Waxwork

Waxwork
Prologue

"The pain of a lost love may dim with time, but the memories will forever exist as a bittersweet reminder of what was once cherished." - Lang Leav.

When love is lost, memories of it remain a constant, if not often a painful reminder, of what was once held dear. However, what happens when that love is reborn and threatens those once-cherished memories?

Chapter 1: Grief

Andrew

They say that time heals all wounds, but I beg to differ. It has been six years since I lost my beloved wife, who was my world. Time hasn't healed anything for me. It has done the opposite, as I feel the wound constantly being reopened, and each time, it is more painful than the last. After her death, I created an altar to honor her memory. I also recreated her in a life-sized figurine made out of wax. It was my way to ensure that I would always have her by my side, memorializing her through her love of candles and wax museums. 

Valentine's Day was approaching, which also marked the anniversary of when we first met, and coincidentally, the day she was killed while out shopping for an additional surprise for me. I still remember that day clearly…

It was an unusually bitter-cold day and it had started to snow, causing the roads to become icy. The snow would melt upon contact with the warmer pavement, but its accumulation would freeze as the frigid air blew over it. Road crews weren’t expecting this sudden winter storm either. It was as though it were conjured from thin air. I was on my way home from work, on the other side of town, when Serena texted me that she was heading to the store. I told her not to go, but she insisted since it was only a few blocks away from the house. 

I knew something was wrong the moment I made it home and she wasn’t there. I waited at least 15 minutes before I started texting her. After getting no response from texting, I decided to call her, which went straight to voicemail. My heart sank. I knew something horrible had happened. I could feel it in my bones. Since I knew where she went, I grabbed my keys and I rushed out of the house to my car. I got in my car and started driving toward the store, which was only a block away from the house. There were many police cars, an ambulance, fire trucks, wrecked cars, and blood all over the pavement. Tears started rolling down my face as I approached the officers. I asked them what had happened and they said that a lady was hit by a car that careened out of control, skidding on a patch of black ice.

They didn’t tell me anything further except to go away and to let them do their jobs. I yelled at them, telling them that it was my wife who was run over. They immediately apologized and advised me that she had been taken to the local hospital and that I would be able to get more information there. When I got to the hospital, I approached the nurses’ station, told them who I was, and that my wife had recently been brought in after being hit by a car. They told me that they were sorry and I should wait in a waiting room for a doctor to come and speak with me. I have no idea concerning how long I waited, but I knew for a fact that I would have waited an eternity if I had to. After a long wait, the doctor eventually came to speak with me. He had a passive, yet sad expression on his face as he told me that my wife had no brain activity and that she was currently on a ventilator, which was keeping her alive. He also reminded me of the DNR that the hospital had recorded on her file.

My wife and I always discussed worst-case scenarios, and now I was living one. I knew that, if there was no chance of her ever coming back, she would not want machines to keep her alive, and that she would want her organs to go to anyone who could benefit from them. I told the doctor that I would honor her wishes, but I wanted to speak to her one last time. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I was still hoping that she could somehow hear my voice. I held her hand for the last time as I kissed her forehead and told her that I loved her and that I would do so forever. I told her that I didn’t know how I would go on living without her; she was my world. I also told her that I would never forget her. After I said my goodbye, the doctor pulled the plug on the machines and declared her time of death. It was 5 PM on February 14th.