Painting this canvas with the colors of our love

I bet you picked up

It had been a few days since dr Lowen's death and that particular day was probably the worst because since funerals weren't permitted amidst a pandemic the only thing allowed was for her family to have a short ceremony right before burying her. The problem was she didn't have family aside her daughter, her husband had died before her and she didn't have any brothers or sisters so it was going to be just her daughter burying her forever and nobody else could be there to say their last goodbye.
I acknowledged Sarah's presence beside me only when the cushions of the sofa adjusted to welcome her body and by the fact she was sitting very close to me so i could feel the warmth of her body that had been under the covers of our bed until then.
"you don't wanna talk about it right?"
"no"
"yeah, no, i was just checking" she yawned.
"go to bed Sarah... it's three in the morning" I sighed.
"i wanna make sure you're-"
"what? okay? i'm not okay, but there's nothing you can do at the moment"
"i know and it's driving me mad" she said under her breath but i could hear it anyway because everything was completely silent at 3 a.m.
"i'm sorry" i said.
"don't, i'd just love if you talked to me but you don't have to do it to please me, i am here to support you and i want you to feel comfortable with me and know you can talk to me anytime about anything"
"i know it's just i don't know what to say... i- it's like i can't convince myself she's dead... my mind doesn't accept it. every time i acknowledge the fact she is dead it's more like i'm forcing myself to believe it but i actually don't because a minute later i get a thought of something i should've done or that she had asked me to do and i go like 'oh i should update her on that' but then i force it in again and i suddenly know she is dead" i said almost whispering because we couldn't wake up Vanessa "i don't know if that makes any sense"
"it does, more than you imagine..." she whispered "i sometimes got the most random thoughts even when i was working and i am usually very focused on what i'm doing. Every time my phone went off in my mind it was always someone calling me to tell me you were awake and in my ideal world that you had asked about me" she said so low it was almost hard to catch everything.
"i don't know what is going on with me..." i said resting my head on her lap and she caressed my cheek lovingly.
"it's grief... you just have to feel it, there is no shortcut on this one" she said.
"i can't it's just... too much" i said "i mean if i could at least go to her funeral it could help me process but of course she didn't allow anyone to be there because we're not family"
Sarah sighed planting little kisses on my shoulder
"i mean we kinda are family, we saw her everyday, we spent hours and hours together, i saw her more than i saw you and Vanessa some days... and i don't know why she hates me so much. i'd love to say she's horrible, rude and hates everyone but honestly, she is rude to everyone, but with me she just tries her worst.." apparently it was hard to stop once i had started talking and she stayed silent so it left space for me to talk.
"right from the start of this... when she knew i was the one she designated to take medical decisions for her she started a war against me... I mean i get it of course she's her daughter but i had never heard a word about her from her mother while she always talked about the beautiful man her husband was... They didn't have a bond and it's sad, i'm sorry about it but honestly what did she expect? We had found something special maybe she created with me the bond she wasn't able to create with her..." i said "... this is exactly why she hates me... not because i killed her mother or whatever she says, it's because she thinks i got the love she couldn't get from her" I said.
"it is hard to lose a parent even more if it's nearly the only family you have left she's surely grieving too and her grief comes in waves of hate because of what you said... i think you're right." Sarah finally said.
"she's suing an entire hospital because she thinks i stole the love of her mother" I said "I have to try talking to her again"
"yeah about this i don't think it's a good idea hun"
"why not?"
"i feel like it wouldn't change anything, it's too soon"
"Sarah I could lose my job because she can't accept her mother is dead... not to mention this is slowly destroying my mental health, i spend all the energy trying to give myself reasons not to believe it's my fault, literally this is all i do, of course i don't have much to do since they suspended me for 'precautionary measure' and they're right... i can't be trusted because i am not present to myself because trying to not feel guilty costs me everything.... damn it i burned dinner last night... when's the last time you saw me burn something? i'll tell you, you never did because i was twelve" i had gone on a full rant and she tried to stop me.
"okay listen to me" she said firmly, all sleepiness gone from her face "listen very carefully, it's not your fault... i know it's hard, i know, but you were almost killing yourself to save her, you did more than you actually could and more than was expected of you... if she could see what you did for her mother she'd be grateful to you forever because being in a pandemic is hard on everyone and when you're stuck in a hospital room and you can't seen none of your loved ones you were there and you gave her the best care possible" she said and she hugged me and kissed my forehead.
"i still can't believe it... i had talked to her on the phone... she was alright, she could speak... not only breathe and then..." I cried.
"it's been so sudden i know but you have to let her go or... it will consume you" she said gravely.
"you had let me go, when you thought i had died?" she stayed silent for a moment "i'm sorry i shouldn't have asked i-"
"given the way we met again after a year i'd say it's clear i hadn't" she said and i suddenly remembered the found raising and i remembered how my stomach twisted and knotted on itself the moment i saw her again.
"i have told you this many times but there wasn't a day that could go by that i didn't think about you"
"i know because i did the same, i had become another person completely, everyone has told me that since we've been back together i am 'the old sarah' again" she said "and i also feel like it more... i was... guilt was eating me up, i thought it was my fault, that if i hadn't let you push me away i could've been able to give you strength and maybe you could've been alive" she sniffled and as soon as i heard that sound i wished i had never brought that up.
"hey honey i'm sorry i didn't want to bring it back" i said and got up to hug her.
"oh no, it's fine i am just so grateful you are here now, that's why i panic when you're not doing well, or you're straining yourself too much, because i've been where you are now, i have felt this way and i don't want you to feel this way"
"i am so incredibly sorry for all i put you through" i said.
"it was all worth it for me... i mean i wouldn't have what we now have... a family" she sniffled.
"i think you're the only reason i am alive..." it slipped like it wasn't even me moving my own lips.
"what..."
"ah, nothing i was just... being silly"
"what do you mean?!" she asked a little too alarmed.
"i- hum- i had some thoughts after i got out of the hospital and my life was practically destroyed... I really wanted to give up everything, i constantly thought about you and i felt guilty, all day, every day... So i thought why not end it? I mean it's not like i wouldn't know what to do..." i said but i didn't have the heart to look at her in the eyes on this one "some days not even the thought of leaving Vanessa alone could keep away those thoughts, the only thing that kept me going was the thought that i had to stick around at least until i could be sure you were safe" I said.
"why'd you never told me that?" she asked taking both my hands in hers.
"it didn't seem like something we could talk about over dinner... and anyway since i saw you in person again at the found raising i have never thought of doing it again." i said.
"are you sure?"
"of course... you see, i didn't have anything anymore, all i had been working for had just vanished, i didn't have my job and my studies because i had been away too long so it was impossible to catch up even though i tried, i didn't have you and believe me, i thought about you constantly. I didn't have any social media for over a year so i couldn't even see if you were doing alright from what you wrote on twitter or instagram, of course i had B check all your social medias every day, but it wasn't the same thing... i felt like in some way i was already dead and i think the only one who actually saw how i felt even though i tried to always be positive and cheerful was dr Lowen" some tears streamed down my face "so i believe that after she understood i wasn't doing okay she offered me my job back as her assistant and i believe she set things up for us to meet again."
"do you think she... did what exactly?"
"i don't know, i think she just made sure you saw all the advertisement they were doing for this found raising... She as well seemed surprised to see you there so i think she had made sure you knew about the event but she couldn't be sure you'd show up so i think when you actually did show up you answered a lot of questions."
"questions..."
"yeah i am not sure if it was just to help me forget about you but she was constantly asking me things so that i would think about the fact that maybe we weren't meant to be... but i mean you showing up to a found raising for her research even though you hadn't had any contact in almost a year made it was clear you were doing it in my memory so... i think she needed a confirmation."
"oh i wonder how i knew about the event, i'm going to have to think about it" she said, brows furrowed in the effort of remembering.
"well if my theory is true do you understand i owe my life partly to her too and that's why i can't let her go? The thought that I could've done more will always be with me every day and i just have to find a compromise to live with it"
"i- i don't believe this is actually a 100% right..." she said looking at me.
"why?"
"you don't owe anything to anyone... i promise you that no matter how successful and good your life is you don't owe that to anyone. You have to acknowledge and be grateful for the people that stand by you and give you strength but you don't owe your life to anyone but yourself" she said "look where we are, we are together, after all that's happened and with all the odds against us here we are and we have a child, can you believe it?" she chuckled but her eyes were glittering in tears "i mean if someone had told me this i wouldn't have believed them. "Me with a child, not my thing i said i'm not a mother... and now every time i look at her there is nothing i wouldn't do for her... when i look at you i see everything i want and need, i see the love of my life, my present and future and we owe this only to ourselves, because i mean we chose to try again we chose to try to be happy, we chose we wanted everything we could have from life. I chose to come to the found raising that night and you did too."
I looked at her in awe because of how beautiful she seemed to me in a slightly more luminous room because of the sun almost rising.
I didn't say anything i just pulled her in my arms and she adjusted her head on my chest as we lied there on the sofa one on the other just so we could keep each other warm. I stroked her hair and kissed her forehead as she rubbed my arms as comforting gesture "it will pass, baby, you'll be fine" she whispered.
"i just... can we stay like this for a while?" I asked.
"I'd gladly stay like this forever" she said.
Having her so close, being able to feel her heartbeat so close to me made me finally feel at ease so i was relaxed enough to be able to fall asleep. Unfortunately it did not last long because i slowly started waking up with that awful sensation of someone staring at me and in fact i wasn't wrong, Vanessa was sitting in the armchair opposite to us still sleepy and in her pajamas but she had a notebook on her lap and she was scribbling something as she periodically briefly glanced at us.
"Good morning honey, what are you doing?" I asked as she looked quite amused and normally she didn't look like that early in the morning.
"don't move!" she yelled making sarah literally almost jump off me.
"good morning babe" i said with a slight chuckle because of the situation "you heard her, i believe, so don't move, come here" i said as she rested her head back on my chest with a smile.
"honey what are you doing?" she asked as she hadn't heard me ask this before.
"i am doing like mommy does" she said and we both understood because we shared a glance and stayed still playing along.
It took a few more minutes for her to finish her artwork at which she looked not so proudly "it doesn't look quite like mommy's drawing though"
"oh no honey i am sure it's great, show it to me" i said gesturing for her to come closer and Sarah chuckled softly as she realized time for soft cuddles was over. She sat up on the sofa, the blanket still wrapped around her but i soon missed the warmth of her body on mine.
Vanessa sat between us and timidly passed me her notebook. I examined the drawing thoroughly so she knew i meant it when i said "you definitely have potential honey, we can still work on human anatomy but you are a real master at drawing furniture i mean this sofa... any chance you wanna become an architect, or a designer? you should think about that honey"
Sarah glanced at me fairly amused to be looking at me extracting potential careers from a child's drawing.
"i don't even know what a designer does..." she said.
"well... you're right it's too soon to be talking about this so we have plenty of time to practice but now how about we talk about something else such as... having breakfast"
"will you make pancakes?" she asked looking up at me with the sweetest pout.
"mmmh i don't know what day is it today?" i asked as we almost always made pancakes on sundays.
"sunday" Sarah said as she secretly wanted pancakes probably more than Vanessa.
"then pancakes it is" i said.
I felt better after talking to Sarah, even only just being with her always made me feel better but there was something different about the way we talked a few hours before. We had shared so much and we had said things of all sorts with such honesty I think we had never done quite that since we had been back together. In some way what each one was always trying to do was protecting the other, in every way possible, we just try shielding one another from having to feel pain and every time one of us ends up suffering more than the other. That night was different, she wasn't protecting me or actually she was trying to protect me by making me understand that the only way out of grief, pain and loss is through. I was still trying to allow myself to feel that pain, i was trying to forgive myself for what i couldn't do and give myself proper credit for what i had done right.
"Honey you're burning the pancakes..." Sarah's voice brought me back to reality as i just realized i had zoned out completely.
"Oh shit... what the-" I said taking them off the stove "okay, it's fine, no panic i have done more just because i kinda knew this could happen"
Vanessa seemed happy enough hearing she was still going to get her pancakes and she went to sit at the table waiting for them to be ready.
"Honey look at me for a second" Sarah said as i put the other pancake mix on the pan "are you here? are you really here with your head?"
"Yeah, i'm sorry, I am now... i was just thinking about what we talked about..."
"what's wrong?"
"nothing, nothing is wrong, completely the opposite I feel like we hadn't shared that much in... i don't know i think we have never shared that much since we've been back together. It's good, we're progressing"
"we weren't... good before?" she asked a little perplexed.
"no, Sarah, i didn't mean that, I mean we are just normal people so we are not perfect and i feel like we took a step forward in our relationship..." i said hoping she wasn't offended.
"Did you have doubts on us?"
"what?! no.." i took the pancakes off the pan as they turned slightly brown because i knew better than burning them again "I have never doubted anything, I love you with all my heart. I love all that we are building for ourselves and our little family here. I would never change it for anything else"
"Good... I was worried for a second" she said sighing and fidgeting nervously with her ring. We hadn't talked about it since i had proposed but I knew she was refraining because she didn't want to stress me out more and honestly i was grateful for that because i didn't really have the strength to think about marriage in that moment and i also felt terrible because of what had happened and ruining our happy moment.
I took her hands in mine and went closer to her so our foreheads were touching and i made sure i had her whole attention "I will make things right, I promise, I just need a few more days... Do you know I love you right?"
"Yes... I know and I love you too" she said.
"Good... now let's go have breakfast shall we?"
She didn't reply but she just put her lips closer to my ear "it's not the kind of breakfast i was thinking about but..." the way her voice change into a lower pitch when she was trying to sound seductive always got the best of me and this time she literally sent chills down my spine.
I looked at her and apparently something about the way i was looking at her made her laugh and i realized it was probably my burning red cheeks because i could suddenly feel hotness rising and i just had to avert my eyes "you are so mean... like i will be able to think about something else now..."
"well, you see we've been able to distract you at least" she said taking my hand as we made our way to the dining room table.
Even with everything that was happening we managed to have a normal breakfast without anything interrupting us or bringing bad news. I was finally able to actually relax even though they didn't seem inclined to give me a break for burning the first row of pancakes.
"She plays the chef character and then she burns pancakes i mean can you believe this" Sarah said elbowing Vanessa to tell her to play along and she did actually laugh at that.
"you know what i'm just going to let you go on at least you can have your little win but we both know who's the one capable to burn even water" i said and Vanessa's eyes shifted from me to Sarah nervously so i winked at her to signal we were joking.
"ouch that hurt but i'm glad you haven't lost your wittiness" she remarked.
"of course not ma'am" i said.
"ugh, call me that more frequently, honey"
"why. ma'am?" i teased.
"okay, how about we go get dressed now? we've been lazy staying in our pajamas so long, what do you think baby girl?" Sarah asked ignoring me completely which was a clear sign she was getting turned on by that.
"are we going out?"
"you know baby we can't at the moment we talked about it, do you remember what i explained you?"
"yeah so why can't i stay in my pajamas?"
"because it's good to get dressed... you can hum... feel pretty and it helps you not feel like everyday is the same as if you stayed in your pajamas all day"
"i still don't see the point if we can never go out".
It was actually the first time she seemed to be struggling with this whole pandemic situation, she never seemed to care a lot, like as long as she had me and Sarah and we were okay she seemed fine but of course she had already had a difficult life and now being able to actually live outside a hospital but not being able to live as normal people sure was frustrating.
"you know what... i think there's somewhere we could go that won't be too risky, we could try going if you behave and go get dressed what do you say?"
"for real... like we can actually go out?"
"yeah i think we can" i said and sarah was looking at me like she couldn't figure what i was talking about.
"okay... i'm getting dressed then" Vanessa said leaving to go to her room.
I left the table and went to the door to get to our room and get dressed as well "ma'am... are you coming?" i said.
She walked slightly behind me but I knew she wasn't catching up because she was busy checking me out, she always did that and honestly i did that too whenever i was behind her. As soon as I got in anyway she pinned me to the wall and started kissing me catching me a little by surprise because i hadn't thought a simple ma'am could turn her on so much.
"Sarah what are you doing?" I asked giggling as she went down kissing my neck and my chest.
"I'm not Sarah..."
"ma'am what do you mean?"
"exactly that" she said breathily.
"so i didn't know this was a thing for you..." i said
"i didn't either it's just i felt something when you called me that" she said putting her hand down my pants and i instinctively pulled her closer to me.
"oh, oh god... i-" she was the best at taking me off guard and also at choosing the worst moments for sex. She moaned softly in my ear and it became absolutely impossible to resist but I really had to because i had something to do before we all went out for the walk i had promised Vanessa.
"Sarah I... oh my gosh... aah" i said as i tried to resist but it was like she just knew where to touch me.
"what baby?" she said
"i can't do this right now. I have something to do..." I said and she let go of me immediately so i took the first clothes i was able to find and got dressed super quickly.
"you still haven't given up, have you?" she asked.
"no... i have to try... it's my life and my career on the line" I said hoping that even if she didn't agree with me at least she understood why i had to try.
"you go and do what you think is right then..." she said opening the door for me.
"I love you..." i said cupping her face with my hands "...so much"
"me too" she replied and left a soft peck on my lips "please be careful..."
"to what?" i asked.
"just be careful... i don't trust this person" she said.
"okay... i'll be careful" I said and left the room.
I drove all the way to the cemetery and honestly i was completely lost going around in there and i couldn't see anyone until i finally bumped into someone that might've been the caretaker. I asked him for directions and I knew that i had arrived to my destination because there was just one person in all that graveyard that stood in front of a grave.
I made my way to her quietly and trying to not catch her attention but it was impossible given we were the only ones alive in there.
"What are you doing here? You cannot come in here"
"Then that might give you an idea of what i would've done for your mother..." i said standing beside her but distant enough to be safe.
"I already told you i don't believe a word"
"I loved her! I loved her too, i wasn't her daughter but i could still love her and she loved me... we had found something special, she was my mentor, my teacher, the one to always believe in me, the one to always push me to do better and she died and i couldn't even..." when my eyes fell on her name engraved on the stone words died in my throat while she didn't even look at me.
"I couldn't even say goodbye... that's why i am here... and to tell you that i am here for you, i want to offer someone to grieve with... maybe you'll understand i am not that bad" i said and then she looked at me.
"we shouldn't even be talking..."
"i am done not talking... i am saying everything i need to say because god knows if i will ever have another chance..."
"we didn't get along... i was a complicated teenager and she held that against me forever... when i decided to set my mind on a less uncertain future and started studying to become a lawyer it was already too late, she had lost whatever trust she had in me and she already considered me an idiot..."
"she never talked to me about you but that doesn't mean she didn't love you"
"what does that mean to you?" she asked sarcastically.
"i don't know she was very private on her own family and friends but she was always looking out for others..."
"i know okay?! i know she was a great person and a great doctor... i am just so mad... i wish she didn't go angry at me" she sniffled and watched down at the grave.
"she didn't.. you said she called you before.."
"i did not pick up.." she sobbed falling on her knees, she was exhausted and it showed "i did not pick up, she died and the moment i called back someone told me she had died" she cried.
I kneeled beside her trying not to look at the grave.
"it was completely unexpected... it wasn't your fault..." i tried to say but apparently not being able convince her.
"i bet you picked up that's why you talk like that" she sobbed.
"okay..." i said kneeling down beside her "this is not a competition between me and you, none could ever win this... she didn't love anyone the way she loved you... you're her daughter, not me..." those words seemed to get to her and it seemed they were the key to some sort of reaction but apparently i was wrong because she just looked at me with an expression i couldn't define. "Now enough, it's too cold, you will freeze if you stay here much longer"
"i don't care... i lived to prove her i wasn't the disaster she thought, every case I won, every success in life or work was for her... Now what is my purpose?"
That kind of caught me off guard because i knew it was true for me too, I worked as hard as I did for me and my career but there was always that voice in my head that told she would be pleased if i did things particularly well.
"You're purpose is... to fucking grow up" I said sounding hostile enough so that she would at least pay attention to me. I didn't know why lawyers only responded to words of provocation. "start really living and do it just for yourself, detach from work, make friends, go out, have fun, meet someone you can fall in love with..."
"i have friends..."
"my friends would be with me if my mother had just died... or at least if they couldn't be with me my phone would be going off like crazy with messages and phone calls of them wanting to know how i am" I said "i see none here except for me... the doctor you're suing for killing your mother"
"i won't take it back..." she said not looking at me.
"i don't remember asking..." I said.
"isn't it the whole point of you being here?"
"i told you why i am here" i said pointing at her mother's grave and then at her.
"You're not here for me..." she sniffled "you don't even know me and i'm already trying to get you fired from your hospital"
"well you know maybe you are right i'm here with you for her too... She wouldn't want you to be here alone and honestly i didn't want it either but somehow i knew damn well you were going to be alone and none was going to show up because that was my place... it was my job to show up when she called but most of all i would've shown up for her even if she didn't call."
"I don't need anyone"
"Yeah that's the tough bitch stuff i thought we were past..." i said "i'll make it clear for you once and for all... I loved your mother as my own, she's been for me all that i needed in very different and difficult times of my life that i will not get into... She wasn't only my superior, my doctor even or my professor, she was my friend and that's the only reason why I am here... because she left... She left and i couldn't do anything more than i did to save her but she left you here so what i can do is care about you... And you can honestly sue me, make me lose my job, even make me lose my visa and send me straight back to where i came from if it makes you feel better, if you believe deep down that this is the right thing to do, that i could really willfully hurt your mother, then do whatever you have to do but i want you to know that it won't bring you your mother back"
"I know she's not coming back.. i know how life works..."
"well it doesn't look like you do or you wouldn't let hate consume you like you do..."
"why are you coming here claiming you want to help me and then you go all sarcastic on me like that" she said taking more than one step towards me.
"because it's the only way to make you look at me" i said forcing myself not to lose eye contact.
"why would i even look at you for a second?"
"oh i know why you don't look at me... with your job you're probably really good at reading people, tell if they're lying or not. So it scares you, you're afraid that if you look at me for a moment you could catch something, something that could tell you i am telling the truth and if that happened there would be nothing left to fight for, no anger to numb down your pain making it more bearable, you'd just have to feel it... all the way through" i said thinking back to mine and sarah's late night talk "and you know it will hurt like crazy so you try to hold on to something, anything actually, that gives you a little relief"
She continued to look at me but at that time i couldn't quite catch what she was feeling, i was just overwhelmed by my own emotions to even attempt to understand her feelings.
"I understand why you two got along so well... you both are so full of yourselves to think you know all about other people and just because you're doctors you think you're the closest to God but you're not God, you make mistakes"
"I make mistakes, many, too many perhaps, but you know how they say, mistakes make you progress, evolve, move forward" I said trying to push back the self destructive idea that she was right and it was all my fault. "but i care... i care about people, i wanna help more than i can damage, I devoted my heart to this and my life too... i am hardly ever home, i work at nights... most of them lately, since we're short on staff because everyone is getting sick... but i don't want it to look like i'm complaining. This job makes me happy, your mother taught me to appreciate everything of it, she showed me that it doesn't matter how many hours i spend dressed like an astronaut and with a million face masks on if at the end of the day i managed to save even just one of my patients... You really can't imagine how many hours i spend dressed like that, it's ridiculous, hot and i can't even pee if i need to but sometimes when i went into her room to fill her in about the day... who had died and who had survived another day sometimes i felt her hand squeezing mine ever so faintly but it meant something each time. it meant 'i'm proud of you' if i was telling her how i had caught someone coding just in time to bring them back. slightly longer meant 'forgive yourself you can't save everyone' if i was crying and telling her how many people had slid through my finger like water in just one day... She was there, she was listening and I talked to her everyday, I really put in all the effort, i did everything i could think of then one day... I had been working for like two days nonstop sleeping on a sofa and eating nearly nothing... I fainted... yes, at work, so unprofessional of me but i was spent" I paused because it was almost time for the part that make me tremble just thinking about it. "They wouldn't allow me to go back to work until i had regained my strength completely but i thought about her constantly, i even dreamt about her... When she woke up and i talked to her on the phone it was like i was the one who had been holding their breath until then" I chuckled but my eyes were filled with tears and i couldn't see but i was quite sure it was raining because i felt something cold and wet on my cheeks. "It was Valentine's day and i felt like someone had just given me an injection of something miraculous because i felt... revived, so she was okay... it was over, all the burden weighing down on my shoulder for any decision on her life had finally been removed... I thought i could do something nice, something to repay the people i love the most that i had neglected at put on the lowest step on the scale of my priorities so i cooked dinner, simple because i do that every day, but i also dressed nicely, put on some make up to hide my red eyes from the countless hours spent crying because i didn't feel good enough for all the tasks i had to face... I did my hair nicely... which as you can see takes a lot of effort, I baked a very special cake with a ring in it and i asked my girlfriend to marry me-"
"why are you telling me this i don't want to know..."
"it will become clear in a moment you listened to most of it, bear with me for a little while more" I said because if my life was going to blow up and be destroyed for the second time around i wasn't going to let her live happily ever after without feeling the slight remorse.
"anyway she said yes... god i love her so much, i am terrible, i literally just work i haven't been helping her for shit and i know that and still everyday... or well, most days... when i actually go home she asks me how i'm doing, if i've had a particularly hard day she senses it, she makes tea... nearly the only thing she can actually make without burning the house down, she sits beside me and listens to me rant and i can go on for hours but she just stays there... I don't deserve her that's for sure but God knows if i love her... and yet i'm hurting her again... I proposed and now i'm acting like i didn't, i avoid every conversation about it because i don't know what will be of my life..." I said and took a deep breath to give me the strength to look at her.
"That's what i wanted to tell you... if you sue the hospital, but especially me, you will destroy not only me... you're going to make everything i built for myself and my family fall to pieces, you're going to destroy my girlfriend's life and our daughter's life and for the love of God you can hate me all you want but please don't do this to her, she's 8... her name is Vanessa and she has already gone through more than a single person could take for one lifetime... she had leukemia... she was abandoned by her parents at the hospital because they couldn't pay for her medications and none ever came to take her back when she started doing better-"
"please stop"
"i need you to understand-"
"i understand"
"you do?"
"yes, I do, i don't want to destroy anyone's life, i'll still get her charts and documentation of every medical procedure that's been done on her examined by professionals to check yours and your colleagues' version but i'm not going to sue the hospital... nor you.." she said.
"oh thank you so much" I said and I couldn't hold tears back anymore "but you really got the point?"
"yes..."
"i don't think you did... if you had let me finish you'd know that one of the reasons why have a meaningful life with meaningful people in it is also your mother... for reasons that i will gladly tell you more in depth if you want to know more but what i wanted you to realize is that if you had destroyed this you would've destroyed part of her good work on this planet as nothing more than a beautiful human being, not a doctor or anything fancy like that, just with empathy and love which belong to humankind, not only to doctors or whatever".
"I know... I know what she was capable of... even though it was never for me..." she said looking at the grave once again.
"Come with me..." I said, it sounded silly but it just slipped "I mean come home with me... we have a room and dry clothes, and a shower, which will really be needed after this... What's the alternative? your mother's place? i wouldn't have the strength to go there just yet..."
"I was thinking a hotel room"
"yeah but doesn't it make you feel lonely?"
"i am used to it, i'll be fine"
"you don't have to be... you can be with someone, someone who wants to be with you"
"do you... want to?"
"do i want to get to know the daughter of one of the most important people in my life? yeah, yeah i think i do" I said and attempted a smile which she didn't return but at least she was yelling at me.
"well then... I- I'm coming with you" she said a little embarrassment in her voice being the only funny thing. We walked to the car and as I sat on driver's seat i felt like prepping her a little was going to help.
"about my girlfriend... she might be a little bit hostile once she learns who you are but I promise she is very nice, she will try her best" I said "but Vanessa will love you i'm sure"
"you said she's eight... Kids generally don't like me" she said. Well it's not that difficult to believe, is it?
"we'll see, she is really surprising sometimes".
They journey was pretty silent but overall fast because of the lack of traffic everywhere since lockdown.
"Girls i'm home, we have guests be presentable!"
"Honey where have you been and why aren't you answering your phone i was worried-"
"I have been rather busy Sar-" i said signaling her with my eyes that this wasn't the moment.
"She's Eve... hum... doctor Lowen's daughter"
Sarah looked at me like i had just said something impossible.
"Eve she's Sarah, my girlfr-"
"fiancée actually... nice to meet you" Sarah said and she was glacial but they simply shook their hands and she introduced herself not giving any signs of recognizing Sarah so i was quite relieved.
"yeah great so... give your coat to me i'll put it somewhere it can dry nicely and the guests' room is at the end on the hallway in front of the bathroom..."
"thank you" she said.
"you're welcome" I smiled but apparently it was too soon because she just walked past me and went straight to the bathroom.
"why did you bring her here?" was the first thing Sarah asked me as soon as the door shut close.

A/N Hiiii remember how i told you i didn't have any inspiration?! sounds like it came back so i'm writing, I don't know what this is or where it's going but we will find out together hopefully. I hope i'll stay on a good streak and that i'll be able to post more frequently but if not you know i am going to show up again at a certain point, I'm not leaving this fanfiction and i won't until it's complete.
As always feedbacks are appreciated and also thank you so much for almost 22k reads i literally don't deserve it and i would've never imagined it.