by Corri Lee
I was naked for all but a blue gown with an open back. The air touching my skin chilled me down to the bones and made me shake mercilessly. The only way to describe the way I felt was ‘fluish’, a feeling that only got worse when I saw the sign hanging from the headboard.
‘Do not resuscitate’. Damn it, so close. I was way too uncomfortable to be having some kind of outer body experience or spiritual parting from my physical being. When did you ever hear of ghosts needing to pee?
So I must have been in bad shape to have that kind of order literally hanging over my head. Really bad shape. Why hadn’t my body quit when it was supposed to?
There again, it kind of did when I lowered myself to the floor and ended up sprawled out across it. Unable to support my weight, my legs folded at the first second and sent me plunging down with a wince and a curse.
Okay, so I’d be crawling to the bathroom. May as well get all my bending over out of my system before it became a little dangerous. Whispers about prison showers came to mind.
Holding on to all my expulsive urges, I gripped the sheets on the side of the bed to pull me upright. Disaster. The only thing I achieved was toppling the bed over and on top of me. Oh, God. Maybe I’d die after all.
“Emmeline? Shit!”
I’d reflexively curled up into a ball when I saw the bed coming toward me and had fully expected some kind of major head trauma, so to be surrounded by metallic clattering and to still be cowering several seconds later was more than a little shock. I shifted the hand I had over my eyes and looked sheepishly at the person who’d sprung in front of me to take the impact on my behalf.
I wanted to cry so I did. The person I’d avoided on the occasions I’d woken up was spread out protectively in front of me, trying to right the madness I’d created. His chest heaved with exertion as he straightened the bed and stood briefly to hit the emergency assistance button on the wall.
And then he turned to face me and I cried harder because he looked so sad and betrayed. Frozen still, Blaze stared right into my streaming eyes for too long before sinking down to his knees and letting his head hang wearily.
“I thought you were dead. We all thought you were dead. You shouldn’t be alive right now.” I didn’t answer, too afraid to say something that would have him launching at me to finish the job and arranging me back on that mattress like I’d passed naturally. Who’d have blamed him? “You wouldn’t stop bleeding. You went into hypovolemic shock. You had a fucking heart attack right in front of me. How are you still alive?”
I swallowed down a hard lump in my throat, dashing my tears away in some bullshit semblance of dignity. “I’m sorry.”
“You’re sorry? Sorry you’re alive or sorry you were so close to dying we’ve been arranging your funeral?”
I’m sorry I’m alive. I turned away, so ashamed of myself. I hadn’t thought as far ahead as heart attacks and DNRs when I decided to die, believing that I’d be alone to bleed. Putting my friends and family through hell wasn’t my goal, and I hated that it had played out this way.
Graciously, Dr. Downes burst through the door with a couple of nurses, who made no delay in scooping me up off the floor, flashing bright lights in my eyes and strapping inflatable blood pressure cuffs around my arms. Being harassed reminded me of how sick I’d been feeling, and I disgracefully wriggled out of their reach to throw up over the floor next to me. It was excruciating and sent a fresh burst of white hot pain through me. Maybe this was the curtain call...
“Eyes open, Emmy.” I dopily obeyed the doctor’s command and willed myself to look at her. I’d only ever seen her so serious once before, when she’d been the only one to convince me to calm down enough to have a nasogastric tube fitted. “I win this round, Tudor. You’ve caused a lot of trouble today. Anything to say for yourself?”
“Yes, actually. You should really do something about the stability of these beds. It could have killed me.”
She laughed and urged the nurses to back off. “She’s fine. Let’s get her in for a full CT and MRI, get some bloods to lab and tell her family she’s awake.”
“I’ll tell them.” The medical types parted, clearing a direct path of sight to the man they’d blocked out when they arrived. Dr. Downes frowned at Blaze and looked between us carefully, gauging the lingering tension.
“No...” Reaching out, she gripped his arm above the elbow and pulled him toward me. “She shouldn’t be on her own. Should you, Emmy?”
Crap. It took the length of just one stolen heartbeat to figure out that she was trying to force us into opening a dialogue. Boxed in, I offered the only answer I could think of—”I need some ‘personal’ assistance.”—and tried not to fall to pieces when I was lifted up into the arms that had once provided such comfort, yet now only gave guilt and worry.
Carried and set down on the toilet, Blaze turned his back on me to give me some privacy. I hated that he was so quiet and stoic when he would have usually baffled me with a poetic sentiment and reassurance. I had no idea where I stood—whether he was angry and which way that ire was directed. All I knew was that the silence was intolerable.
“Well...” I muttered, leaning limply against the support rail on the wall. “This is awkward.”
“Don’t, Emmeline.” He shook his head, turning only slightly in my direction. “Don’t make light of this.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You keep saying that but I’m no closer to knowing what for. Because you screwed up my life and tried to irretrievably walk out of it? Or because you tried, failed, and now you’re resorting to dry wit and sarcasm to soften the blow?”
“I... God.” How could I argue when he made such an indisputable point? I had screwed up his life—screwed it up good. And now I was trying to joke my way out of it?
“I so want to be angry. You committed the worst of sins and you broke your promise to never leave me by trying to take the cowards way out. I spent today missing you even though you were lying right there in front of me. I had to keep looking at your god damn mother to remember what colour your eyes are.”
“Blaze...” It seemed strange to me that those words could make me feel better. Something so morbid yet so sweet gave me reason to believe he didn’t hate me.
No longer caring for my privacy, he spun around and dropped to his knees again, slowly creeping across the cool tiles toward me. “I drove to you it. I spent too much time focusing on what I thought was best for us that I forgot what was right for you. If I’d paid more consideration to what you were feeling—”
“No! Shit. No.” I reached out shakily and rested my hands on his shoulders. “You couldn’t have stopped me. I couldn’t have stopped me. You had nothing to do with it.”
“Nothing? You didn’t think about me once? My feelings or esteem? How I’d have to live my life afterwards?”
“Actually, you were the only thing on my mind.” He went rigid and shrank back, hurt by the honesty. “That didn’t come out right. I meant...” I didn’t know what I meant. My head was such a fucking mess. “My subconscious took over and made me do what it thought would make your life happier. Natasha would have ruined your life and—”
“God.” Blaze shrugged my hands away and leaned his head against my knees. “I don’t want to think about her right now.”
“But we need to talk about it. About her.”
“We don’t. It’s taken care of. You don’t need to worry about anything.”
“But—”
“Emmeline.” He sighed and tentatively lifted his gaze to mine. His eyes were so reddened through sadness and exhaustion but no less vivid. Maintaining eye contact was difficult for me, but he held on to my attention like no other person alive could. “Since I woke up in the early hours of this morning, I’ve seen you dead more than I’ve seen you alive. I’m still not convinced you’re going to pull through and you’re going to leave me for good. Is it too much to imagine that I might not want to waste time talking about my fucking ex-wife?”
“
I guess not.”
Feeling drained after such a short time awake, I leaned my head atop his and closed my eyes, hoping to scrape back a little energy. It didn’t work. I started drifting instead, which only got me briskly jostled.
“Don’t you dare fall asleep. If you’re leaving me, you’ve got to give me closure first. I need to know why you did it.”
“I don’t know!” I complained, feeling around me for a safe place to lay down. “I just... did.”
“Emmeline...” My face was held steady, pinioning me with minimal force. Protesting to the ache in my neck, I went lax and accepted that my excuse just wasn’t going to cut it.
“You could have split up with me. You didn’t need to do this. I know I fucked up—”
“You fucked up? Why aren’t you tearing me a new one for my crime? I took a life.”
“You tried to take a life. Nearly succeeded, too. And you tried to take the only life that matters to me. Yours.”
Releasing me, Blaze sat back on his heels and rubbed at his eyes. He looked as miserable and as regretful as I felt. “I understand if you don’t love me anymore...”
“Blaze!” Forgetting my weakness, I made to jump to my feet, just to end up in a heap on the floor in front of him. Before he could stand to help me up, I grabbed his legs and hugged against them. Refused to let go. “I love you too much. Don’t you understand that? I couldn’t stand the idea of losing you.”
“You will never lose me, Emmeline. You can’t possibly contemplate what I would do or fight through for you—what I have done and battled for us. There is no obstacle too big between us.”
“Even death?”
He looked at me dubiously; then cautiously pulled me up from the floor to sit on his lap. Brushing the hair back from my face, he skimmed his fingers across my cheek and nuzzled gently against my neck.
His tenderness was exactly what I was afraid to lose. I loved how he’d brought me so far through life in such a short time and made me stronger. He was the rock that grounded me, the solid foundations that I was built on. I’d fall apart without him. My suicide was inevitable.
“We still need to talk about Natasha.”
His chest puffed out on a sigh. “No, we don’t. I told you; that’s taken care off.”
“It’ll come back to haunt us someday very soon.”
Cursing softly, Blaze pulled back to look at me and tapped the end of my nose. “I’m telling you it’s okay. She can’t say anything that’ll separate us.” Of course she can’t, she’s dead. He caught the look of confusion on my face and canted his head to one side. “Her quarrel is with me, Emmeline. In the nicest way possible, she doesn’t care about you. She didn’t even come out of her bedroom to find out why her house was crawling with paramedics.”
“She’s... Oh, God.” My stomach roiled. She was either still lying there dead and nobody was any the wiser or she was flouncing around that big house of hers with one hell of a bargaining chip against me. Either way, I was in deep trouble.
“Are you okay? You look like death.”
“I feel like Death.” Withdrawing, I chewed on my fingernails and fretted over how long I had before the ugly truth got out. Blaze could say it would be okay because he didn’t know any better. Unless he’d spoken to her... “Are we really going to be okay?”
He nodded and smiled for the first time since I’d woken up. “We are. And you owe me big time.”
Didn’t I just?
Blaze stayed with me through the following hours of testing and prodding, kind and attentive while I was covered with new drips, braces, dressings, wires and an oxygen mask for good measure. My family and friends were kept at bay by the nurses, who worried that the stress of their grief would be too much for me.
I learned how Blaze had instinctively felt my absence and started searching Natasha’s house. He’d walked into the kitchen just as I fainted and hit my neck on the lip of the breakfast bar. He’d timed it so well; he’d run to my side and caught me before my head hit the ground.
Of course, I would have had to try and do away with myself in a mansion fitted with emergency call buttons. Between his limited first aid training and the express line to paramedics, I was in a house most ill-equipped for suicide. The only things I had on the side of death were my shitty platelet levels and alcohol-thinned blood. I’d bled faster than they could control.
Blaze never took his eyes off me, which would have been lovely if he hadn’t looked so glum. He might have smiled when he told me how he was the only one who believed I’d wake up but I saw how the memories of that day replayed in his mind.
He wouldn’t let me sleep. I was exhausted but he’d shake me every time my eyes closed. It was hard for him to believe that the next time I fell asleep wouldn’t be the last and I suppose I understood that. Truth be told, I was scared myself.
With his love and support, I thought I might be able to get through anything. He was a much stronger person than I was unless it came to matters of losing me. Murder—attempted or otherwise—was something he’d unfortunately seen in his life before when he’d lost his father. He could handle a lot more than the average person.
Which was just as well when I started to deteriorate. Oxygen levels already low, every breath I took felt like it followed a marathon. My slashed wrists might have stopped bleeding but they felt just as fresh and sore as they had the very minute the flesh had been cut apart, and my back felt like it was broken in several places. I begged and pleaded for pain relief, thinking death might be my better option for a whole new reason. It was more than I could bear.
“Emmy, I’m sorry but I can’t.” Dr. Downes held my hand and stroked it gently, apologising again and again. “We gave you everything we could before we thought we’d lost you for good. I’m not happy to give you any more yet.”
“How long?”
“Maybe in the morning.”
I lifted my head to look out of the window and reluctantly nodded. It was so dark, though I had no idea what time it might be. I knew she’d only make sane, reasonable suggestions so I acquiesced on one condition.
“Don’t let my mother see me like this.” She wasn’t like Blaze. My last attempt at killing myself still tormented her and she’d never deal with seeing me writhing like I was.
Blaze kissed my forehead and rose to his feet. “I’ll keep her away. They owe me.”
“Why?”
“The DNR.” He returned my inquisitively raised eyebrow with one of his own. “I fought them on it until I was blue in the face, Emmeline. If I’d been your next of kin, I’d never have allowed it.”
Smiling, I closed my eyes and tried to relax the best I could. “Why doesn’t that surprise me? You won’t let me go, will you?”
“No.” He tickled my chin until my eyes opened again. “I was fully prepared to revive you myself. Typically, the only time I left your side was when you decided to wake up. Now, you stay awake until I get back, understand?”
I nodded and watched him war with the part of him that wanted to stay by my side. Even when he was outside the room, I could tell he was watching me somehow, making sure I obeyed his order. Despite how low I’d been just hours before, being close to him had given me back a little fighting spirit.
“You’re very lucky.” I glanced up at Dr. Downes and smirked. Jeez, she didn’t need to tell me that.
“He is one hell of a man.”
“I was actually referring to your somewhat miraculous recovery and once again coming out of it relatively unscathed. How you pulled yourself back from the cusp of multiple organ failure with nothing to show for it but some nasty cuts and some spinal bruising, I’ll never know.” She hung my notes on the end of my bed and grinned. “But as you mention it, he is rather wonderful. Gorgeous, devoted, wears his heart on his sleeve... Which begs the question why you’d leave the bed he was lying in to kill yourself?”
My happiness faded, replaced with cruel reality. Since he’d sworn we’d be okay—that my life wasn’t ruined—I’d almost
forgotten how it was I’d come to be in that hospital.
“Well?”
“I thought I’d done something terrible,” I said vaguely. “I thought I’d lose him because of it.”
“Something terrible?”
I shook my head quickly and looked down at my wrists. “I was wrong.” At least I thought so. “My perception might have been a little warped. Things have moved so fast between us—so much has happened since last June. I’ve been unsettled and it’s revived a few... doubts.”
“Fat Emmy.” Dr. Downes bowed her head slightly, remembering my vicious inner monologue from my teen-years. She was the one who’d diagnosed me as borderline schizophrenic and understood better than anyone how muddled I could get in times of disruption. “Your medical records say you were given anti-psychotics in New York. You’re not taking them anymore?”
“Crooked shrink. Blaze flushed them.”
“I see.” After a thoughtful minute, she brushed a crease from my sheets and slowly exhaled a deep breath. “Trust me?”
“I do. Implicitly.”
“Good. I’ll get your head straight if you promise to slow down with the drama.”
“Really?” I wrinkled my nose mockingly. “But you know what they say; ‘live fast, die young and leave a pretty corpse’. Is my corpse pretty?”
“It’s so beautiful it should never be seen by human eyes.” Blaze slid back into the room, one hand in his pocket and the other holding a travel mug. Seeing it reminded me of the time he’d brought me a rum cocktail for ‘lunch’ when I was working in the book shop, Double Booked, and cheered me up a little. “Everyone is heading to the closest hotel. Your parents wanted to stay but... You know.”
“They owe you. I owe you.” Who didn’t owe him at that point?
“Right. So I hope you don’t mind watching me pee because the only way I’m leaving that seat next to you tonight is if I’m in that bathroom and I’m going to keep you in eye-shot.”