Differences

Chapter 52 - Luke

New Chapter!!! ⏪️▶️⏩️

Warning: The image above may be distressing, if it does, you are more than welcome to skip this chapter or scroll it away, please take care of yourselves. In addition, this chapter explores ideas of illness and mentions the idea of passing. Please read what you are most comfortable with.

This chapter is once again, quite heavy in topic. Please take care of yourself and love your close ones. 💜💙🩵

But, I hope you still feel something while reading this chapter. 🌙✨

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I didn't know what I was expecting to see. But it wasn't this.

Across the other side of the glass door was a bed, surrounded by countless machines and monitors. All beeping and flashing something in colors of red, green, and blue. Some displaying numbers that I could never understand, while others displayed graphs and lines. From each and every single one of them, a handful of wires and tubes were attached and snaked its way to the woman on the bed.

They were all attached to her.

And they were the only things keeping her alive.

She laid there, still. Unmoving. Even from afar, her complexion appeared deathly pale.

The only movement that could be observed were the steady, calculated rise and fall of her chest, assisted by the ventilator, breathing in her place.

Because she couldn't breathe on her own.

Everything in that room was controlled. Movements deliberate. All the machines completing their intended tasks systematically. Because it would only take one mistake, one small mistake for a life to cease.

Her life to . . .

Gone were her reassuring voice. Telling me to keep it together. Telling me she wouldn't leave me. Not unless I died. And yet here I was, alive, standing, while she . . . while she was at a crossroad.

Of life and death.

And I couldn't do anything because there was nothing I could do.

I could only watch from afar. Behind a glass window. Because her health was severely compromised. I could potentially kill her.

Someone approaches and stands next to me, observing the same view in front of me.

"She's a strong girl. She's holding on.", the female voice says, Mia, my brain registers. She had always been a present figure in my life. Attending to my wounds that become larger and more serious as I aged. Her touch on my wounds always gentle and soothing, and yet her eyes held to more darkness than anyone's eyes I've ever seen.

"You know, some comatose patients can hear. Some have internal awareness of what's going on around them, even if they can't react to it. Even if their body is failing upon them." She explains.

"But I can't go inside."

She faces me and I do the same. Her eyes staring at mine serious, but they were also filled with pity. I knew I wasn't going to like whatever was going to come out of her mouth next.

"Luke, I'm going to be honest with you right now, okay?" I nod in response.

"Patients with severe septic shock like her, many don't survive. Even if we pump her with the right medication at the right time through the right route, monitor her like hawk, the possibility of her not making it is high. Very high. I've seen it so many times. And every time, no one's there by their side. Only us medical professionals. Because they could deteriorate at any given moment. But . . . don't you think its best if she has someone she loves by her side?"

"She will make it." I affirm. The other option wasn't an option.

"Perhaps she will. And I have every intention of doing everything I possibly can for her. But that also includes making her feel safe and comfortable. Besides, there has been studies that show that patients have better outcomes when they have someone there for them close by."

"What if I make her situation worse? What if I become the cause for another infection?"

"Infection control isn't too difficult. And" she takes breath looking down before meeting my eyes once again, "I'm afraid there isn't much worse than the state she's already in."

I could see that. Over the course of my life, I have seen injuries of all kinds. Majority of the time, it was inflicted with the intent of causing death. Both quick and slow.

But to see someone . . . someone irreplaceable to you in a state where she could take one step to the other side, a side where it was slightly unapproachable, definitely irreversible . . . it was a thought I didn't want to consider at all.

"Can you help me? I don't want to hurt her."

"Of course." She replies giving me a reassuring smile, before grabbing a few things which I assumed were protective wear. She hands them over to me before she placed the same on her own. I follow how she put on the gown and mask and sanitize my hands.

Once she and myself were donned with protective wear, she slides the sliding door open, ushering me inside.

The room was cooler than the corridor outside. The smell of antiseptic much stronger and the heaviness that clung onto these walls felt oppressive. Like a persistant reminder that it only took one moment for either an angel or a grim reaper to appear.

Mia motions me over, pulling out a chair for me to sit on. I take it, now seeing Alaina's face closer to mine.

Seeing her in this state up close, within touching reach of all these monitors and tubes was far worse than watching her through a glass window. The situation she was in, felt more real, if that was even possible. Watching through a glass window made the situation feel as though it was still controllable. Like I had some power to untangle and repair the damage.

But I couldn't and I wouldn't be able to. This wasn't an issue I could bend to make it work in my favour.

Mia gently manoeuvres a few tubes and wires out of the way from Alaina's hand, before she turned her attention towards me.

"Be careful of these." She whispers before letting me take Alaina's hand. I gently take her hands in my mine, cautious not to pull or tug on any tubes or wires and just hold it. Her hands were warm to the touch and yet . . . it felt cold.

Impassive, cold, and  . . . just so wrong. 

It was nothing like her.

In this moment, I realise how powerless I truly was. Just like Mia had mentioned, no matter all the medications that were pumped into her system or all the machines attached to her took on the role of living in her stead, nothing would change the current situation she was in.

Only she could change and control it.

"I'll back in a bit" Mia quietly slips out of the room and now it was just me and her in the room.

This could have been avoided, or at least her condition could have been controlled so it didn't lead to this severity. But I was the fool, who got injured and so easily at that which made the people around me believe that she was somehow involved.

Some even still continue to believe that this was all a façade. I was sure to give them a lesson or a hundred. Starting off with the people close to me. They needed to learn.

But wasn't I at fault too?

If I had proved to them earlier, if I had showed them she was never involved, if I . . . if I . . .

"I'm so sorry. I'm  . . . I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for not being able to protect you. I'm sorry for not being there for you.I'm so sorry for breaking our promises. I'm so, so sorry . . . please, please . . . please come back to me."

. . . Just come back to me . . .