Forbidden Alliances // Alfie Solomons Peaky Blinders

(162) Desolation

*edited 04/19/23*

TRIGGER WARNING.

It was so cold.

Freya stirred from something dark. She awoke in an infirmary but the images of her body rejecting her insides still clung freshly to her foggy mind. Her eyes were scratchy and there was something in her throat that didn't feel very comfortable but it wasn't suffocating; if anything, it made breathing easier.

She blinked a few times to clear her vision. The lights were bright in the room and the eerie sound of unknown voices talking far off in the background caused her heart rate to spike. The increased beeping of the monitor to her left alerted those in the room and the chatter got louder as she turned her head and faced three plain faces in white coats and grungey green scrubs.

"Miss Shelby," the man in the white coat addressed her. "Good morning, Miss Shelby. I'm Dr. Rapp. You're at the Winston Green Prison's medical unit. I want you to stay calm and try not to speak because we have a breathing tube inserted into your mouth to help you breathe. Now, I want you to nod or shake your head when I ask you a few questions, is that alright?"

His voice was meek and almost shy when he spoke to her. She could hear the sound of her heartbeat on the monitor. The two nurses who accompanied the doctor followed the sound and checked her vitals, then jotted something down on a notepad they had stuck to a clipboard.

"Miss Shelby?" the doctor called out again. "Can you hear me?"

She quickly nodded her head and winced. She didn't realize how painful it could be to move her neck. The doctor asked her questions about herself, reducing them to 'yes' and 'no' questions until the next day when they would try to remove the breathing tube if her vitals kept up well.

After explaining that her airways were obstructed when the rope came down around her neck, they began assessing her heart. She felt like they were avoiding the thing she dreaded most. Maybe they thought it would be best to save it for last, that she might act out if they confirmed what she prayed hadn't already happened.

But they didn't know that she could feel it. She didn't need them to tell her what she already knew because the hollowness, the utter defilement her body underwent told her far more than the doctor's relentless stalling.

They told her about their theories, just as Dr. Wilson did a while ago. She already knew what was wrong with her but none of them seemed to want to listen. None of this would have happened if they had just listened to her, given her the right to a doctor, or even treated her like a human being.

They put her on a lot of drugs to help with the pain and keep her blood pressure down but they didn't want to tell her why she was bleeding in the noose. The doctor paused after explaining her condition and glanced up at the nurse standing off to Freya' right. He nodded his head and looked down at his clipboards before letting his arms fall to his sides.

Freya looked over and saw the nurse injecting her IV with something just as the doctor took a moment to prepare himself. Freya wondered what it was she had in that needle and prepared herself for whatever its contents would do to her.

"We have also concluded that the reason you collapsed was because you were suffering from an infection, Miss Shelby," he informed her gently, using his words very wisely so as to not sound overly concerned or horrified as he delivered the worst news a woman could ever receive. "We found that both your lungs contain bacteria associated with pneumonia, and because you suffered with prolonged respiratory distress which wasn't treated in time, the bacteria in your lungs spread to your bloodstream," he explained sympathetically.

Freya didn't understand why he was trying to sound so depressing and sorry for her when all he was saying was that she had pneumonia again. She was waiting for him to address the blood that ran down her legs, not the pain in her chest.