was nothing that could have been done to save her.

The knowledge does nothing to ease the pain. He knows, even if they hadn't said so, that if they'd gotten her headaches checked out she would still be here today. He knows it. It's his fault for not pushing her harder.

He tries to remind himself that there's nothing that he can do to change what happened. The thought makes his skin itch. He doesn't like that he has no control over the situation.

He again feels like that helpless 19 year old boy who had to chose between enlisting in the army or staying in the same shithole of a neighbourhood and ending up like all his old friends- miserable and drunk, on drugs, a gang member, in prison, or dead. It hadn't been much of a choice.

He is fortunate that it had turned out so well. It hadn't for thousands of others who died or languished on the streets, devastated by unspeakable traumas.

Bay was the person who'd pushed him to be better. Not just because she or Callie deserved him to be the best person he could be, but because he deserved that too. That he mattered and was good and worthwhile.

They'd made so many happy memories together, and survived many tough times. They'd raised a family, travelled, and been good citizens to the world by creating positive change.

He thinks of his happiest memories and relaxes back. Those thoughts always managed to bring him out of the darkness, happening more easily each time as he recovers from the most unimaginable pain ever. Never before did he think that he could hurt so much until his soulmate had departed this earth.

A breeze brushes strands of his hair across his forehead. It was Bay, reminding him to think of the good times.

Like when Theo had been born and they'd introduced to his sisters. While Addy and Bee had been too tiny to understand, it had warmed his heart to see him carefully laid across their laps while the twins looked on curiously. Callie had stood silently by, crying happily while keeping a careful eye on the twins and her baby brother.

He remembers when he'd encouraged Bay to go back to her job early after noticing how miserable she'd been while trapped at home. He knew that she needed to spend time teaching and using her degree, no matter how much she claimed that she hated working. More than once she'd fretted how many years had gone into her degree and how few had come out it. She'd also worried about the example she was setting for her children, wanting them to grow up in a house with two hardworking parents and the financial stability that came with it. And so he'd rearranged his schedule, working more early mornings than he'd like so she could stay at work and be involved with the students while he was at home in the evenings. But it was worth it when he saw the tired fulfilment on her face each and every day. Her happiness was everything to him.

He thinks of the day they found out that her infection was gone and that she could come home from hospital. How he'd wished for 20 more long years and gotten them. The joy that day had been overwhelming and blinding in its intensity.

He remembers so many mundane moments too- teaching the kids to surf, late nights together in the pool, long hot baths and backrubs and trips to the zoo or museums, quiet nights reading and cooking dinner side-by-side and big smiles and loud laughs. He remembers her teasing him about how he didn't know how to hang up art, and how he teased her about how her hair had a mind of its own.

So many smiles and so much laughter. He'd lived a happy life and had to remind himself of it and be grateful. Without her, none of this ever would have happened. He never would have had a zest for life. Instead he'd be an onlooker in his own life, waiting for something to happen to him. That wasn't a way to live.

Bay had made his life truly meaningful and he'd never be able to return the favour. He could only continue to be grateful and chose to be brave in her memory.

Tilting his head back and smiling at the thoughts of all his experiences over the years, he feels the rays of the sun on his face, warming him pleasantly. Closing his eyes, he embraces the darkness like an old friend.

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The End

Please review!

Random note:

Thank you so much for sticking by me and supporting me as I wrote this beautiful story! I had many struggles, but I pushed through and produced a product that I can say that I am relatively proud of (the main exceptions being Bay's Italian cousin who I cringe thinking about and not utilizing Emmett like I'd planned). It was a challenge to write these characters as they got older and their life experiences began to seriously differ from mine, but I learnt a lot from this challenge.

The ending is deliberately ambiguous as to whether or not Ty passes away. In my mind he does, but it can also be interpreted as him having found peace after struggling for months with the loss of his wife.

While it is very unlikely that I will ever return to write about Bay and Ty, the possibility is still open as I have an old idea brainstormed out from before I even wrote Lock and Key. It's still a solid idea, but my inspiration has drifted towards other areas. If I get a good enough response, I will consider writing out a short fic in the range of 5-10 chapters exploring an alternate universe where Regina had reported the switch after she discovered it, and Bay and Ty find each other and fall in love.

Thanks again for everything! :)

Merry Christmas!