A Second Chance

Then I asked myself, "What did she just say? Give us a chance to be a family? Is she pregnant? God, I had to wake up, I had to." God, I was crying as hard as any man ever cried. I was going to be a father and I was dying. I kept crying. All of a sudden tears were rolling down my cheeks on my near lifeless body. Sally looked up and called the doctor in. "He's crying doctor, my love is crying. Is that a sign, doctor? Is it?"

The doctor pulled up my eyelids and I cried harder. Sally grabbed my hand and I moved my finger. "Doctor, doctor, I felt him move." The doctor quickly yelled to his nurse to turn all the machines back on. He had to read the meters. "Pulse up, blood pressure rising, temperature rising." Sally was crying. She leaned over and kissed me on the lips. I opened my eyes and began to cry.

The doctor called for help. They asked Sally to step out, she looked at the doctor, "Please," he said, "just for a minute. He'll be all right." Sally ran to the telephone to call my mom and dad.

The doctor looked at his nurse and said, "There really is a God. This just didn't happen, this was a miracle." The nurse asked the doctor what she should write on the charts? He said, "We can't write a miracle down. We will just have to put down 'Comatose patient regains consciousness.'"

I as a spirit was leaving the air and going back into by body. I turned and looked at the doctor and asked for a glass of water. It felt good to have fresh water touching my lips. I looked up and it was a crying Sally holding the cup full of water with a straw to moisten my dry lips. The doctor didn't say a word. He knew it was this woman's love and prayers that helped bring me back.

In the next couple of hours everyone in the family showed up. Mom and dad, Leah and her husband, my brother Kevin and his wife. I was allowed three visitors at a time. The hospital knew that Sally wasn't going to leave my side. I was getting tired so everyone was smiling and leaving. Well, almost everyone, Sally spent that night in the chair right next to me holding my hand.

In the next couple of days I began to return to normal. All life support systems were removed as well as the feeding tubes. I was allowed soup and Jell-o for the first couple of days. When I was released from the hospital Sally took me to her place. She said the doctor said she needed to be by my side. We both laughed. I knew she just made that up. We sat at the kitchen table and she brought me out a bowl of homemade soup. She looked at me very seriously and said, "Jerry, I have to tell you about my life. It might completely change our relationship. It's why I ran out at your sister's home. I have to be totally honest with you. There is no other way if we're to stay together."

I took her hand in mine, "Sally, I love you with all my heart. There is nothing you can say to me that would change that."

Sally said, "But. . ." I cut her off.

"But nothing, I love you and besides you all ready told me everything while I was in the hospital. About your teenage years, about your wild college years, my wild sister and yes even about the abortion."

Sally was in full fledge tear dome, "You heard me? You were in a coma but you heard me. You know everything? Will you forgive me?"

"What's to forgive? That was your other life, you asked God to give us a second chance and he did. I do have one question though. When is our baby due?"

She got up, hugged me then she said, "Babies, we're having twins and they are due in seven months"

I was elated. I have the woman of my dreams. I'm going to become a father in seven months. Then I realized that would be right around Christmas. What better present could my wife give me than a family of our own?

Sally wanted to be a June bride. It was already May so we started making plans for a small wedding. Her mom and dad were so happy for us and said they would fly in. A couple of her brothers and sisters were going to make the trip also.

On my side of the family everyone showed up. We had a small church wedding with our family around us. Sally was just beginning to show so she didn't want a wedding dress. But she looked beautiful in her light blue dress. I rented a blue tux in the same color. I wanted everyone to know that we were a couple.

We left after the wedding for a honeymoon. We made love every night. Seeing the radiance around her and kissing her little belly that was home for our future children was a wonder all its own. I never pictured life being so good.

We moved into Sally's apartment for now. We planned on getting the house with the little picket fence in the future. We were taking the gift of life that God gave us one day at a time. I did stop over to talk to Leah. I told her that I knew about her past and her secrets were safe with Sally and I. Her past was between her and her husband. I mentioned that Sally and I agreed never to discuss her past with anyone. We were only looking toward the future.

Mom invited us over for Thanksgiving dinner. All my family was there. We were all sitting around the tables and were getting ready to partake of the feast when Sally stood up and asked my dad if she could say a blessing before eating?

My family believed in God but we weren't big church goers or even the type to say grace before meals. My dad looked at my pregnant wife and said, "By all means, Sally, it would be an honor for you to give thanks on this day of Thanksgiving."

We all held hands as Sally spoke, "Our dear heavenly Father, we are gathered together here on this day to give thanks for all you have given us. Thank you for family but thank you most of all for giving us back Jerry. I know that it was only because of your Devine intervention that we have Jerry with us today. Thank you for giving me, my husband and my family a 'Second Chance' in life. In your name we pray. Amen

As she finished I looked over at her and kissed her gently. Then saying "I Love you" as we all began to eat.

My mom was asking Sally about our future babies. She was wondering if twins ran in her family? Sally told her when she spoke with her mom that she said that she knows of no other sets of twins in our family. My mom said that she didn't know of any in ours either. I just said there's probably a set somewhere that no-one remembers.

In truth Sally and I talked about it. We honestly feel that God in his infinite wisdom is giving Sally her baby back through us. He's giving her baby a "second chance" at life also. We could be wrong but we don't care what other people think. We know what we have been through.

Sally's parents planned on coming to Ohio for the Christmas holiday. They wanted to be here for the birth of our babies.

They arrived here on December 23rd. Sally was ready. She was happy but she wanted the babies born. On the 24th we were all over at my parents home celebrating Christmas eve. Sally came out of the bathroom and said, "Jerry, my water broke. I think your kids are about ready to come out." I jumped up running around gathering everything up. I thought I was prepared but I wasn't. I threw everything in the car and started off until I remembered I forgot Sally. I backed up and ran to the door. There stood my family laughing at me including Sally. I slowly walked her to the car, opened her door and then got in and drove to the hospital. I took her to the emergency room and had her admitted. The nurse said something about dilating and that it might be a couple of hours.

I went to the waiting room and Sally's parents and my parents arrived. They all wanted to be there for the arrival of their new grandchildren. I was so nervous I had to go to the restroom and throw up. When I got back it was just after midnight, December the 25th. The nurse came out and got me. She asked if I wanted to be there during the delivery. In one sense I did but in another I didn't. I had to be with Sally. They gave me a hospital gown to put on and a face mask. I walked in the room and saw Sally looking at me. I knew she was in pain but she still smiled at me as I held her hand. Just like she had done for me many months before.

I heard Sally scream out as the doctor said, "Here it comes. A baby boy." They weight him. I went to the door and said, "I'm a father. I have a son, Joseph, five pounds seven ounces. Born at 12:17am." Our parents were smiling with joy. Then I ran back in and grabbed Sally's hand. She screamed out again. The doctor again said, "Here it comes, a beautiful baby girl." Again after being weighed I ran to the door, "We have a beautiful baby daughter, Mary, five pounds four ounces, born at 12:42am." As our parents were crying with joy outside in the waiting room I was crying inside the room with my wonderful wife.

After the little ones were cleaned up and Sally was presentable our parent came in to see Sally and the babies. All three were so beautiful. The babies were taken to the nursery and our parents left. Sally had gone to sleep. The nurse asked me if I was leaving. I just smiled at her and said, "No, you see I love this woman with all my heart and all my soul. If she wakes up, I want her to know that I'm here waiting for her.

Epilog:

From that day on we had a storybook life. Sally decided she wanted to be a full time homemaker. She wanted to be there for her family. I received a promotion, I was the head accountant on our floor. We bought that house, though not so little, but it did have the little picket fence.

We're still not real religious people. We do go to church from time to time. We know that our life was all second chances, Sally's past, our twins, my near death experience. It was God that answered Sally's prayer, it was God that heard the doctor saying he didn't exist, it was God who intervened and saved me from a sure death. I believe it was all because of the love of one woman for one man that God saved me. "I love you, Sally."

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Thank you for reading my story.

Comments welcome.

DG Hear