LOVE ON THE EDGE

THE STORM

"Beep, beep, beep," went the machine in Marilyn's hospital room, the machine which was monitoring her oxygen saturation level, blood pressure and pulse rate, all which had been deranged in the last hour when Tom had found her on the bathroom floor in a pool of her own blood, passed out and gasping for breath. He had never been that scared before in his life, he knew she was really hurt by what Jacklyn had done and the role he had played, coupled with similar experiences in the past but he never expected that she would try to take her own life.

"Mr Tom," a voice jolted him out of his thoughts. "Yes," he replied. It was the nurse. She had come to transfuse Marilyn with the second unit of blood she will be receiving since admission. Apparently, she had lost a lot of blood and had her husband not found her at the exact time he did, she would have died.

The doctor said if she could be resuscitated adequately and her blood level became normal again, she had a good chance to recover fully. Also, the source of all the bleeding which was the deep cut on her wrist had been sutured and dressed neatly.

Tom had gotten up to excuse the nurse, he stood at corner of the room and wept. He could not believe the role he had played in all this and how he could have lost his wife because of his pride and poor judgement. How could he not see that Jacklyn was a bad influence and probably just wanted to destroy the beautiful relationship he had with his wife?

He made up his mind to confront her and tell her what she had done and possibly, cut ties with her.

"Daddy," a voice cut through his thoughts. Turning around, he saw his son Blaise. "Daddy, what happened to Mummy?" Blaise asked. Tom just drew the boy into an embrace and said, "your mummy will be fine my boy."

And there she was, standing beside him, face appalled, looking unperturbed. "What are you doing here?" Tom questioned. "I was passing by the school when my attention was drawn to Blaise standing by the fence with his school teacher, waiting to be picked up. I went in and spoke to the teacher who said she had tried reaching out to both you and Marilyn severally but to no avail. I offered to take Blaise home but she was reluctant, even though she knows that we are best buddies. In the end, she made me sign an undertaken in the presence of the headmistress and other staff that I will bring the boy straight home and have his parents call them to say I did before night fall. Imagine my surprise when on getting to your house, I met no one but was told by neighbors what had happened and that you would be here," Jacklyn explained. "I am so sorry for everything." she added.

"Well," Tom continued, "We were best buddies, but not anymore. How could you do this to me Jacklyn? I trusted you and even let you speak ill of my wife, only for you to go behind me and steal her idea, the very one you called dumb and foolish. All this happened and is happening because of you. You have done enough, please leave." "But Tom..." Jacklyn tried to talk but he would not listen. He took his son and asked the nurse to excuse her from the room. Jacklyn left indifferent, in. her mind, she had nothing to apologize for, after all, he brought the idea to her not the other way round. He betrayed his wife, not her. And she sure was not the one who had slit Marilyn's wrist.

Marilyn coughed, and started struggling to breath, the beep sound of the machine suddenly changed to a constant continuous sound. "Nurse, Doctor," Tom called out, rushing to her side. "Daddy what is happening?" Blaise asked, scared, crying. Tom held on to his wife, begging her not to leave him. The medical team had arrived and were all over her, trying to stabilize her. One of the porters had taken Blaise out of the room as the doctor had instructed. Marilyn was immediately rushed out of the room to imaging, so Tom was told. They needed to know why she was coughing out blood.

He followed closely, weeping and begging her not to leave him.

While the imaging procedure was taking place, he paced up and down the walkway, praying and begging God to spare his wife's life. He promised to turn from his evil ways and love her more.

"Mr Tom," the doctor called him in. He went into the consulting room adjoining the imaging centre. She went on to explain that during imaging, they had detected a rare condition which was life-threatening and had probably not been diagnosed before. Infact, she was a hundred percent sure that Marilyn had never known.

She had a hole in her heart which has been silent all these years. But due to the amount of blood loss she just had, her heart was challenged to do more work in pumping blood needed for the whole body and so the defect has become obvious. As a result, Marilyn will need a surgical procedure to close up the hole as soon as possible or she will die.

As the doctor spoke, Tom could not hold himself back, he cried like a baby, not knowing what to do. Where was he to get the amount of money needed for the surgery, where was he to begin?