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Gretchen pursed her lips and nodded. A moment later, she was gone. Twelve weeks ago, Gabby was rolled into the emergency room on a gurney, unconscious and bleeding heavily from a gash on her shoulder. The physicians concentrated first on the gash because of the heavy blood loss, though in retrospect, Travis wondered whether a different approach would have changed things. He didn't know, nor would he ever. Like Gabby, he'd been rolled into the emergency room; like Gabby, he'd spent the night unconscious. But there the sim women puma black ilarities had ended. The following day, he woke up in pain with a mangled arm, while Gabby never woke up at all. The doctors were kind, but they didn't try to conceal their concern. Brain injuries were always serious, they <a href="http://www.cheapnikeairmaxshoess.com/"><strong>cheap air max </strong></a> said, but they were hopeful the injury would heal and that all would be well in time. In time. He sometimes wondered whether doctors realized the emotional intensity of time, or what he was going through, or even that time was something finite. He doubted it. No one knew what he wa latest puma shoes s going through or really understood the choice that lay before him. On the surface, it was simple. He would do exactly what Gabby wanted, exactly as she'd made him promise. But what if . . . And that was the thing. He had thought long and hard about the reality of the situation; he had stayed awake nights considering the question. He wondered again what love really meant. And in the darkness, he would toss and turn, wishing for someone else to make the choice for him. But he wrestled with it alone, and more often than not, he'd wake in the morning with a tear?drenched pillow in the place Gabby should have been. And the first words out of his mouth were always the same. "I'm so sorry, sweetheart." The choice Travis now had to make had its roots in two distinct events. The first event related to a couple named Kenneth and Eleanor Baker. The second event, the accident itself, had occurred on a rainy, windy night twelve weeks ago. The accident was simple to explain and was similar to many accidents in that a series of isolated and seemingly inconsequential mistakes somehow came together and exploded in the most horrific of ways. In mid?November, t puma trainers hey'd driven to the RBC Center in Raleigh to see David Copperfield perform onstage. Over the years, they'd usually seen one or two shows a year, if only to have an excuse to get away for an evening alone. Usually they had dinner beforehand, but that night they d women puma black idn't. Travis was running late at the clinic, they got a late start out of Beaufort, and by the time they parked the car, the show was only minutes from beginning. In his haste, Travis forgot his umbrella, despite the ominous clouds and building wind. That was mistake number one. They watched the show and enjoyed it, but the weather had deteriorated by the time they'd left the theater. Rain was pouring down hard, and Travis remembered standing with Gabby, wondering how best to get to their car. They happened to bump into friends who'd also seen the show, and Jeff offered to walk Travis to his car so he wouldn't get wet. But Travis didn't want him to have to go out of his way and declined Jeff's offer. Instead, he bolted into the rain, splashing through ankle?deep puddles on the way to his car. He was soaked to the bone by the time he crawled in, especially his feet. That was mistake number two. Because it was late, and because they both had to work the following morning, Travis drove fast despite the w men’s puma future cat ind and rain, trying to save a few minutes in a drive that normally took two and a half hours. Though it was difficult to see through the windshield, he drove in the passing lane, pushing past the speed limit, racing past cars with drivers who were more cautious about the dangers of the weather outside. That was mistake number three. Gabby asked him repeatedly to slow down; more than once, he did as she asked, only to speed up again as soon as he could. By the time they reached Goldsboro, still an hour and a half from home, she'd become so angry that she'd stopped speaking to him. She leaned her head back and closed her eyes, refusing to talk, frustrated at the way he was tuning her out. That was mistake number four. The accident was next, and it could have been avoided had none of the other things happened. Had he brought his umbrella or walked with his friend, he wouldn't have run to the car in the rain. His feet might have stayed dry. Had he slowed the car, he migh cheap cat for sale t have been able to control it. Had he respected Gabby's wishes, they wouldn't have argued, and she would have been watching what he intended to do and stopped him before it was too late. Near Newport, there's a wide, easy bend in the highway intersected by a stoplight. By that point in the drive?less than twenty minutes from home?the itch in his feet was driving him crazy. His shoes had laces, the knots made tighter by the moisture, and no matter how hard he tried to push them off his feet, the toe of one foot would slip from the heel of the other. He leaned forward, his eyes barely above the dash, and reached for one shoe with his hand. Glancing downward, he struggled with the knot and didn't see the light turn yellow. The knot wouldn't come free. When it finally did, he lifted his eyes, but by then it was already too late. The light had turned red, and a silver truck was entering the intersection. Instinctively he hit the brakes, and the tail began to swerve on the rain?slicked road. Their car careened out of control. At the last instant, the wheels caught and they avoided the truck in the intersection, only to continue hurtling through the bend, off the highway, and toward the pines. The mud was even more slippery, and there was nothing he could do. He turned the wheel and nothing happened. For an instant, the world seemed to be moving in slow motion. The last thing he remembered before he lost consciousness was the sickening sound of shattering glass and twisting metal. Gabby didn't even have time to scream. Travis brushed a loose strand of hair from Gabby's face and tucked it behind her ear, listening to his stomach as it gurgled. As hungry as he <a href="http://www.cheapnikeairmaxshoess.com/nike-air-max-90-c-10.html"><strong>nike air max 90</strong></a> was, he couldn't bear the idea of eating. His stomach was perpetually knotted, and in those rare moments it wasn't, thoughts of Gabby would come rushing back to fill the void. It was an ironic form of punishment, for during their second year of marriage, Gabby had taken it upon herself to teach Travis to eat things other than the bland food he'd long favored. He supposed it had come about because she'd grown tired of his restrictive habits. He should have realized that changes were coming when she started slipping in the occasional comment regarding the tastiness of Belgian waffles on Saturday mornings or how nothing w men’s puma future cat as more satisfying on cold winter days than a plate of homemade beef stew. Until that point, Travis had been the chef in the family, but little by little she began edging her way into the kitchen. She bought two or three cookbooks, and in the evenings, Travis would watch her as she lay on the couch, occasionally folding down the corner of a page. <a href="http://www.cheapnikeairmaxshoess.com/nike-air-max-2010-c-44.html"><strong>air max 2010</strong></a> Now and then, she would ask him whether something sounded particularly good. She'd read aloud the ingredients of Cajun jambalaya or veal Marsala, and though Travis would say they sounded terrific, the tone of his voice made it obvious that even if she prepared these dishes, he probably wouldn't eat them. But Gabby was nothing if not persistent, and she started making small changes anyway. She prepared speed cat butter or cream or wine sauces and poured them over her portion of the chicken he cooked nearly every night. Her single request was that he at least smell it, and usually he had to admit the aroma was appetizing. Later, she took to leaving a small amount in the serving bowl, and after she'd poured some on her plate, she simply added some to his whether he wanted to try it or not. And little by little, to his own surprise, he did. On their third anniversary, Gabby prepared a mozzarella?stuffed, Italian? puma ferrari trionfo flavored meat loaf; in lieu of a gift, she asked him to eat i Cheap pumas t with her; by their fourth anniversary, they were sometimes cooking together. Though his breakfast and lunch were as boring as usual and most evenings his dinners were still as bland as always, he had to admit there was something romantic about preparing meals together, and as the years rolled on, they started to do it at least twice a week. Often, Gabby would have a glass of wine, and while they cooked, the girls were required to stay in the sunroom, where the prominent feature w buy puma trionfo as a Berber carpet the color of emeralds. They called it ‘green carpet time.'While Gabby and Travis chopped and stirred and conversed quietly about their day, he reveled in the contentment that she had brought him. He wondered if he'd ever get the chance to cook with her again. In the first weeks after the accident, he'd been almost frantic about making sure the evening nurse had his cell number handy. After a month, because she was breathing on her own, she was moved from the ICU to a private room, and he was certain the change would wake her. But as the days passed with no change at all, his manic energy was replaced by a quiet, gnawing dread that was even worse. Gabby had once told him that six weeks was the cutoff?that after that, the odds of waking from a coma dropped dramatically. But still he held out hope. He told himself that Gabby was a mother, Gabby was a fighter, Gabby was different from all the rest. Six weeks came and went; another two weeks followed. At three months, he knew, most patients who remained in a coma were moved to a nursing home for long?term care. That day was today, and he was supposed to let the administrator know what he wanted to do. But that wasn't the choice he was facing. His choice had to do with Kenneth and Eleanor Baker, and though he knew he couldn't blame Gabby for bringing them into their lives, he wasn't ready to think about them just yet. Eighteen The house they built was the kind of place in which Travis could imagine spending the rest of his life. Despite its newness, there was a lived?in quality from the moment they moved in. He attributed this to the fact that Gabby had worked hard to create a home that made people feel comfortable as soon as the door was opened. She was the one who oversaw the details that had made the house come alive. While Travis conceived the structure in terms of square footage and building materials that could survive the salty, humid summers, Gabby introduced eclectic elements he'd never considered. Once, while in the process of building, they were driving past a crumbling farmhouse, long since abandoned, and Gabby insisted he pull over. By that point, he'd grown used to her occasional flights of fancy. He humored her, and soon they were walking through what was once a doorway. They stepped across floors carpeted with dirt and tried to ignore the kudzu that wove through broken walls and gaping windows. Along the far wall, however, was a fireplace, thick with grime, and Travis remembered thinking that she'd somehow known it was there. She squatted next to the fireplace, running her hand along the sides and beneath the mantel. "See this? I think it's hand?painted tile,?" he said. "There must be hundreds of pieces, maybe more. Can you imagine how beautiful it was when it was new?"She reached for his hand shoes puma round . "We should do something like this." Little by little, the house took on accents he'd never before imagined. They didn't just copy the style of the fireplace; Gabby found the owners, knocked on their door, and convinced them to let her purchase the fireplace in its entirety for less than it cost to clean it. <a href="http://www.nationface.com/blogs/3462/48093/blogs-big-friends-group-power"><strong>Blogs » Big Friends Group (Powered by phpFoX)</strong></a> She wanted big oak beams and a vaulted, soft pine ceiling in the living room, which seemed to match the gabled roofline. The walls were plaster or brick or covered with colorful textures, some that resembled leather, all of them somehow resembling works of art. She spent long weekends shopping for antique furniture and knickknacks, and sometimes it seemed as if the house itself knew what she was trying to accomplish. When she found a spot in the hardwood floor that creaked, she walked back and forth, a big grin on her face, to make sure she wasn't imagining it. She loved rugs, the more colorful the pattern the better, and they were scattered throughout the house with generous abandon. She was practical, too. T puma shoes men 2011 he kitchen, bathrooms, and bedrooms were airy and bright and sparkly modern, with large windows framing the gorgeous views. The master bathroom had a claw?foot tub and a roomy, glass?walled shower. She wanted a big garage, with plenty of room for Travis. Guessing that they'd spend a lot of time on the wraparound porch, she insisted on a hammock and matching rockers, along with an outdoor grill and a seating area located in such a way that during storms, they could sit outside without getting wet. The overall effect was one in which a