take it how you want it (take on my love) // carmuel one-shots

tribulation

A/N: i played with the theme of s3 samuel getting progressively angrier and darker as the season went on, and in this fic he more or less has a real problem with alcohol, just a head's up! (also the title is taken from the song tribulation by matt maeson so if you wanna hurt i suggest listening to it)

description: angsty s4 reunion (set during the middle of samuel's repeat year at las encinas)

rating: mature

//

Samuel is no stranger to being hurt. He's been mugged on the job, ran off the road by a car full of drug dealers, punched in the face on more than one occasion... not to mention the psychological hurt he's endured in such a short amount of time since starting at Las Encinas. So, no, he's no stranger to it at all.

But in this moment, as he slowly blinks his eyes open and comes into consciousness, he swears he's never been in more excruciating pain in his entire life.

Every square inch of his body feels like it's been set aflame, the sensation so intense that he has to blink back a few sudden, wayward tears. Even the slight stretch of his torso as he breathes has him throbbing from head to toe, but he grits his teeth, trying his best to stay silent. He doesn't want to alert anyone that he's awake just yet, in favor of taking in his surroundings.

What he finds makes it immediately clear that he's in a hospital room, and suddenly all the memories of why he's here come rushing back in all at once. Being angry again. Being drunk again. Getting on his bike because he couldn't stand to be in his apartment anymore, not by himself, not with every single memory, good and bad, there to mock and laugh at him from between the four walls of his living room. And he remembers the headlights of the car right before it slammed into him; the resulting grind of asphalt on his skin.

Fuck. That last part must explain the burning, then.

It takes a great amount of effort—and an even greater wave of fresh pain—to lift his head off the pillow and inspect himself. The hospital gown they'd put him in and the blanket draped low over his hips hides most of the damage from his searching eyes, but his right arm is scraped up pretty badly. He doesn't doubt that if he turned it over, his palm would be even worse. The blinking red light of the pulse monitor on his finger seems like a warning not to even try it, almost, so he turns to inspect his other one—

And that's when he finally registers the slender fingers entwined with his own on the mattress. He follows the length of the arm up and finds himself staring at a girl he hasn't seen or spoken to in nearly six months.

Carla is curled up on a chair pushed next to the bed, her knees drawn to her chest. Her head is resting on what looks like some sort of bundled jacket, propped up as a makeshift pillow and buffer between her temple and the sharp edge of the side table.

Honestly, she looks nearly as uncomfortable as he feels. She's also fast asleep.

She can't be real. Maybe the drugs they've most likely got him hooked up to are affecting his mind more than they're doing anything to ease the pain, because Carla can't be here. She's in—well, wherever the hell she'd gone to; he doesn't really know, but it's certainly not Spain, certainly not Madrid, and certainly not this small hospital room. This isn't her. He's fucking hallucinating, imagining the same shit he always does when he's two bottles deep in whatever alcohol he can get his hands on: her voice, wavering slightly as she said that she won't remember him in five years. Her eyes, filled with pain as she stared back at him from within the arms of another man. Her lips, curled up in a sad smile as she told Samuel that she was leaving. Her face. Her, her, her.

But Samuel blinks a few times and nothing changes. He stares and nothing changes.

Carla isn't wearing any makeup, her hair is pulled back, and she's dressed more simply than he remembers ever seeing her. There's a long coat over her body meant to serve as a blanket, but it's sliding down because the arm she has outstretched towards him has dislodged it, and now he stares at their interlocked hands. She looks real. She feels real.