A week passed by quietly. Scott studied hard, trying to keep Ana put of his mind.
She would come back.
She always did.
He finished a paper, looking up. She knocked on the door making him smile.
"It's open," he called.
She stepped in. "What's my favorite color?"
"Lavender."
"What's the worst thing I've done?"
"You took a whole cocktail of drugs, took your mothers car crashed it into a house because you thought it was your mothers house."
She blinked. "You really do remember everything."
He tapped his head. "Like a steel trap."
"That's inconvenient,"
"You could always shoot me in the head. Steel trap of knowledge but not made of steel," he smirked.
She rolled her eyes. "You take your medicine?"
"You gonna ask me that every time you see me, Ms. suicidal nurse?"
Her lips quirked up. "You're doing well, Scott. You should proud of yourself."
"I'm not. This feels like I'm...like I'm regressing. I went from...the best to a...fucking med student. But, there's nothing to do about it."
Ana smiled, sitting across from him. "You were the only person I liked you know? Not that, you know, the patients were bad. I like helping them. But there was something about your eyes."
He glanced up, smiling. "Was it the violent dissociation?"
She snorted. "No. I guess I thought, your eyes looked a little like mine. You got to live full time, in a world of your own making. And I walk through mine like a zombie. I thought maybe it was freeing, yknow?"
He nodded, not knowing what to say. The shackles of reality were heavy, that was true.
"I can't help but destroy myself," She said simply. "But I guess you know that about me already."
He purses his lips. "Yes. Yes I do. You always chose the thing that will hurt you most. So I knew you'd come back."
She crossed her legs. "No reason..."
He raised a brow.
She just shrugged. "There's no reason I exist. I just...came to be carelessly. I think that's pretty cruel, don't you?"
Scott smirked, the truthfulness of her statement almost a dagger. "Yes. It is cruel. Bringing someone to life, just to give them a life they want to die to escape. Almost pointless."
Ana stared at the wooden floors, her mind empty. She couldn't even focus enough to get a coherent thought through.
"You should get off the drugs," he said softly.
She looked up.
"Downers before a decision? Why would you do that, Ana?"
Ana shrugged. "I'm self destructive. I can't catch joy. But I can feel pain."
He closed the textbook. "What exactly do you think I want to do here, Ana?"
Ana closed her eyes. "When i was younger, I took my mothers sleeping pills. I went outside. Got in a pool."
He narrowed his eyes. Even that?
"I sank to the bottom. I was halfway down. Half way between death and life. I couldn't get up. I couldn't move. Too many downers. In that moment, I regretted it," she said softly, remembering the water in her lungs.
"And I wanted to live. I couldn't get the taste of chlorine out of mouth."
He frowned as she sighed.
"I lived, of course. And to this day, I can't remember why I thought life would be better, I can't remember why I convinced myself life was worth living."
He smiled. "Maybe it was fate. You met me."
Ana opened her eyes. "What a fate that would be."
Scott snorted softly. "Don't die, Ana. Even if you don't ever see me again. Just don't die."
"No promises."
He rolled his eyes. As he looked back down at his book.
"I think I know," he said suddenly. "Why you convinced yourself to live."
"Why's that?"
He smirked. "Spite. You didn't want the people who ignored you, your mother, the people around you to pretend they loved you in public. You didn't want to have the luxury of playing the grieving family, when they've never cared about you a day in your life."
She smirked. "Heh. Yeah...you know what that sounds like me."
He looked back down. "Well, I do know you."
"Seems like you do. I'll take your deal, Scott. Let's watch each other die."
He rolled his eyes. "How romantic."
"Your words, not mine."
