Ladders

Ruined

Madeline sat in the hospital bed scared, no one was around in the dim lit hospital room besides an iv stand besides her and a heart monitor on the opposite side. She looked outside of the window of her hospital room and saw darkness. She'd been awake for four hours now and it was 3:16 am. She woke up but only half an hour ago regained the strength to sit up and adjust her bed. She looked down at her bandaged arms and wanted to cry. Why did I survive? Madeline looked up as another nurse walked in. They would greet her and ask her how she was feeling ever since she woke up. They even offered her water and food but her stomach felt so upset she had to decline. Though this nurse pulled a chair up next to Madeline's bed and sat next to her with a clipboard. "Hello Madeline, I'm nurse Francis. I know you must be very emotionally upset right now but just know we are all here for you and we all want you to survive and have a happy life. Now we're going to talk about what you did to get yourself here. You gave us all quite the scare" he gave a soft smile towards the young girl in the hospital bed, but Madeline look back down at her bandages that had little dollops of blood on them "I didn't want you all to save me" she said sounding defeated as if she lost a war. Francis wrote what she said down on his clipboard and looked back up at her "well your parents and friends sure did. Can you tell me what gave you the final push towards your attempt?". Madeline teared up as she thought of all the things she's done wrong in her life "I'm a waste of money towards my parents, my sister will always be better than me, and I burden my friends with too many problems but, Gilbert...he made me feel like I was a princess in his eyes. That I was the only one. He somehow lessened the pain of my depression" tears fell from her face onto the white sheets "but I'm so terrible that I pushed even him away and he cheated on me. What good is person on this earth if nobody needs them around?". Francis wrote most of what she said on his clipboard and sighed "Madeline you're in a dark mind set right now that's putting the blame of Gilbert cheating onto you. Though it just isn't true. You're young and sometimes relationships such as yours just don't work out. From what I've seen of your family and friends crying over you, that's the love you should focus on. Your mother and father told me every hour when I'd walk in, that if I lost their baby they'd loose their entire world. Depression makes us blind to the love and happiness that's truly surrounding us". Madeline stayed quiet as the blonde nurse finished his speech, her heart ached in so much pain and she wished his words would heal her instantly. She finally answered "I want to get better". Francis smiled "good. That's the first step and largest step you've just made, saying you need help and want to get better. I've arranged for you to meet with a therapist. You'll meet every other two days for two months then you'll move to only doing two days a week". Madeline nodded nervous about her life starting once again after the hospital. What would people think of her? Would they think she's weak? She was also nervous about having to talk to a therapist. "How long have I been out?" She asked wondering if her parents gave up on her waking up "you've been in an induced coma for 3 days". She frowned, she's already missed three days of her life and yet she still in her mind wanted to miss all of her life. "You're probably starving so I'll bring you in some food, but for now would you like to watch some tv?" Madeline nodded and grabbed the remote as Francis handed it to her. She smiled at him as he went to leave but he stopped in the doorway "would you like me to try and contact your parents?" Madeline quickly shook her head "no, I don't want to have to wake them up". Francis frowned "okay". He hopped Madeline would soon realize her worth towards her parents, and that she was worth loosing a few hours of sleep.

Emil sat in front of two gravestones. He had Leon drive him towards the edge of the city to this graveyard. Leon stayed in the car as per Emil's wishes, and Emil just stared into the ground that held two people he knew six feet under. Both were buried in the graveyard for unclaimed bodies, bodies nobody cared for. One read

Anya Brainsky
1990-2018

The other read

Chun-Yan
1988-2018

Neither had any special writing on it, or any withered flowers replaced with fresh ones laying on it. He sighed "you both deserve something better. I wish I could done more". Emil sat on the grass and laid two roses on the grass beneath the stones "I don't think your guys family even knows your here. They probably wondering if your ever coming back home Chun-Yan. You did promise them you'd be back to China". Emil looked at Anya's grave, she never talked about her family like Chun-Yan did. Though Emil gathered snippets about them. Apparently Anya ran away when she was nineteen due to her family telling her not to date her boyfriend mostly because he was much older than her. Well she moved here with her boyfriend and then it turned out he had a wife and left her in the streets to fend for herself. She didn't have the money to go back home so she turned to the brothel but nobody escapes the brothel. Emil wiped away his building tears from his eyes "I'll try and find them. Tell them what happened". He knew it'd be hard to find either of their families. Both Anya and Chun-Yan were immigrants so he assumed their parents were in their original country. He would do anything though to let them know what happened, especially Chun-Yan's parents knowing she was supposed to escape from the brothel back to China. "Should I tell them about the brothel? Or is that too shameful to share? I don't even know if I want my family knowing what job I did if I died soon..." He asked into the cold air. He truly wanted their answers but he knew he'd never receive them. After a few more minutes of mourning, Emil sat up and walked back to Leons car leaving the two gravestones that would most likely never be visited again.