Falling (JohnLock)

chpr. 17

A/N: I dunno I'm half asleep rn
Trigger Warnings: Depressive and suicidal thoughts

Day broke over the small hospital, sunlight beginning to stream into the window, cut by the slats of blinds. A new day. John felt nothing. He felt nothing lying in the dark caverns of his mind. He thought too much, he darkened his mood of his own accord.

How can you see into my soul, like the windows in my eyes? 

No visitors on a Sunday, no one to lighten his mood and push away the hole in his heart. When did he get so emotional? 

Wake up. 

When last did he stop, and think about life? 

Wake. Up. 

When did he think about the pain of poetry? 

Sleep.

Time is an infinitely racing concept, quicker than anything at a snail’s pace. It laughs and cries and wounds and heals. It brings life and takes relationships. Conflict and heartbreak, angels floating through the world, in flowed ripped white cloth. Halos tainted and poisoned with narcissism and gluttony, wings torn and faded into the dark of oblivion. 

I will not break.

He was far from whole. The starched hospital blanket curved around his legs, sitting up in bed, unable to mask the tired lines on his face. A young girl was resting in a bed next to him, and he seemed to only notice her then.

“Hello,” he croaked, trying to gain conversation.

She glanced at him briefly, with only the motive to see if he was talking to her.

“No,” she replied, sneering at him. Bandages, which he assumed were burns, covered her shoulder, leg and majority of her chest. 

“My name’s John,” he tried again, biting his lip.

“Who cares,” she bit in reply, his motivation fading.

 “Look, I’m just trying to be nice, okay? It’s not my fault if you don’t have the decency to return it”.

She scoffed, “Whatever”.

He rolled his eyes, and went back to staring at the wall. Time burns through mighty civilisations and breathes across art. It captures the patented seductive smile of Ms Monroe, the tragedy that almost sailed across the North Atlantic Ocean, and the dark, distressing times of a world at war. It’s far more complicated than humanity itself.

The girl’s face softened, heart tugging with the pull of guilt. 

“Olive,” she sighed, and John jumped subtly, “My name’s Olive”

“Hello, Olive,” John smiled.

“Hey, John,” she scratched her cheek inattentively. 

“How old are you?”

She narrowed her eyes in suspicion, “Fifteen… you?”

John breathed a short laugh, “Old. So… why are you here?”

She glared at him, “We’re on suicide watch, ya prat. What the hell do you think I’m ‘ere for!” she snapped and John raised an eyebrow. 

Am I a bad person for wanting to die?

“Yeah, but I wanted to know your story. I know they don’t ask, much, they just do their job. If they decide you’re depressed or suicidal, then they shove you somewhere bright white and sterile, doped up on a dozen different types of meds. I just wanted to know your opinion,” he said kindly, looking at the wired-glass window with glazed eyes. “How about a question for a question?”  She stared at his unseeing face for a while, internal conflict raging through her. She bit her lip. 

Panic. Panic and run away. 

“I set my room on fire,” she admitted after a while, “What’d you do?”

“I slit my throat. What’d your room ever do to you?”

“Bad memories. The hell you that for?”Nothing really matters anymore. 

“I lost someone. What kind of memories?”

“Painful ones. Who’d you lose?” Pain makes people change. 

“My friend. What happened?” 

“My brother. What happened to your friend?”

“He killed himself. What happened to your brother?”

“A brain tumour,” she choked out, sucking in her lips immediately. A deafening silence passed through them. 

How does emptiness feel so heavy?
 

“I’m sorry about your brother,” John said eventually, looking away. 

“I’m sorry about your friend”.

Death seems more inviting than life. 

“Thank you,” he murmured. His eyes glazed once more. Silence is an absence. It screams and howls. Alone but not in solitude. Surrounding and consuming innocence and taking the guilty. No survivors. 

Being angry, or even furious, is better than being sad. 

“Dr Watson?” a familiarly calm voice asked from the door. John absently turned his head towards the sound, not taking his eyes off the window. 

“Hmm?” he wasn’t paying attention.

“May I have a word?”

He looked at her, Dr Smith again, and blinked slowly. “Oh! Right, sorry,” he suddenly became more animated. Smile. He smiled, slowly, falsely. He hoped she wouldn’t see past it. 

A friendship is not a one way street, and it’s sad that distance is making it that way.

It was arranged to have him taken to a private office. Her office. Two male nurses helped him into a wheelchair. He tried to insist he could walk. They ignored him. Another starched, uncomfortable blanket was draped over his knees. His dressings itched uncomfortably, the fabric of his hospital gown irritating his neck.  A fluids bag hung from a pole on wheels, included liquid morphine, it squealed and squeaked as it travelled beside him.

Dr Smith talked at him during the short journey. He tuned her out. “Call me Rebecca, please,” she offered politely, but was disappointed when she was met with an uninterested grunt in reply.

No one teaches you how to walk away from someone you love. No one teaches you how to say goodbye.