Nothing Can Change This Love

Cold yellow light spread across the pale coral walls as surging electricity sparked the bulbs to life. The bones and joints supporting Ellie’s ninety-four year old knee’s ached from layers of arthritis with every step. Yet the pain was no match for the evergreen love within her heart. Adjusting her own eyes to the sharp illumination, Ellie began her daily routine.

First, she used the sink in the small bathroom to wash her hands and apply a faint layer of cherry lip gloss to her chapped lips. Second, she ran one of the black combs resting on the counter beside the faucet through the lightly tangled knots in her thin gray curls. She may have been ninety-four, but that didn’t mean her hair wasn't just as luscious as it was when she was a young woman. Smiling at her reflection, which she was both afraid and proud of, Ellie exited the bathroom and opened the room darkening curtains on the fall. Letting the daylight of the early autumn morning charge the room with chilled warmth and hope.

She stared out into the nearby foliage and began identifying the oaks, pines, elms, and maples. It was a technique to help keep her vision, as well as her mind sharp as they navigate through the ladder years of life. She also loved everything about nature and regularly, however politely, cursed her spoiled knees for ending her life-hobby of hiking. She was also a wildlife biologist and a damn good nature photographer. Although, for the last twenty years, her passion for wildlife bloomed into an unconditional love for birds. Pivoting her studies towards Ornithology, she immersed herself and learned everything she possibly could about as many different species of birds until the dreaded day her knees forced her to retire.

Observing the branches, Ellie quickly spotted the tree she was looking for. Hiding in plain sight in between two orange and yellow maples, the old elm was bustling with the morning songs and dances of male birds courting the waking females. Her heart erupted with splendor as the magical renditions reminded her of how her husband sang and danced with her for the first time when they were in highschool.

Seventy-eight years later, Clyde could no longer sing or dance but he still consistently found ways to make her heart feel just as magical. He stirred beneath the weighted blankets, sensing his wife was near, and used every ounce of strength he could muster to open his eyelids so he could gaze upon the love of his life.

Hearing the faint rustling, Ellie turned from the window and joined Clyde at his bedside. She slowly descended into the cushioned chair, picked up the two hearing aids resting on the nightstand and delicately inserted them into each of Clyde’s ear canals. His instantaneous ear to ear smile told her he could hear the world around him. Unfortunately, his latest stroke left him unable to verbally communicate, but knowing that he could hear her voice and seeing him smile every time she spoke was more than enough for Ellie.

“Good morning honey pot. Did you have sweet dreams? I hope they were about me.”

Clyde smiled blindly, as his vision had descended into a permanent haze, and puckered his lips. Ellie giggled for a moment, which felt like a lifetime, wiped the small bubble of drool pooling at the corners of his chapped lips with her thumb, then puckered her own lips and kissed him.

As always, Ellie was transported through time to a long forgotten memory she shared with her husband. She was thirty-three again, and Clyde’s handsome face and chiseled, strong arms swung her all around the dance floor at their wedding. She was dipped, twirled, spun, hugged and even lifted into the air. It was a difficult move she feared they couldn't pull off, and she urged Clyde to cut it from the routine, but he was confident they could nail it. Which they did. On the first try. The room erupted with cheerful applause and she kissed her newly wedded husband with every ounce of love she could muster.

Opening her eyes, she had been transported through time again and was delicately hovering over her ninety-seven year old husband’s grinning face. The kisses were her connection to their lives together. Ellie suffered from Alzheimer's disease and was slowly forgetting all of her and Clyde’s best moments together, but every time she kissed him, her brain broke free of the veil and was able to remember one moment at a time, “You were always there to catch me. Raising me up. Making me feel alive. Visible. I love you my dear.”

Clyde stirred beneath his sheets..

“I need you to hear me, honey. I love you so very much. You’re my everything.”

Clyde stirred again, grunting and coughing as he reached out his quivering hands. Ellie grasped them with her own, kissed them, and squeezed them as tightly as her frail fingers would allow.

On the opposite side of the bed, beeping a void as dark as pitch through Ellie’s heart, was Clyde’s EKG monitor. She fantasized about unplugging the machine, so she could spend these moments with her husband in peace, but the plug was too large, and too low to the ground. Her knees would never allow her such a feat. Even if she was successful, she feared she wouldn’t be able to get back up. That was a risk she wasn’t willing to make.

She knew that with every passing second, Clyde slipped further and further away from her.The beeping only reinforced that harsh truth, so she leaned over her chair and pulled her cell phone from her tote bag. Slipping her oval glasses down onto her nose from the brim of her hairline, she used the tip of her finger to unlock the screen. Struggling to remember the icon of the little green app, she finally located it and opened Spotify. Thankfully, her daughter created a playlist containing all of Ellie and Clyde's favorite and most memorable songs.

Without needing to scroll, she pressed the first song in the playlist, giggling while the piano began to fill the room with magic. She dragged her finger across the screen, turning the volume up the maximum level, then carefully placed the phone down on the pillow beside Clyde’s head - giving him the best chance to hear Sam Cooke’s voice sing their wedding song, Nothing Can Change This Love.

Ellie rested her head on Clyde’s chest, listening and feeling his heart rise and fall to the song. Even though he couldn’t move, or sing, she knew he was dancing with her.

As the music continued to play, Clyde continued to drift and Ellie slipped back into one of her happy memories.