1.1 | daunting medleys

thirteen | part one | metallica against the violin

The indifference with which Tabitha's sickness was uttered cut through her. She'd sat up previously, and was at eye level with everyone, especially Oliver. His grey, shocked eyes bore into her in unmuted disbelief as he shoved off the door that lent him support. Tabitha looked down at her trembling hands to avoid looking at anyone, especially the nice doctor.

"Mother." Talia hissed.

Tabitha couldn't look, or rather, she wouldn't look up. She didn't like mentioning her illness, to anyone, for fear that people would look at her with sympathy. She didn't like being pitied, she hated being pitied.

Her mother continued nonchalantly. "What? It is the truth. Her sickness is flaring up again, and your sister needs to start taking her medication regularly. I..." Tabitha started to fade out. The older woman's voice was grating, like Metallica against the violin, or like the unruliness of a tumultuous rainstorm. Her mind went numb, her hands shook with the tremors of a thousand earthquakes, the usual stability that came after missing.

"You are going to be okay." Talia whispered with unprecedentedly steeliness in her voice, although she was shaking as Tabitha was.

But she could barely hear.

She could barely hear because her ears were closed with the pressure of what her mother said. Her heart was failing again. Pristine walls flashed in her ears. Drugs forced down her throat. Then the resounding slam of the door shut. As if clockwork, the echo of the click from the door being locked shook her vision until she couldn't see Talia, nor could see her father's worried eyes. Or Oliver's.

He looked at her, with droopy eyes. Tabitha didn't want to think he felt pity for her, that the heaviness of everything that was spoke here weighed down on him. He quietly excused himself, sending a smile her way before leaving. Tabitha knew he felt uncomfortable, who wouldn't when watching hysteric yells targeted at the one on the hospital bed. A tear dropped, the moisture spreading on the pale blue blanket that sheltered her legs from the chilliness of the room, and the sharp edge of her mother's nonchalant words.

"Not now Nike." She managed to hear her father's stiff words, after pinching her wrist and bringing herself from the bleak chasm of her childhood.

"Banji-" Her mother began with stubbornness but stopped herself when she saw his lips press in a firm line, a clear sign of his growing annoyance. It felt like she wasn't there, like she was watching from within a bubble where she could only gauge the reactions of everyone except herself.

Her father turned to the doctor who was closely watching Tabitha. "I'm so sorry for my wife's behavior but Tabitha is okay now, right? Her heart isn't acting up again?" He asked carefully, fear and hope imbedded in her syllable he uttered. Tabitha hadn't noticed but her father looked more stressed. His eyes looked more sunken. His clothes hung awkwardly off his shoulders and each word seemed too heavy for him to get out. Tabitha's heart cried for her father, he must have been so worried because of her.

Tabitha wanted to block out her ears, she knew what was coming next. She hadn't spent all that reading about CHD for nothing. This was her one of her few visits to the hospital because of her heart, and the first time she felt so scared. The first few visits were by the same doctor, many, many years back and now this. She was okay, Tabitha thought she was healthy but this meant she wasn't.

"Who is usually in charge of your health?" She asked. Tabitha's eyes flitted to her mother. The doctor noticed, and turned to the elder woman with a frown.

Her hands straightened her coat, and fear filled Tabitha at the thought of bad news. "And when last did you go for a checkup?" She'd inquired again. Tabitha didn't know.

"I don't take her for checkups regularly because the initial test said she had mild CHD and I'm a doctor so I wanted to treat it for her at home without going to the hospital all the time." Her mother replied, boredom in her voice. The doctor didn't reply and the entire room was filled with silence, deep, awkward silence.

The doctor was shocked. "That is beyond irresponsible. As a doctor, you should've known better than to not take her for her checkups."

"It is mild so there is no need for concern right-" Her mother said, panic creeping into her tone but her face darkened when Tabitha interrupted her.

"Are my arteries okay? I've been staying away from fatty foods to avoid the buildup of plaque so I don't understand why I passed out all of a sudden." Tabitha asked the doctor, her eyes unwavering from the sky blue eyes that stared back at her.

With what seemed like pride in her tone, the doctor bypassed her parents and sat on the bed, uprooting Talia from her position. "When you came in yesterday, I had tests done because I wasn't sure of why you fainted and Ollie here told you were arrhythmic. I immediately thought of CHD. From what you just told me, you know that CHD occurs from the buildup of plaque. The test results came back and there's no buildup of plaque anywhere, your arteries and cholesterol levels are okay. You may have an allergic reaction to the medication you've been taking because of the false diagnosis and ingestion of false prescription."

The silence that echoed throughout the room was deafening. Tabitha wasn't sure what to do, neither did anyone in the room. Everything and everyone was still, even the air seemed to stand still. Tabitha was scared to breathe, her eyes burned.

"W-What do you mean?" Tabitha whispered softly. Or maybe it was loudly because her ears were blocked, her hands shook and her ears overflowed. A tiny bean of hope entangled with doubt sprout in her chest.

The smile the doctor sent her way was meant to be comforting but it did nothing. "Exactly what you heard. You are fine. You don't have a heart disease. You just have Arrhythmia and it poses no problem because you are a very healthy young lady." She didn't look at anyone, she couldn't. There was nothing that she could do. Black creeped in the edges of her vision. She was shaking, and cold creeped into her bones.

White walls. White pills. Pale vomit. Salty tears.

Tabitha's grasp with reality was bending, she fumbled to hold on to the blanket. "I'm okay? I don't have to go back?" She muttered distortedly but before she could hear a reply, she let out a strangled gasp as she fell into the warm hands of oblivion. Despite the yells and frantic hands that clutched at her body. She could, through the haze that had engulfed her, the way her mother yelled at the doctor to fix Tabitha, but she wasn't broken.