Wherever You Go [Katy Perry Fan fiction]

Chapter Sixty-Two

After a couple of minutes of listening to voices speaking around me, not that the words were even forming sentences in my head right now, I finally managed to use the little energy I had left in my body to lift up my heavy head to face the doctor in front of me. She looked back, concerned and apologetic, as if she felt as though it was her fault. Oliver just sat there, so still that I actually had to check that he was breathing at all. I looked into his pain ridden eyes and saw how useless he felt. He felt guilty because he knew there was nothing he could do to change this. 

"That's all for today but I will see you again tomorrow morning at eleven thirty, where we'll run some more tests. Is that okay?" Doctor Taylor asks me, doing her best to keep me as calm as possible. I had managed to convince myself for the past couple of days that I was going to be okay. I honestly believed that when I got the news I would take it on the chin, keep my head up. What you think in your mind and what happens in reality are two very different things. 

"That's fine." My croaky voice sounded pathetically weak. I didn't want to be weak. How could I be weak when I had a family to fight for? I couldn't let myself be beaten because I had far too much to lose. 

All three of us rose to our feet. Oliver was the first to offer a hand shake to Doctor Taylor, thanking her for today with the best fake smile he could possibly wipe across his devastated face. I was next to do the same, and as my hand came into contact with the warm palm of hers, she clutched it just a little bit tighter and said, "You are in good hands, you know. Try and stay positive." 

Staying positive was so hard to do when I felt as though my life was crumbling at my feet. I just gave her a small smile and nodded, before thanking her for her time. I didn't really know where everything was going to go from now. 

Doctor Taylor walked us to her door, politely opening it for us to leave. Nobody spoke another word. It was painfully silent. I couldn't even feel Oliver's presence. It was as though his head was now somewhere else entirely and he had forgotten where he was. I wanted to feel his hand in my own; his arm around my waist. Even the touch of his shoulder against mine. It was more of a need than a want right now, but he just slowly walked behind me. His hands hung loosely at his sides and his eyes never left the floor. 

I felt the smallest of drafts as I stepped back onto the hospital corridor just outside of Doctor Taylor's room. I used the backs of my hands to rub my make up free eyes, afraid that if I didn't do it quickly, the tears I was holding back would come falling from my eyes. I knew that as soon as that happened I wouldn't be able to stop, and to be fairly honest, I just didn't have it in me to cry right now. 

I felt behind me with my hand until finally, the warm skin I craved to touch came into contact with mine. I wondered how long it would be until me and Oliver managed to find the words to speak to one another. Right now, we just didn't know what to say. Our brains had completely shut down. I had been looking at my feet for a good couple of seconds, unable to figure out what I could even begin to say to Oliver when we got home, when I lifted up my head to meet a face and glistening pair of eyes that was enough to stop me from breathing altogether. 

A deep voice spoke the words, "Mom we brought you-" until the words eventually faded into thin air when another dark pair of eyes switched from Doctor Taylor to me. 

In that moment, my face fell faster than someone who had just seen a corpse. My mouth hung with my lips slightly parted, and my eyes widened to as far as they could stretch. I could physically feel the blood draining from my face. My brain was still scrambling to make sense of everything that was going on, still unable to comprehend what the hell had just happened, and now, this was enough to make my body shake in disbelief and wonder why the hell God was setting me with these challenges. Did he really believe that today wasn't already complicated and difficult enough?