The Teammate

04 - Wilting Daisy's

February 2024

The room was completely silent but deafening loud at the same time. Everything in the room was clouded over by a thick shadow that couldn't be brightened by any amount of sun that came through the south-facing window. Monitors beeped and groaned as they worked on keeping the figure in bed alive and breathing.

Arabella Van Dijk's face had healed from the bruises and cuts and a nurse must have just washed her hair since it was laying around her face in shimmering clean waves. If it hadn't been for the breathing tube down her throat, she would have looked beautiful and peaceful. The same way she always looked when she was sleeping.

Which was exactly what she was doing, sleeping. At least that's what Max was telling himself as he stepped into the hospital room. However, somehow even the Daisy's in his hands started to wilt from the shadows around him.

"I brought you..." he held them up but stopped talking as his eyes trailed her silent and still stunning face. The hole in his chest had somehow grown, or just become more noticeable, either way, it became noticeably empty in his chest as he stepped closer to her.

Taking the last step forward he placed the flowers on the bed beside her, his knuckles brushing against her hand. Slowly he slid his fingers around hers, wrapping her hand in both of his. It was limp, colder, and thinner than it should have been, but it was still her hand. Smiling he slid into the chair beside her bed, never letting go of her hand.

"I know we aren't exactly on the best of terms." He said his voice cracking as he pulled her hand up pressing it to the side of his face. "God, I don't even know how to do this." He breathed, his voice cracking. Tears had started slipping from his eyes, sliding across his cheeks.

"I'm so sorry." He said after a few moments. "I am so so sorry." He leaned into her hand, his sobs mixing in with the sounds of the breathing machines and beeps from the monitors. "I know I'm probably not the person you want to see right now, not after what I did." With a shaking breath, he leaned back, resting her hand back on the bed, but not letting it go.

"If I could take it back I would" He took a breath. "I wasn't thinking, I was being so stupid. I should have never let you walk out of my life." His voice was cut off with broken sobs. Pushing back he stood walking around the end of her bed. "I wish I could go back, I would give anything to go back, not just to that moment, that stupid fucking moment, but to just hold you one more time." His voice completely broke as he leaned forward, wrapping his hands around her blanket-covered ankles, dipping his forehead to her shins.

"Please just come back." He breathed after his breathing had calmed. "Just wake up. I know I'm selfish, you've called me out on it enough times, but just please give me the chance to make it right."

Mistakes had been made in their relationship, by both parties, but it was his own mistake that ultimately ended it. Max had lost her, and he had lived with that. Had been living with that. A part of him had always thought that one day they would reconcile things with her. He never imagined he wouldn't get the chance. Their relationship may not have been perfect, the ending surely wasn't, but he never thought that he'd have to say goodbye to her, not forever.

"Please baby." He breathed, reaching for her hand again. He brought it back up to his face, brushing his lips against her knuckles. "I never thought I'd have to say goodbye to you," a few more shaking breaths, "not like this, not for real."

His knee crashed against the floor as he knelt, resting his forehead on the bed beside her he just held her hand and cried.