Chapter Book pt. I - How the story goes

One of my favorite authors says that every story has a beginning, a middle and an end, not necessarily in that order. 
I keep reminding myself of this quote lately, so I remember the chapters of my life frozen in their best moments.

MIDDLE

I am standing behind wooden doors and a white veil waves on the other side of the little glass tiles. I see a little bit of him.
He looks around anxiously, as if a kid who had lost his mother in the supermarket.
I listen to the song we picked for my entrance and hold my bouquet firmly. I see the reflection of a worried bride staring at me. She dares to ask if that was really what I wanted.
The song grows louder as my brother offers me his arm. When the door opens, my eyes meet his. I immediately break into a inevitable smile and every ounce of pain, fear or doubt is washed away, as if the sight of the love in his eyes was a wave made out of the only waters I could ever baptize myself in.
In that moment, I know he is the love of my life. In that moment, I know that I had made many mistakes, but he was not one of them. He was my certainty.

END

You learn a lot of things on the Oncology wing of a hospital. You learn names and numbers - platelets, trombocytes, neutropenia. You learn how to operate chemotherapy machines and change IV bags. You learn how to change diapers and wear hospital cloaks, gloves and masks as if you were getting ready to go to a masquerade gala.
You learn how to check vitals. How to know if someone is alive. If their brain is still working.
We spent three months in that hospital on a secluded street of Copacabana, a monument to the fallen in the heart of one of the most vibrant neighborhoods of Rio.
He sang everyday. He cried when I finally took him outside to see the sky and smell the green of the trees. He had child-like eyes. So when he seizured on my lap on that terrible night, and I felt the blood drip down my legs as if my body already knew I was about to be split in half, I only wanted him to open his eyes. The last thing he said to me was "I am sorry for making you go throught this. I am sorry.". The last thing I said to him was "Please, don't do that to me. Don't leave me.". I don't remember who said what first.
When you spend three months watching cancer poison each well on your love's body, you learn a lot of things. So when he stopped seizuring, I checked his vitals. His eyes wouldn't open. The ambulance wasn't there. I grabbed my phone and pointed a flashlight to his pupils - dilated and fixated. Non reactive to light. The most common sign of brain death.
But he was still breathing. His heart was still beating. And that beating resonated in the depths of  my heart like a thousand judges bringing down their gavels and finding me guilty. Of not saving him. Of his dilated pupils. They forced me to have hope.
He stopped breathing less than ten hours later.

BEGINNING

I am standing proudly on my heels, my 20 year old body always dressed in cute dresses, my hair too short to ever wear a ponytail. He walks in and we look at each other in the eyes. For a minute, eveything and everyone else becomes a simple blur, an inconvenient background noise.
I see him. He sees me. Our souls smile at each other and go like "There you are! I've been looking for you.".