"Why do I have to die?" Shana asked her mother. It was a hard question, but Lorelle didn't want her daughter's last memory of life to be a horrible one.
She could not bear to see her daughter die with a look of pain and suffering on her face, she wanted her to pass peacefully.
"You were much too precious on earth, so heaven wanted you back, my love. That's the reason you feel so sick, it's because you're afraid and you keep resisting," Lorelle beamed with affection for Shana. "There's no reason to resist sweetheart anymore, heaven wants you back, you can go."
"I don't want to go alone," Shana exhaled slowly.
"Close your eyes, my love, and when you open them, I'll be with you," Lorelle reassured her little girl. "It will be like falling asleep and waking up again."
"Where am I gonna be when I wake up?" Shana's question was a very hesitant one in which she wasn't so sure if she wanted to hear the answer.
"You'll be in heaven, Shana," Lorelle replied. "Everyone is waiting for you, grandma Lucy, grandpa Abel, your aunty Lorraine, and even Peeper."
"Peeper is in heaven?" Shana asked excitedly. "They have heaven for Peeper because he's a dog?"
"Yes, even for Peeper. Can you imagine the long walks you'll take him on? He's so eager to see you again." Lorraine rubbed Shana's arm and placed a strand of hair behind her ear.
"Can you sing me, my song momma? I'm tired now," Shana looked her mother in the eye with expectation as she waited for her to sing.
Lorelle cleared her throat, and she began, "All your life, you waited for love to come and stay, and now that I have found you, you must not slip away. I know it's hard believing the words you heard before, but darling, you must trust them just once more. Cause baby goodbye doesn't mean forever. Let me tell you goodbye doesn't mean we'll never be together again. If you wake up and I'm not there, I won't be long away, 'cause the things you do, my goodbye girl will bring me back to you."
"Momma, it hurts everywhere, but I'm so tired," Shana moaned. Her eyes were half opened as she scanned the room back and forth. "I can't see anything, it's so dark. Momma? Momma, are you here?"
"I'm here, my love," Lorelle whispered. "Close your eyes, baby, go to sleep, sleep now. Shhhhhhh, momma's here, Shana. Momma's here."
Shana's eyes closed for the last time as her mother sat and watched her sleep the same way she always did. She was so perfectly innocent with the whole world waiting for her once she awoke, that big world that can be so overwhelming at times. The world that she would one day grow into, the one that would give her a job, a husband, children, and maybe one day grandchildren. That was always the hope at least until leukemia came and ravaged her little body that was too small and too new in life to fight back. Now Lorelle watched Shana as she slept an eternal sleep from which she would never wake. There would be no milk and cereal to follow the next morning, no brushing teeth, and shuffling off upstairs to change before heading to her pre-school for fun circle times and finger painting. All she could do as her mother was to be there at the end and help take away as much of the pain and suffering as she could. That's what a mother does.
............
10 MINUTES LATER
Lawrence Pascua sat next to his daughter's body in ICU at Kapiolani, she was still warm while he ran his fingers over her forehead and gently stroked her dark curly again and again. It was always his way of slowly waking her from her sleep in the morning, it became such an ingrained habit that when Shana's eyes did not open it suddenly dawned on him that his little girl was truly gone. Lawrence's cry was filled with the kind of deep grief that could only come from a parent, it was worse than that of a wounded animal. At least the animal would eventually die, but this kind of pain was worse, and it never goes away. Even when the doctor and the staff came to take Shana away, Lawrence could not bear to part with her, it took a while, but eventually, he had to. Alone in the darkroom, he rocked back and forth in his chair while rubbing his hands together, "I wish you were still alive Lorelle, I really wish you were. Our baby is gone ..... you'd know what to do, babes, you always know what to do."
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