I am saying her name while I am still a person who can mean it precisely. She was my friend before she was your weather. I asked her to keep coming. I asked her in the hospital on a Tuesday you were at the pharmacy, because Emma needs more than a father and a grandmother and a casserole schedule, and because Lauren knows how to sit in a room without filling it with her own goodness. I saw your face when she knocked. I am not blind and I am not a saint and I am too tired to pretend those are the same thing. You are already practicing widowhood in the parking garage. I understand it. I hate that I understand it. Understanding is not the same as a blessing you can spend in secret.
If you love her, love her in the daylight. If you do not, do not use her as a hallway out of me. Either way, Emma cannot be the last to know. Say my name in the same sentence as Lauren's until it doesn't scare you. Tell Emma I knew there was a tenderness growing in my own kitchen. Tell her it was not a theft from a corpse unless you hide it until it curdles. If you marry Lauren someday, do not do it as an apology and do not do it as a finish line. Do it only if Emma can stand in the room without translating you. If she cannot, wait. Waiting will not kill you. I am the one doing the dying.
I left the cream dress in the cedar closet. Not for Lauren. It was never a costume someone else should finish. It is for Emma if she wants a piece of me that is not sickness, years from now, for a dance or a play or a day she wants weight on her shoulders. Don't let anyone call it a wedding dress. It was just a dress I was happy in once, in the rain.
I am going to stop before I beg. Come home if you're still at the hospital. I want the ordinary night. I want Emma's cold feet under the blanket and your complaint about the porch light, which I still have not fixed, because I like the way you stand on the steps and swear softly like a man with a project. If I don't get many more of those, this is me saying I still choose you. I am still choosing you. Even now. Even with her name in my mouth.
Don't let the nurse throw this phone out if I fall asleep before I figure out how to send it. I love you. Tell her. Tell Emma. I'm here until I'm not."