Free ROAR by Kallypso Masters Page B

the hospital had long since been replaced by the percutaneous endoscopic gastrostomy tube inserted directly into her stomach and well-hidden under her gown. Seeing her once-unblemished skin marred by the PEG tube or any other medical apparatus pained him, but she’d have died without it. The question became whether this, too, had been extraordinary means. Putting her on dialysis or a ventilator clearly crossed the line of what measures he would impose upon her. However, the thought of withdrawing nourishment from her body—despite the fact there was no hope of recovery—had been out of the question early on. Feeding her and providing water hadn’t seemed like an extraordinary act to him.
    Although if he knew then what he knew now, he might have reconsidered.
    As her legal guardian, he worried every day whether he’d correctly determined what her wishes would be. They’d never really discussed end-of-life preferences. Who wanted to talk about such horrific eventualities when they were happily married and going about their lives with no inkling of what horrors the future held?
    All right, in retrospect, that sounded irresponsible. If he could do it over again, he’d have made sure they talked about it. Fortunately, her parents agreed with everything he’d done and supported his decision to insert the feeding tube when she’d come out of the coma. While she’d been raised Catholic, neither he nor Tori had been particularly religious, so the situation hadn’t encouraged him to seek out religious answers, either. Since the night Tori had been taken from him in that crash, he’d seen no evidence of a benevolent God. What kind of deity would leave her in this state, lost somewhere between the here and hereafter the way she’d been for four goddamned years?
    In hindsight, he should have pulled the plug within the first six months when she was deep in a coma and still on the ventilator. The physicians had told him there was no hope and encouraged him to pull the plug. But when she started breathing on her own, he hadn’t been able to remove the feeding tube. People woke up from comas every day. Look at the police officer in Tennessee who woke up after eleven years. Reports said he even spoke.
    Never give up hope. Believe in miracles.
    But the media failed to tell people that the man died a few months later with zero quality of life after his “miraculous” awakening.
    Kristoffer continued to hold out hope and kept reading about miracles happening to others who had suffered severe traumatic brain injuries. Why not expect one for Tori? She’d been a kind, benevolent person who was loved by many. Why had her life been destroyed and his spared when both had been involved in the same accident? If he’d been paying attention to the traffic in front of him, he wouldn’t have swerved and caused the accident.
    Hope didn’t always spring eternal, though. Eventually, one had to face reality.
    And here they were. He could take comfort in the fact she appeared to have moments of wakefulness and sleeping, as close to normal as she’d ever be again. But when her body jerked and twitched as if in response to his voice as it had done a few moments ago, he no longer pretended she knew who he was or had heard his words.
    He brushed a strand of hair away from her face. Realizing he hadn’t kissed her yet—something he normally did the moment he entered the room—he stood and bent over her, placing his lips against her cool cheek.
    “How’s my sweetheart doing tonight?” he repeated.
    No response.
    No change.
    No surprise.
    He settled back into the chair with a sigh. What could he talk about? Ah, yes . “You won’t believe what Gunnar’s up to.” No need to wait for any acknowledging murmur like she once had given when he recounted news from his workday. “He’s looking into buying a school to train Dominants and submissives in the lifestyle.” For the next ten minutes, he told her about his tour—well, most of it. Again,