Headsets For Fear

PRESENT 20 : NORA

Fifty days after

It didn't feel like death, to tell the truth. I didn't see any mystical light coming towards me, telling me to cross the border or anything of that sort. It was complete darkness, until the moment I woke up.

Perhaps I was clinging on to life too tightly.

The hand which I had stabbed had a bandage wound tightly around it. It felt numb, but hurt a lot when I tried to move it.

It didn't take me long to register that they had found me and brought me to the hospital. I'd been saved, and they were all waiting outside. Alex had probably told them everything.

They were going to ask me a lot of questions.

A nurse helped me sit up on the bed. I felt incredibly weak, but that was to be expected. I had lost a huge amount of blood. It would pass soon enough. I just needed to eat something. And take deep breaths.

"Are you feeling alright?" The nurse asked. I nodded meekly.

"You're such a young girl, and there are so many opportunities life has for you. Why did you take such a drastic step, dear?

I had no idea how I should reply. Wasn't she being too intrusive? I kept my mouth shut.

She sighed. "Life has given you a second chance, dear. Don't waste it. Everyone is not as lucky as you are."

I nodded stiffly, as the nurse sat down to change my bandage. After a few minutes later, she was done. She told me that my friends were coming to visit me in a few minutes.

I prepared myself for hell.

The door slowly opened, and Benji came storming it. He didn't even bother to ask if I was feeling okay. "Why. The. Fuck. Did. You. Do. This?" He said, emphasizing every single word. "Look, I don't understand how things work in the FBI, but this was very risky."

"There wasn't any other option, Benji," I replied meekly.

"There were so many things that could fucking go wrong. What if you couldn't land the cut properly? What if we were too late? Wasn't there any other way?"

"There wasn't," I replied. I wasn't going to explain anything else to him now. He wasn't going to listen. "And Benji, you were going to stop me. All of you. I knew that. How could I just tell you in spite of knowing that?"

Rick and Kaitlin had slowly entered the scene. I searched for some tears on Kate's face. There weren't any. My heart sank. Had my betrayal been so shocking that she couldn't even cry?

"You're impossible," Benji replied. "You didn't think even once about how we'd feel about this, did you? About how I would feel?"

I looked at Benji's eyes, and I could sense the hurt that lay behind his words. How had I not foreseen this? He would be the most baffled about the entire affair. That something he did with such seriousness would be used by his best friend to fool others.

Rick came forward and rubbed my head. He touched my forehead, as if he were checking if I had a fever. "You're alright now, huh?" Rick asked.

I nodded.

"That's why you asked me to go to your room, didn't you?"

"Yes," I replied.

Rick turned towards Benji, grabbing hold of both his shoulders. "Look," he said softly, "What's done is done. She's fine now. Whatever she wanted to do is successful. What else do you fucking want?"

Benji shook himself out of Rick's grasp. He glared at me. "I don't want anything from a woman who plays with our feelings."

Played with their feelings?