What Should Have Been From The Beginning

Macabre

DEREK'S POV

'Meredith! You need to answer your phone. I love you.'

'Please, when you get this call me back Meredith. I love you.'

'Meredith! Please answer I need to know you're okay. I love you.'

Every time I hung up an unanswered phone call, my foot hit the pedal even more. I was racing to be with Meredith and all my worst fears were becoming regular thoughts inside my head at this moment. I kept wondering over and over, if she had been the one to be robbed and then have a gun to her head. The thought of my fiancé being dead right now made hatred and anger encase me and then the overwhelming amount of love I have for her, overtook the hate and I wanted nothing more than to hold her and never let go, even if she hadn't been involved. The pure unknown scared the living daylight out of me more than the realisation that I was now reaching a constant speed of over 100mph on an open motorway. I couldn't help but think the worst every minute of the time which felt like an eternity. I tried calling her again and again over 30 times, leaving a haunting voicemail every time, before the atmosphere became unusually calm and I was gliding along the road still at the same speed. The last phone call that we both had together entered my mind in this paralysis. 

For the first time since hearing the news, I had serenity enter my mind and happy images floated around my head. Feeling tears run down my cheek, I pictured our future. With our child. Our wedding day and the night of our wedding. I pictured watching the love of my life, my soulmate, my life, walk down the aisle towards me and then joining her hands in mine, saying 'I do' and then I would take her breathe away with an everlasting kiss to seal the deal. 

A sudden motion brought me out of my idealisation and I literally felt my heart drop to the bottom of my stomach. Sirens deafened me, and I threw my head back thinking that the police were about to pull me over for speeding. I didn't abide the law and stop. I carried on driving. A ticket didn't matter. A sentence didn't matter. All that did, was that I got to Meredith as quick as I possibly could. The sirens continued blaring but passed me and to my surprise and unsolicited feeling, the apparent form of vehicle that it was became visible. An ambulance. That knowledge only made me more determined to be next to her and all the earlier emotions that she might have been hurt, started to become a reality. The sirens and the noises sounded serious and were obviously made for an emergency. The gun and the person holding the gun clouded my thoughts the whole journey but before I knew it, fortunately I had pulled into a hysterical car park. 

The scene was eerie but not in the normal way, in a surreal way. Packed with ambulances and police, news stations and public people, I assumed that had been evacuated from the hotel, I got out of my car without even checking if the hand brake was on. I started wandering and searching the area of dozens of panicked people for my fiancé but without surprise, there was no sight and then I knew where I had to be. In that room with her and I was going to get there whatever it took. I knew she was in there and the gut instinct I had, made me reckless. I immediately found a police officer and started hysterically shouting and screaming. 

'Hey hey! This is the robbed hotel, right?'

With a confused but serious tone and expression he replied back confidently. 'Yes, sir. It is. You need to wait over there please.'

I had my fingers running through my hair pushing it off my face and I could barely catch my breathe. My breathing was erratic and my words were becoming slurred as I couldn't quite comprehend what was happening or how I was going to get in there. I had sweat now covering the entirety of my skin. 

'No no. Listen to me. My fiancé isn't here. She should be but she's not. She's in there, I know for a fact that she is. You need to let me in to get her. She needs me.'

'We can't do that, I'm sorry but we gonna take care of her, if it is her.'

I screamed at the top of my lungs making everyone turn their heads in our direction. Glaring the officer directly in his eyes, I yelled, 'MY FIANCE IS IN THAT ROOM AND SHE HAS HAD A GUN HELD TO HER HEAD. LET ME IN THE FUCKING HOTEL.' As a moment of silence and frustration fell, I searched the space again with any hope I was making a fool of myself and soon she would come running to me. I saw a police car. A police car that was being opened at the back door and two officers stood next to it covering a person. I pointed in that direction making everyone's focus change again by my demand. 

'Is that them?' I asked sighing. I realised that there was either two outcomes to this finding. She was dead or she was accompanied by others in the room. For a split second, their focus wasn't on me anymore and I shot my chance by sprinting for the entrance giving myself a head start before I heard officers shouting and chasing me. I ran faster than I ever had before, even when I was running in front of a moving car for her. Whilst running up staircases and through endless hallways of silence with only my panting being audible, I questioned myself and asked if I was doing the right thing. If I was going to walk in that room and see Meredith dead. On the floor. In a pool of her own pure, cold blood. With a gunshot penetrating her skin. I wondered if I would be able to live after seeing her lay there lifeless and with our unborn child still in her cold body. I came to a halt as I had approached the door at the end of the corridor and saw multiple police officers stood outside of a single room with the door wide open. No noise was coming from the room or the services but instead of being selfish, I carried onto the macabre atmosphere, fully aware I wasn't the one who needed the help right now. If I was going to see my fiancé dead, then at least I got to say my goodbye in some type of way and I wanted to thank her soul for saving mine. I wanted to tell her body how much love she filled me with and that she and only she had my heart forever. She made me the happiest I have ever been and my life without her wouldn't be a life but a liveable hell. Even if I was to walk in and see her lifeless, porcelain face, I wanted to hold her in my arms one last time and kiss her cold lips once more. I was with her and that was all I had ever wanted and needed.