Second Fate

21

Hospitals were pretty far down on the list of my favorite hangout spots. The clinically sterile white, which hung over the buildings like a mourning veil, and the smell of aggressive disinfectants and sickness awakened memories in me.

Memories, which never quite took on a concrete shape; they were like a dream, losing detail whenever I tried to catch one. However, that didn't mean they weren't causing my hands to sweat and my stomach to turn whenever I entered a hospital.

They're probably connected to the time I spent living with my mother, I guessed with mild interest, while my eyes wandered through the impersonal room and to the window. Perhaps I should go and open it to at least get rid of the smell.

Over the course of the morning, there'd been some drama on the hospital corridor which I'd followed like it was a soap opera before an older nurse had noticed my half-open door and closed it firmly. Since then, I was trapped in starchy-white sheets, alone and at the mercy of my thoughts and memories.

That didn't happen too often, and I could've gone another day without remembering these tiny snippets of emotional pain. It was mostly a disgusted look here or a cigarette stump there, but my memories from the years before I'd entered foster care were a mess – not exactly a hot one, rather one fuming with cigarette smoke and other questionable substances.

There was one memory in particular which I always recalled when I was surrounded by all-white, and that one I hated more than all the others. It was the day when I'd been told that my mother had overdosed. But no matter how hard I thought back, I couldn't see my tiny self crying as she was lead through the hospital's corridors by an older woman in a pantsuit. There had been no tear spilt that day.

The busy chatter outside my room grew louder, and I noticed that the door was opening. Together with the corridor's noises, Vine slipped into the room – insofar him pushing his broad shoulders through the door could be called slipping.

I greeted him, still groggy from the painkillers and bad memories, while my eyes were wandering over the tanned skin which showed.

"Damn." The curse had left my mouth before I knew it, so I hurriedly explained: "Your wounds, they're actually gone. All of them?"

"Oh, those", he replied, as if three broken rips and a dislocated shoulder were nothing to be worried about. Not to speak of the countless bites and scratches. A single reddish half-moon could be seen on his nape, right above the seam of his t-shirt.

"I think my arm will take a bit longer than that."

"But it will ...?"

"It's going to be fine", I assured him in a – what I had thought to be – calming tone, but his shoulders remained stiff.

"And the tests a–"

"They're all negative. No infection."

This time, I noticed the relief spreading on his features and loosening the tension in his body. After a friendly doctor with large, brown eyes had talked to me about the complications which usually accompanied a change without werewolf blood in the family tree, I could understand his emotions.

As much as I would've liked to have been of more help at the congregation or in the alley, I wasn't a big fan of broken bones and hair loss.

But before I could start to share about my stay or invite Vine to sit, I'd noticed his mood darken again. He was stalking through the room in a restless manner, while I grew more and more suspicious.

Something was up. Something which I wouldn't like, so he didn't know how to tell me.

Finally, he came and sat down at the edge of the hospital bed I was tucked into. He'd looked almost normal from afar, but up close, I could see the dark circles under his fir green eyes.

"Are you going to tell me or –"

"We can't meet anymore", he announced abruptly.

I blinked at him in confusion. "What did you just say?"

"I will ... distance myself", he continued. He was looking at me, but his gaze went straight through me, like he was looking at something out of this world. "It has to be like before. Its better if we don't meet or talk."

I felt myself laugh by a strange impulse. It was a short sound and definitely not one of joy.

Before undoubtedly meant the seven years in which he'd avoided my company entirely. Seven years in which I'd thought that he wasn't wasting a second thinking of me – and still I hadn't been able to let him go entirely.

The thought alone threatened to suffocate me. I couldn't do that again, knowing what I was giving up on.

"Why now? What happened?" My voice was croaky, but I didn't care. He already knew he was hurting me with his words, so there was no sense in hiding it. "Did I do ... something?"

When he didn't answer immediately, I kicked off the blankets and crawled up next to him. I used my hands to trap his face and forced him to lock eyes with me, but the look in them remained distant. Cold even.

I felt the ice from his gaze spread through my whole body, freezing my chest.

No, not like this.

"Can't we go on like we have? I thought this is ... this is what you wanted now."

"You know just as well as I do that we can't simply go on."

"Of course we can. What do you–"

"If we do, Meredith's people will always be watching, aiming for one of us. And if they catch you alone –", he swallowed hard, but the words also began to fall out of him faster now, "–then I'll die. I swear, Nina, I can't do this again. I'd rather kill myself than know that you're gone too."

I felt my eyebrows scrunch together. "Don't say shit like that."

Vine finally looked at me, his gaze defensive as if he wanted to say But it's true.

"You didn't cause Kenna's death, there is nothing you could've done. And even if something will happen to me in the future, it's not going to be by your hand, is it?"

"It doesn't make a difference if I'm the one killing you or if I'm the reason they kill you." His voice was quiet but full of conviction. With every word, my hopes of dissuading him became fainter. "Meredith has lost her mind, I can see that now, and her pack will stop at nothing to give her peace."

And with those words, he got up to wander around the room once more. I followed suit, stepping off the bed in my grass-green snail-print pajama. I'd bought it because the current color of my hair was just one shade darker, making the combination look decidedly silly – but right now, it couldn't lift my mood one bit.

"Doesn't it matter that I want you?", I asked, my voice sounding as hurt as I felt. "Despite Meredith and Kenna and whatever else comes with you, I want to keep us. I don't care about your past any more than you care about mine."