We All Want Impossible Things

Back in Edi’s room, Ash and Jonah refill Edi’s ice water. Jonah leaves to find coffee, and Ash sits alone with Edi. Ash realizes that Edi is staring into her eyes for reassurance and to feel safe, just as her children did when they were young. In a moment of clarity, Edi tells Ash what a good friend she has been: “I’m crying and smiling so hard my face is breaking apart, my heart is. You are too. The best” (173). Edi’s lucidity leaves as quickly as it came, and Ash cries a little.

Jude comes back and tries to lie in bed with Edi, but he disconnects her tubes and waste bag, spilling mess all over the bed and floor. They clean it up as Edi lies in bed, largely unaware of her surroundings. Ash reflects on the messiness of life, and recalls how she felt giving birth—a chaotic mess of love, pain, and exhaustion.

Jude and Ash share a cigarette outside the hospice. They are interrupted by two people who come out the back door crying. Ash consoles the pair and tells them not to worry, that they’re all there doing the same thing. After the couple leaves, Jude tells Ash that he thinks she and