He shuffled the deck deftly, swiftly, then handed them to me.
“Here, you deal them, two each, remember to leave yours unturned.”
Nervously I took the cards, felt them warm to the touch, the silhouettes overflowing and wrapping themselves around my hands as I dealt his out. A Queen and a Jack of Hearts.
“Now deal yours,” he said.
I laid my cards face down. “You need to call,” I said.
“I’ll stay,” he replied, “twenty is enough for me, I have what I want. Now let us see your cards.”
I turned one card over revealing the King of Spades, the other was the Queen of the same suit. “I’ll have to take another,” I said, still not really understanding the game.
“No need to, you win that round, but if you choose another card and it is an ace I’ll retreat for now,” he replied.
“And if I don’t?” I asked. “Then we’ll play another round.”
I hesitate but feel that luck is on my side. I take the next card from the deck…an Ace of Spades, and sigh in relief as I lay it on my hand.
A soft cold breeze brushes past my cheek, and all disappears, the grey-suited man, the roulette wheel, cards, and table. I am on the shiny white floor of a hospital, my cheek pressed against the cold tiles. I blink back the bright lights that surround me. All is quiet except the regular beep beep of the machine attached to someone on the bed. I get up unsteadily, heavy with foreboding but hoping it is all a bad dream. There he is, my loved one, seemingly asleep. I watch over him and caress his cheek, and hear him whisper, ” I’m glad you are still here, hold my hand.” I take his hand in mine…he squeezes it gently, then says, “lt’s time to let go, darling.”
It was almost nine months ago that he passed away. I attended to the funeral arrangements, robotically went through all the administrative requirements of deleting his name from all financial documents but kept his email address. His ashes now fertilise the soil for daisies and bluebells to grow in the English countryside, close to where he grew up and roamed as a child.
Life goes on for those left behind, like the slow ticking of an old-fashioned clock but we are more conscious of it. We adjust to listening to it and learn a new rhythm, a new reality that becomes the norm. I doze off in the armchair and the man in the suit appears again, but I jolt awake before he can speak to me. I recall the roulette wheel, something I had put aside in my mind while grieving. I remember there was something about in nine months’ time, and I look at the calendar and realise it has almost elapsed. I feel time pressing on me but the sense of urgency is tempered by a rationality that attempts to calm me.