Finally Letting go

Molly

My mind feels foggy as I try to wake up, like the feeling that you get when you are in a smokey room but I'm in my bedroom and in my bed so this doesn't make sense. I slowly start to open my eyes but the stinging only gets worse. What the hell is going on with my eyes?

I finally manage to open them fully but my sight is still fogged while a commotion of noise hits my ears and an awful smell hits my nose all at the same time. What the hell is that? I rub my eyes to try and clear them but it makes no difference, if anything the fog seems to get worse while my throat starts to burn.

A muffled noise outside my door brings my attention away from the fog. I think it's Tom's voice but I can't be sure. I sit up in bed and take a moment to look around the room and that's when reality hits me square in the chest. It isn't the fog that's stinging my eyes, it's smoke. Holly fuck my bedroom is full of smoke!

"Archie!" I call my husband as I go to nudge him but I completely miss him. Calling out his name suddenly sends me into a coughing fit that has my lungs burning in seconds. I put my hand over my mouth and nose as I turn to my side to face Archie as I call his name again but stop before I finish saying his name when I realize that he's not there, his side of the bed is empty.

"Molly!" I hear more commotion outside of my door only this time the voice is louder and more clearer. It's definitely Tom. "Molly, wake up!" I quickly scoot out of bed and get down low while heading for my bedroom door.

"Molly, can you hear me?" Tom's voice is, even more, clearer now. "Tom, Tom what's going on?" I call out as I pull my rope down from where it is hanging on my bedroom door and use it to cover my mouth and nose. Another painful cough leaves my mouth as I go lightheaded and fuck it scares me.

"Molls, the house is on fire, you have to come out babe!" Deep down I knew that my house was on fire but still I didn't want to think it never minds believe it, even if my smoke-filled room was the biggest clue, I still didn't want to believe it. Still don't.

I take in a deep breath readying myself to face whatever hell is on the other side of my door and fuck is that a big mistake. The moment I take a deep breath my lungs burn like nothing else and I find myself in the mists of a major coughing fit. God, please help me!

"Molls come on babygirl. I'm right outside your door. you can do this!" I try to calm my breathing while keeping most of my face covered and once again grab hold of the handle. The moment I touch it I want to let go again but I don't instead I scream my way through the pain that's building inside of me and pull open my bedroom door before falling into Tom's arms.

"I've got you, sweetheart, you're ok." He holds me up while I hold my hand close to my chest. "Tom, where is Archie?" I look up at him to see his entire face covered in smoke while he holds some sort of material to his own mouth and nose. "He's downstairs, remember?" Oh, that's right. "We need to get moving Molls, now!" His no-nonsense tone has me wiping away the tears that are soaking my cheeks and nodding his way. "Get down on the ground. we're gonna crawl our way out, ok?"

Again I nod his way before getting down on the floor on my stomach and crawling along our landing after Tom. The further along we go the thicker the smoke becomes making it almost impossible to see anything in front of me but somehow, I manage to keep my focus on Tom's feet. It only takes us a few minutes to reach the stairs but it feels like a lifetime.

Once we reach the top of the stairs we change our positions and quickly slide down them on our bums. Halfway down I realize that the smoke is again getting thicker and stronger and I'm pretty sure that the fire is downstairs somewhere.

"Archie!" I scream out his name as we stand at the bottom of our stairs which also leads to the front door. it would be easy to get outside right now but I'm not leaving without my husband and by the looks of things neither is Tom. "Archie!" Tom calls out his name as we try to get in the lounge but the door isn't budging.

We both push, punch, kick, and slam ourselves against the door but it won't budge. "It feels like there's something behind it stopping us from getting in." Tom's words mirror my thoughts and have me completely freaked out. Why the fuck can't we open the door? Why would something be behind the door?

"What if the fire is in that room? What if the ceiling has caved in? What if Archie... oh my god... Archie!" Tom takes my hand and pulls me until I'm facing him. "Molly we have to get out of here." I go to speak but he stops me just before I go into another coughing fit. " I know you don't want to and neither do I but we have to baby girl... We have to."

I can see the sadness on Tom's face and I know that this isn't a decision that he's making lightly but still, I can't just go that easy. I pull from somewhere deep inside of me and use every ounce of strength that I have to barrel; at the door one more time. Just before I make contact with the door I hear a nose and Tom appears next to me as he smashes into the door and finally, finally he breaks it down enough that we can see inside the room.

Well, I may have lied when I said that we could see inside the lounge because we can't, the moment Tom makes a hole in the door thick black smoke pours out, it's so much worse than the smoke that we have endured so far and the thought of Archie being in that room terrifies me but I don't think hell be anywhere else in the house.

I don't know about Tom but I feel my head getting fuzzy and I'm pretty sure that I'm close to passing out but despite that and the fact that we are both choking on the smoke that's pouring out of the lounge we both ram against the door some more and somehow manage to break through it but still, neither of us can see a thing.

"Archie!" I call out his name causing myself to inhale more smoke and cough until I'm close to throwing up. I feel myself getting weaker by the second and I can't imagine Tom's doing any better. We need to find Archie and get out of here. FAST!

"Molls, over here!" Tom rasps out the words while holding himself up against the wall. "He's over here!" I use anything I can to help move me across the room but I still feel like I'm barely moving. Thankfully I manage to reach Tom before I pass out but the sight that greets me is too much and all I see is darkness. Complete and utter darkness.

Molly

"Goodbye, Archie I'll always love you." I place a single red rose onto the dark brown casket, step back, and watch as the casket is lowered into the vault where my husband's remains will be burned until there's nothing left but ash and dust.

His soul left his body long ago even before he lost his fight with life before he lost his beautiful laugh and smile. Before he lost his cheeky personality and the ability to even dress or talk to anyone including me.

Seven months ago he returned home to me. We had seven months to add to our bond and love. Seven months to create more memories to last a lifetime, and seven months were all we had before he left me with his unfailing faith.

Right until the very end, he held on to his faith with a vice grip and I couldn't ever understand why, I still don't understand why if I'm being honest.

How do you keep your faith in God when you're slowly being taken away in one of the cruelest ways possible? How do you still hold on to that faith when it's doing nothing to help you?

I'll never understand it but for Archie, it was his biggest joy in life, his faith, his love for God, and his love for this exact church which is why I made sure he got one of his final wishes and was cremated here. I may not have understood his views or even agreed with them and I may not have got what I had wished for in life but I made dam sure that he did.

I watch as his family leaves the church looking at me like I'm something they have stood in and I watch as his friends leave giving me killer looks and I don't blame them because knowing what they know they have every right to hate me, every right to wish me harm, to wish that I was in that coffin and not Archie.

I wait for everyone to leave before I do and as I leave the church I'm pulled into arms and for the first time all day, I feel comfort and warmth, not hate or loneliness. "How are you holding up Molls?" I look up to see Thomas's eyes laced with tears, which only brings on my own.

I shrug my shoulders unable to find the words. I want to scream, shout, rip things apart, beg for my husband to return to me but speak? No, I don't want to do that. I don't have the words for that.

His cell rings and he answers it as he pulls me into his side while gently rubbing my arm while I manage to calm down my tears and breathe a little easier.

"Hi, Claire,"

"Yes, I'm on my way now."

"I just had to pop out for some fresh air."

"Of course, I'll be 10 minutes."

"Goodbye, Claire."

He puts his phone back in his pocket before wrapping both arms around me. "I know it may not seem like it now but you will be ok baby girl, I promise." He pulls away from me a little before giving me his famous Thomas grin and despite my pain, I find myself lightly laughing. He is the only person that can make me laugh right now and I'm grateful for it.

"You should head to the wake before Claire calls again." My voice is raw from all the crying I've done today, hell all the crying that I've done over the past 2 weeks since Archies death and over the past 5 months while he's suffered and I've had to watch.

"She'll be fine I'd rather stay with you." I know he means it but Claire already hates me enough without me keeping her son's best friend away from his wake.

"I know and I love you for that but she needs you there. You were his best friend and he was her only son, she's hurting and you comfort her. He goes to talk but I raise my hand to stop him.

"Do it for Archie and do it for me. I hate that I can't be there for her or any of the family but you can be there to help them in my place instead." He knows when I'm not going to budge on something and he knows that this is one of those times.

"Ok I'll go but you call me if you need me ok?" I nod agreeing just before he kisses my forehead and says his goodbyes and I head off to the only place I want to be right now.

For 4 hours I sit on his favorite bench, It's tucked away on the grass bank overlooking the sea and this was always his favorite place to be in good times and bad. We were out here two days before he died... before he left me and the image of his beautiful smile as he looked out at the never-ending ocean will always stay with me.

I reach into my pocket and take out the letter. I've read the words a thousand times but every time hurts just as much as they did the first time that I read them.

Sometimes I wish that Tom hadn't found the letter that night because knowing what it says, knowing the truth constantly feels like a thousand knives slicing me but if he hadn't found it then I know that I would have always questioned his death and I'm not sure how I would have coped, not that I'm coping any better right now.

My husband was one incredible man and loved by so many people that they were standing outside the church because it was full inside and yet I'd never felt so alone. This was once our home, our family, and our friends but none of those include me now nor do I belong in this town anymore.

We moved here for a fresh start and for him to be close to his family again and I loved it here but now that he's gone and everyone hates me this town feels empty, It doesn't feel like home anymore even with Thomas here.

I step inside the hotel that overlooks the ocean and head for room 309. I step inside pull off my shoes and flop on the bed rubbing my aching feet. I take out the letter and again read it. I know I'm torturing myself by doing it but I can't help it nor can I help the tears as they resurface and I let them fall once again.

Molly

Room 309 of the highland motel has been my home for the last week. After the fire, I spent a week in the hospital, and by the time I got out I was allowed back in the house to get my stuff but it's not safe enough to live in and quite frankly I don't want to be there nor have I been back since that night

.I try and shake myself off the memories but it doesn't matter what I do they continue to haunt me every single day and night. I head inside the bathroom, switch on the shower and quickly strip off before stepping under the steaming hot water hoping and failing to wash away this pain.

Once I'm washed and dried I put on my pajamas brush my teeth get into bed and take out my cell to start my usual nightly routine. My cell was destroyed in the fire but by some miracle, my memory card survived, and for that, I am seriously grateful as I have a lifetime of photos and memories on there that I can't replace.

I always kept a copy of my pictures on my laptop but I didn't think about what would happen if we had a house fire and is safe to say that my laptop didn't survive the fire and so the pictures on my phone are currently the only ones I have left.

I finish looking through the photos just in time for Thomas to arrive. He has been with me every single night since the fire. When I was in the hospital he would come in the night and stay until the morning and he is still doing the same now even though I'm in a hotel now he still won't let me spend the nights alone and in all honestly, I'm grateful for it.

Thomas wasn't just Archies best friend he's mine too. I met them both on the first day of high school and It was the three of us from that very first day. I was new in town and I didn't know anyone, didn't have any friends but Archie and Thomas never left me be alone and 13 years later it's still the 3 of us, well now it's just the two of us.

Mine and Archies friendship developed into more when we were 16 and he's been the love of my life ever since. We got married at 18 just before he and Thomas joined the army and I was allowed to move with them and live local to their base because of our marriage, of course, Thomas lived with us too but we wouldn't have had it any other way.

Both of them re-enlisted twice but eight months ago when it was time to decide if they wanted to reenlist again they both decided it was time to leave and start their lives. Archie and I both wanted kids and at 26 and after being married for eight years I was ready to start a family and Thomas was ready to meet the man of his dreams.

Archie wanted to move to Florida, his family moved here three years ago and he wanted to be close to them and I was more than happy to follow him here. In all honesty, I would have followed him anywhere because he was my whole world and there isn't anything I wouldn't have done for him which is why I'm doing this... and despite Thomas's family living in Texas he wanted to come with us and we were honestly thrilled, after living together for so long I couldn't have imagined being in Florida without him.

The door creeks as Thomas lets himself in and as always he greets me with his warming smile even though I know he's hurting underneath. He's been trying to stay strong for me this whole time but I know that underneath this is killing him we both loved Archie and we're both lost without him.

As soon as he comes in he goes into the small closet that we are sharing and brings out a large duffel bag and puts it down on the floor and I'm instantly confused. We both lost all of our clothes in the fire so Tom went shopping to get us a few basics but I'd never noticed the duffel bag before.

"What's going on Tom?" he walks over to the bed and sits down next to me and a strange feeling comes over me.

"When we first arrived in Florida Archie and I got talking about what we wanted from life. we had spent so much time being told what we could do and huddled up in awful conditions. Arch, he knew he was ready to start a family with you and I knew I wanted my knight in shining armor." he winks at me making me smile before he carries on.

"Anyway as I said we knew what we wanted but after everything, we felt like we needed something different first and so we got these." He hands me an envelope looking a little nervous while I know I look confused.

"They are tickets, tickets to travel around the world. They leave tomorrow and return in one year, he planned on surprising you on your anniversary but then he..." I nod knowing what he means but completely shocked at what he's just given me.

"How the... What the... Huh?" I'm completely speechless right now which is a first for me.

"I've thought about this trip a lot over the last few days and I decided that I wouldn't go but the more I thought about it the more I realized that he would kick my ass if he thought I wasn't going because of him!" For the first time since his death, I laugh, a real laugh because I know he's right.

He's been one incredible friend to both me and Archie since the day we meet but he's also been my lifeline since Archies death and I'd be lying if I said that I'm going to be lost without him. I'm not even sure how I'll cope but I won't let him know that and I won't stop him from going because he deserves this more than anyone else I know.

Thomas is without a doubt the kindest guy that I know, he always puts everyone before himself and I know that if I asked him to stay he would without a thought or care for himself, and that among many other reasons is why I won't ask him to do it.

I shake my head to bring me back to the present and feel the tears prickle at the back of my eyes at the thought of not seeing my best friend for a whole year but I push them back because the moment he sees them he will drop all his plans and I won't be responsible for keeping him from this once in a lifetime experience.

"He definitely would do that and you are right you have to go Tom. This is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity and you'll regret not going, I know you will." He nods agreeing which I'm glad for.

"Molly... I want you to come with me."