Summertime Strawberries

5

I sat bolt upright and screamed, the white surrounding me burning my eyes, and the nightmarish scene playing over and over in my head for the whole time I had been out of it, still repeating in the back of my head. There was just a few moments near the beginning where I had fallen into a pit and was dragged by invisible entities before a flaming Demon, but those moments passed as the torture and ruthless screaming lasted almost centuries to me. Then, it all just stopped and I was thrown into a worse kind or torture, reliving the death of my mother over and over, just this time, my death was an added bonus feature in the move of "OH MY GOD JUST LET ME DIE ALREADY". I panted heavily as a beeping to my left increased and when wild, sending me further into my panic. I was in an empty white room with a window blasting sunlight into my eyes, but as I heard an alarm from outside the door to my right, that was the only place I could think of going. I jumped out of the bed I was in, automatically plagued by light headedness, and charged for the window. I swiftly slammed into the end of my chain in the form of three tubes connecting to my body from my nose, mouth, and arm. I quickly ripped out the one in my arm and gripped both of the tubes left in one hand, ripping them out with a disgusting feeling of vomiting, then stumbled towards the window in my light hospital gown. I slammed against the glass with a heavy thud as I heard people come through the door, finally being called by the alarm. They tried to wrestle be back into bed, but I shoved them all off with brutal force, sending then to the ground. "JAX!" I turned and slammed my fist into the face of the person who yelled at me, the shout sending an arrow of pain through my head. "Oh GOD!" Ed clasped his hand to his cheek and blinked a couple times in shock. "That hurt."

He looked me in the eyes and when I noticed who I was looking at, I mumbled something incoherent and finally let my legs go out from under me. He caught me as I dropped, holding me in one of those dramatic movie poses when the heroine was about to die in her lover's arms only for him to kill himself later. Ed put his other arm under my legs and picked me up slowly, my head spinning like a top before he set me down on the bed gently. The doctors surrounding us breathed a sigh of relief as I complied willingly with the IV being put back into my arm, no more use for the breathing tube or feeding tube. I was light headed and so out of it that I felt as if I was on a cloud, the pain just a dull throb from all sections of my body. "Ed?" I leaned up a bit, watching him as he stopped leaning against the wall and came to the side of the bed that wasn't connected with multiple wires measuring my breathing, heartbeat, and brainwaves. He grabbed my hand and I leaned back onto the pillow as I sighed. "Where am I? Why do I feel so strange? What happened to me?"

Ed looked nervously at the doctor that was changing the IV, finally the only one in the room, and he looked at Ed with the same uneasy face. The doctor quickly walked out once he was done, giving us some space. "Well..." Ed cleared his throat. "When you... came downstairs, I saw you holding the gun and panicked a little. So, I tried to-" Ed choked on a sob, trying not to let his tears fall. "I... I couldn't watch you do it." He sniffed, tears falling down his cheeks. "I couldn't watch you kill someone. I was so selfish that- tha- th-" Ed broke down, full on sobbing. He put his head down onto the mattress, the cries shaking his whole body, so I shifted over on the bed and slipped my

free hand under his arm, pulling him upwards towards me in a hug. I pulled the blanket covering my legs to the side and he slipped in beside me, still wracked with his tears as I held him in my arms, working my hand through his messy, tangled hair, my other one rubbing his back as his head rested on my chest. It hurt like a bitch, but I dealt with it because as much as he needed a shoulder to cry into, I needed a link to the the reality of the situation I was in. When the tears finally stopped coming, and his voice was hoarse from the ragged breaths, he finally calmed down enough to continue speaking. "I'm so sorry Jax. I distracted you and nearly got you murdered in the process." I lifted up his chin to look at me and placed my lips on his forehead, no apology needed from him. "I can't believe I didn't know about your abus- um... father." I stayed silent, it was Ed's time to speak. I knew whenever he just needed to talk to someone because usually, I was that someone. That had obviously been put on hold for however long I had been here, and he was holding it all in for about a week I was guessing. "I just-" He bit his lip in thought then continued. "I was scared that I would never see you again. I was terrified that you would be gone and I could never have the chance to ask you the most important question I ever needed to ask." He sighed and shifted closer to me, sending me into a confused whirl through my head. What was the Question? Why was he so scared if I was only out of it for a week or two? What was going on?