Below the Clouds

I

A/N: Hi, thanks for stopping by :) So this story was made as a sequel to my other story 'The cloud will stay'. This could be read as a stanalone but I suggest reading the other one too to understand more.

TW: Death, angst and grieving

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A woman sits at the bedside of a young girl. The young girl is asleep, already at peace with the fact that she is going to die.

Marionette Bell looked at the girl's calm face, savouring the look of the girls chest rising and falling, the way the vital signs monitor shows that she is still alive. She prayed that the girl would live. The girl was strong after all, she ought to be able to survive the cancer in her lungs.

The woman stays there until the girl wakes up and continues to stay there when the girl sleeps again. She holds the girl's hand tightly, afraid that if she lets go, the girl's gentle breathing will cease. The woman stared at the young girl's sleeping face and cried. 

Sometimes, Marionette shows Claudia pictures of the blooming clouds. She tells Claudia the truth, that she loves her and always will. And with childish innocence, Claudia says she loves her back just as much (or maybe more).

The girl's name dances across her mind sometimes. She thinks about her death. 

She hates it. The young girl who lights up most people's days is dying. Her grave is being buried while she sleeps peacefully in the sterile white bed in a sterile white room.

The room is quiet save for the girl's snoring when she sleeps. Sometimes Marionette cries, sometimes she whispers reassurances to the girl. Empty promises that the caretaker can't fulfill. 

Sometimes she thinks the careless whispers are more for her than the girl.

In the mornings, Claudia's doctors give her a checkup. Marionette wishes for her to get better. 

She never does. 

Dark circles rim Marionettes's eyes after nights of staying up looking after the girl. If the girl wakes up during the late hours of the night, Marionette needs to constantly be there for her, even if she doesn't.

After a month, Claudia doesn't wake up.

It was a night where Marionette allowed herself time to sleep. In the morning,a doctor woke her up gently. Marionette woke up to the girl sleeping forever, her vital signs in a flat line. The girl's chest wasn't rising up and down, she's unresponsive.

The woman by her bedside screams. Tears come flowing out as she lets out loud sobs. She can't believe it. She doesn't let herself to.

She screams at the girl to wake up, anything. The girl can't actually die, right? Claudia was strong, she wouldn't, no, couldn't just go like that.

A nurse restrains her, attempting to calm the grieving woman down.

That day, the woman looked up at the clouds, hoping to see the girl among them.

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Hi! Thanks for reading, have a great day!