Life can change in an instant. Just yesterday, I was arguing with my wife over trivial things, and today I sit in our empty flat, choking on fear and solitude. My Emily suddenly fell ill, and this day became the hardest of my life. A story of how I nearly lost what mattered most—and learned what it truly means to cherish those you love.
It began with her scream. Emily clutched her stomach, her face drained of color, unable to speak. I called an ambulance, and the paramedics rushed her to a hospital in the outskirts of Manchester. I followed, my heart hammering as if it might tear free from my chest. At the hospital, they told me Emily was being prepped for emergency surgery and ordered me to go home. “Call later,” they said briskly. I stood in the corridor, stunned, unsure how to keep breathing.
Back at the flat, the silence roared in my ears. Everywhere, traces of our life together: scattered belongings, a half-finished mug of tea gone cold on the table—cold as my heart. And then it struck me: the last thing binding me to Emily had been our fights. Endless, petty arguments over nothing.
Money was always tight. Emily, I’d insisted, spent too much. Yesterday, she’d bought a small punnet of strawberries. In winter! For that price! I’d grumbled about extravagance, about how we weren’t millionaires. “Who needs a handful of berries?” I’d snapped. She stayed silent while I droned on. In the bathroom, her new moisturiser sat on the shelf—overpriced, I’d complained, a waste.
On the stove, a pot of stew remained untouched. How many times had I nagged her to cook less? “There’s only two of us—who’s going to eat all this?” Now those words echoed in my skull. Two of us. Until today, there had been two.
I flicked on the laptop to distract myself, but an ad for a lakeside hotel in the Lake District flashed up—somewhere Emily had dreamed of visiting. “Too expensive,” I’d shut her down. “We’ve got the mortgage, we need to plan for the future, a bigger place, a car.” Always an excuse to deny her wishes. And now? Now I sat alone in this hollow flat, hating myself for it.
Her dressing gown lay crumpled on the sofa, the one with the embroidered puppy. She’d barely had time to change before the ambulance arrived. I picked it up, smoothed it, then pressed it to my face and wept like a child. It still smelled of her—warm, familiar. Loneliness swallowed me whole. This flat, our home, felt alien without her. Why had I always looked for reasons to fight? Why begrudged her small joys? Those strawberries… Had they been her last moment of happiness?
I sat in the dark, wiping my tears with her gown, realising how meaningless my stubbornness had been. Money, plans, possessions—all dust compared to her smile. I prayed—begged—for her survival, for a chance to make things right.
Later, I rang the hospital. “The operation went well,” they said. I bolted from the flat like a madman. On the way, I stopped at a shop and bought every last strawberry—five punnets, wildly overpriced, barely ripe. I carried them like an offering, my penance.
In the ward, I handed them out—to nurses, to other patients. Everyone smiled, thanking me. Emily couldn’t eat yet, but I sat by her bed, holding her hand, overflowing with gratitude. Because she was alive. Because she was here. I swore to myself then: never again would I deny her dreams or her joy. Life is too fragile to waste on quarrels.
