I hold the
two bandage rolls in front of me. “B-blue or red?” The red is actually more
pink and I know what the little boy will chose before he does but I want him to
feel like something is in his control and also hope it will make him stop
crying.
It works
and the boy sniffles, presses a sleeve to his running nose and points to the
blue roll.
“Good
c-c-color.” I grin at the mother hovering over us, her eyes still wide and
scared, hoping to alleviate her worries. Before I have cleaned the wound some
it looked worse than it actually was and a quick scan has shown that the bone
was not impacted. It will also need no stitches. But although this is not a
real emergency, we never turn anyone away from the Children’s ER.
“So… you
are a s-soccer player, huh?” I ask as I slowly unscrew a small medicine bottle.
The boy
nods.
“Which
position?”
“Midfield,”
the boy mumbles behind his sleeve.
I carefully
turn the bottle upside-down, pressing a clean cotton wad against the opening.
“And who is your most favorite s-soccer player?”
The boy
removes his sleeve, looks at me with big wet eyes and actually starts smiling.
“Iniesta.”
“Oh… g-good
choice.”
“Who’s
yours?”
“Uhm…” I
know my fair share of soccer by now since it is the most important conversation
topic with my male clients. “Zidane.”
“But he’s
not playing anymore!” The boy exclaims, slightly outraged as if I have cheated
him.
“I-I know…
but he w-was good.” I smile down at the boy’s knee. The wound is perfectly
clean now and disinfected without him so much as noticing the sharp sting while
he was immersed in our conversation.
“Do you
play soccer?”
I am
momentarily thrown by the question and I can hear the mother shifting
uncomfortably behind me, probably about to call her child off. “No…” I quickly
say, matter-of-factly. “But I like watching from time to time.”
I look up
at the nurse standing in the background and hand her the blue roll, propelling
myself back to give her space. My manual dexterity does not qualify me to apply
bandages but it is also not necessary. Talking is the thing I mostly do,
nowadays, and probably no one is more surprised about that than I am. I talk to
patients and their guardians, calming and reassuring, to the nurses, giving
instructions and sharing observations, sometimes lowly muttered under my breath
to not worry the parents, sometimes quick words yelled across the room before a
bed is hurried away to a scan or an emergency operation. In those situation no
one cares how I sound and as long as I get out the words that need to be said
neither do I. Until this day I never got stuck completely when a small life was
at stake, I seem to reserve this for ordering food at the restaurant.
Children
apparently do to not mind my stutter and the adults are mostly too panicked and
scared in the moments after they arrive with their sick offspring that they do
not question my expertise as a doctor as long as I am wearing a white coat and
a name tag. Which does not mean that I do not get the occasional stare, later.
Especially when I am in my chair parents seem to do a double-take, trying to
figure out if I am a patient who disguises himself as a doctor or a doctor who
is taking a rest in a wheelchair that was conveniently nearby. Only I am not. I
am a doctor in training and I invested part of my first months’ income in a new
wheelchair, one that actually fits me and that is not a literal pain in the ass
but a real improvement of my situation. I am pretty sure I would not survive
the hasty walks up and down long hospital corridors all day otherwise, from the
waiting room to the examination room, from the ER patient’s room to the MRI or
other scanning rooms on other floors and back again, for ten or twelve or
fourteen hours a day. The wheelchair allows me to do my job quicker, longer and
in much less pain, plus, it leaves my hands free, free to shake parent’s hands,
to lift blood-stained clothes or carefully bend small joints in a first
examination still in the waiting room to determine the urgency of a case.
“When can I
play soccer again?” The small boy asks eagerly, inspecting his wrapped up knee.
“I w-would
wait until next week. But when you feel good by then, you c-can give it a try.
Keep it slow at the beginning.” I look at the mother at that.
The boy
grins happily, jumps down from the inspection table, making all the adults
wince and storms out of the room.
“Sorry,”
the mother says, clutching her bag and getting ready to leave, too. She is
quite attractive I notice, long blond hair, long neck and a beautiful face now
that she is smiling. “You know how they are, children… He’s a little impulsive
and does not always know what… I mean-“
“Don’t
w-worry,” I say. I draw my prescription pad from the chest pocket of my coat
and write something on it on my knees. “This is a prescription for pain
k-killers. Very low dose. If he is in pain tonight, and he might well be with
his knee still s-swelling, give him one of these. They can be dis-dissolved in
water, so he does not need to s-swallow a pill.” I try not to think about the
number of pills I took already when I was a boy his age. “In the meantime, try
c-cooling it, if he lets you.”
The woman
smiles at me and takes the piece of paper from my outstretched hand. “Thank
you, Doctor… Parker.”
“You’re
welcome,” I say and I wheel ahead of her to the door, swinging it open for her,
spinning the wheelchair around in the process to face her again. “Children can
be a h-handful, I guess.”
The woman
sighs and gives me that relieved look that I often get when I say that. “Whom
are you telling this? Since my ex and I got divorced my son has grown into a
whirlwind. Sometimes I simply don’t know how to handle him anymore.” She
blushes after the confession and grips her bag tighter, her lips pressed onto
each other.
I fish in
the other chest pocket and offer her one of my business cards with my office
room and emergency mobile number. “If you n-need someone to talk to or to
direct you to someone professional, please don’t h-hesitate calling me, Ms.
Martin.”
She takes
the card with a smile. “Call me Violet.”
“Violet…”
She steps
through the door, calling after her son who has already charged down the
corridor. “I’m sorry, I need to go after him, I’m afraid,” she says, blushing
again.
I block the
door with a wheel and offer her a handshake. “Good luck, Violet.”
“Thank you
again, Doctor Parker. You’ve been a great help.”
“I’m
h-happy I could be of service.”
“Goodbye.”
“Bye.”
I listen
from behind the closed door to her telling her son to behave at least until
they have left the hospital, smiling to myself.
My life has
turned out well in the last months. I graduated with better grades than I had
hoped for, I got the position here at the hospital that I had dreamed of and it
turned out that I am good at what I am doing. I like being a doctor, I love my
little patients and I might be fooling myself but I think that they like me,
too. Earning my own money has improved my life a hundred fold, it certainly did
wonders on my credit status. I did not only buy the new wheelchair but also a
more reliable car with hand controls that are better suited to me and rented a
new apartment, with a continually working elevator and actual accessibility,
with real grab bars, wide door frames and lowered cabinets. I have great
co-workers and although I do not go out often anymore since working takes up
most of my time, I have had the one or other promising date. Nothing has worked
out in the long run so far but I am definitely hopeful.
I took
Rachel's painting with me to my new apartment. It stood for some time in the
hallway, facing the wall, before I had the heart to let it be mounted on the
wall in my bedroom. I often stare at it, thinking of her.
From my
father I know that Rachel got sentenced with failure to provide assistance and
some minor accusations like trespassing. The sentence is only a few weeks and
most of it is on probation. The video tape that she had taken from the assault
by hacking into the guard's computer using my laptop while he was on patrol had
relieved her from the accusation of attempted murder and a medical assessment
of her mental illness had rid her of most of the responsibility for what had
happened. However, I also know that she was sentenced to several months in a
secure psychiatric unit after prison, with a possible extension depending on
her development.
My father
and I are on speaking terms again, something we have not been for years, more
precisely since I confessed I wanted to become a doctor and he told me how
ridiculous he thought that was. We have been working on having a proper
father-son relationship since I asked him for help with Rachel. I still
remember the scene, after I had been at Victoria's, too late to do anything
else than call an ambulance that I knew would do nothing else than officially
determine her death, after I had called Karl and heard what Rachel was accused
of and then had driven the four hours to my parent's house, in the morning of
this long night, feeling more dead than alive myself. I had stood in the middle
of my parents' living room, trying desperately not to collapse but at the same
time refusing my mother's repeated pleads to sit down because I did not think I
could ask my father for help in any other way than facing him directly.
After I had
told them everything, my father had remained silent, his face unreadable like
always. He has the perfect face for a lawyer, I do not think I have ever seen
any emotion coming from him. Then he had nodded and said: “Of course, son”. My
mother had burst into tears.
My father
showed up at my graduation ceremony, hugged me carefully not to disturb my
precarious balance and told me how proud he was. We speak once a week over the
phone. I am still mostly shit at phone conversations and sometimes I suspect
that this is the reason why we are doing it, because we both know how much it
takes of us, me speaking on the phone, him listening to me stammering forever
on the simplest words. We are punishing ourselves for our failure at sustaining
a real connection but it is all we can achieve in the moment.
“Doctor
Parker?”
I turn the
wheelchair to the nurse who is standing behind me. “Yes?”
“There are
no new patients in the moment...” she looks at me apologetically.
“Oh...” I
have been deep in thoughts for quite some time I guess, staring at the closed
door of the examination room. “Um... you c-can take a break, then, Sarah. I...
um... yes...”
She looks
at me worried but then she smiles shyly and leaves. I sigh, keep sitting for a
few moments before I wheel to the computer and start typing in the few
information about the latest patient when there is a knock on the door.
“It's okay,
Sarah, I already t-took c-care of document-”
“Hi.”
I slowly
turn the wheels, propelling the wheelchair around to face the door.
She has cut
her hair and it is back to blond, fluttering around her head like bird
feathers. She wears a tank top, denim shorts and heavy boots. No make-up.
“R...
Rachel?” I swallow against the tightness in my chest.
She does
not move. “Can I come in?”
I shrug.
“S-sure.”
She steps
in the examination room, closes the door and drops the huge backpack on the
floor next to it. For a few surreal seconds I imagine she ran away from the
secure ward and is hoping to get shelter in the hospital, with me.
“W-w-w...”
“What I am
doing here?” she asks, hopping onto the new clean paper sheet on the
examination table, her boots swinging under it. “Saying goodbye. Today was my
last day in the nuthouse.”
I wince but
she laughs. “Hey, it wasn't that bad, altogether. Crazy nice people in there.”
I groan and
roll my eyes. Nothing has changed with her.
And everything
has.
“Yeah, you
should have visited me.”
I stare at
her.
“I'm just
kidding. They don't allow that, of course. Which you know, I guess, because you
tried visiting.”
“I...”
Shit. I wrap my hands around the push rims, trying to figure out her state of
mind.
“Listen,
Noel, don’t worry. I won’t stay long. I know you do not want to be seen with a
crazy person like me, and a nearly-convicted murderer at that.”
“T-that's
not true.” I manage to say, finally. “O-okay, at first... W-w-when I thought
you had wanted to murder that guy...”
Her eyes
widen before she turns them down.
I wheel
closer, stopping directly in front of her, touching her knees with my fingertips.
“I shouldn’t h-have... I-I’m so sorry for w-what that swine did to you, Rachel.”
Rachel
nods.
“I-I am.” I
repeat, trudging through the stammer. “And I u-understand w-why you had to do
w-what you did.”
“You left
me,” Rachel whispers, not looking up.
I inhale
slowly. I could explain to her how difficult it was, not being a family member
or in any way connected professionally, to meet her during the trial or
afterward. But I know what she really means.
“I d-don't
know why I... I... Ra-Rachel, I was confused, s-so confused. One d-day you were
gone and then b-back again and I let you in and it was w-wonderful and then...”
I stare at her, willing her to understand why I had drawn away, why I had
needed to get space between us, to prevent getting burned in her flames.
Rachel says
nothing.
“P-please...
It was... I realized I d-d-don't know y-you at all and thought that I h-had
been so stupid.”
I still
know how it had felt believing she had murdered him. The problem was not the
thought she might have ended another life. The problem was that I actually believed she could. If only for a second.
“Stupid for
letting a murderer into your apartment?” She says, her voice dead.
“S-stupid
for letting her into my heart,” I say, pulling my hands away as my fingers
start to spasm.
There are a
few moments of silence.
“I-I'm so
sorry for what happened to you. I really am.”
I am sorry
for what happened to us.
Rachel
exhales slowly and lifts her head. “Karl said you asked about me.”
“A-all the
time.” I smile, folding my trembling fingers in my lap. Karl and my father had
been the only source of information about Rachel, during the trial, during her
sentence and during her stay in the psychiatric hospital. Karl had tried getting
me cleared for visits but internally I had been glad when he never managed. Apart
from not knowing if I would survive meeting Rachel emotionally, I had seen the
look in her face at the funeral. The pain, the accusation, the pity… as she had
steadied me in the snow.
“R-Rachel...
I'm s-s-so sorry I c-came too late.”
Rachel
sighs. “I know,” she says, and she reaches down and firmly takes my quivering
hands in hers, her thumb tracing circles on my knuckles. “I’m sorry, I know. It
was not your fault.”
I exhale a
shuddering breath, suddenly realizing that what had really and most of all kept
me from visiting her, from going back to her even in my thoughts and forming
the idea of starting to get to know her again, was guilt. A festering,
sickening doubt that if I had driven faster, if I had been able to talk to
Rachel on the phone, if I had done anything, everything, differently, Victoria
would still be alive. I know that this is an illusion, that nothing I could
have done would have changed anything, but although I kept telling that to
myself I could never shake off the thought.
“I-It was
not y-yours either,” I whisper, closing my fingers around hers, squeezing
lightly.
“So they
say, yes,” Rachel exhales slowly. “She died in her sleep. Just like that.”
I nod,
swallowing against the sudden constriction in my throat, looking at my hands in
her slender ones. “I d-don't know w-why I ever thought you c-c-could k-kill
someone.”
Sitting in
front of her, her hands steadying mine, the last traces of doubt that had
plagued me are gone and I can see clearly... Rachel would never hurt anyone.
Not willingly.
Rachel
chuckles and lets go of my hands to play around with a few leather bands on her
left wrist. “It's okay. You were not the only one and I guess I cannot blame
anyone who thought the crazy bitch had finally lost it completely.”
I wince
again.
“So yeah...
thanks for helping me out, nonetheless. Your father is a scary lawyer.”
At that I
chuckle. “T-tell me s-something new.”
“Is he like
that at home, too?”
“P-pretty
much, yeah.”
“Oh god, no
wonder you turned out that way.”
I glare at
her. “W-what's that s-supposed to mean?”
She only
laughs.
“So...” I
nod towards the backpack. “W-where are you going?”
“Places,”
she says, scoots to the side and hops off the table. She retrieves a battered
photo from the top compartment of the backpack and offers it to me.
I hold it
in my hands and study it. “What is that?”
“More
importantly: where? Victoria got it a few years ago. Turn it around.”
I turn the
photo, my hands trembling still. The other side is blank, except for a post
stamp and a single letter: R. “Re-Reagan?”
“Maybe,”
Rachel says. She takes the photo from me again, turning it around. “The post
stamp is from France, the mountains probably the Pyrenees. Do you see this?”
She points at a spot in the distance of the photo. “Could be a building.”
I take a
closer look. “A c-castle?”
“Something
like that. Karl thinks it's a monastery.”
“Oh... So
y-you are going there?”
Rachel
nods. “I sold the house and I am going to search Reagan.”
This is
when it hits me. “F-for… for how long?”
“As long as
it takes.”
I grab the
hand rims, trying to keep myself from veering off because the room is spinning.
It takes me several minutes until I find the courage to ask. “W-will you c-come
back?”
“Maybe.”
“P-promise.”
She looks
at me strangely and goes to store the photo again, carefully handling the frail
piece of memory. I catch her hand as she returns, pull her towards me before
she can step away. Roughly.
“Promise!”
“Noel...”
She sits down in my lap, light as a bird, and her cool hands encircle my face,
her fingertips pressing lightly into my temples. She kisses me, tenderly, her
soft lips taste of smoke and cinnamon.
“Please...”
I beg, holding her around the hips as she strips off her clothes, her top
falling to the floor in a small black heap. Her breasts are still those perfect
wonders, her skin smells of rain.
“R-Rachel...”
She presses
my hands to her breasts, holding my shivering fingers in place, my callused
skin on her soft, pristine white one, and kisses me again, deeper this time,
her tongue slipping between my teeth.
The knot in
my chest grows, a deep ache filling me until I can barely breathe.
“Rachel...”
Before I know it I am crying, the tears falling from my eyes unstoppable and I
sob embarrassingly loud, my head falling forward on her chest, and I cannot
seem to stop anymore, my body heaving with the anguish flowing from it. I have
tried shutting my feelings away, I have tried leaving her behind, living with
the fact that nothing will ever be the same. Now, I realize what a mistake I
have made, and that I will never be able to repair it and I cannot hold back anymore.
“I-I'm
sorry, Rachel, I'm so sorry.”
She hugs
me, her arms tight around me until I have gained some control at last and
pushes back, unbuttons her pants and steps out of them and her slip, standing
naked in front of me.
“Please...”
I am shivering uncontrollable at this point, all my muscles do not seem to
belong to me anymore. “D-Don’t go. Please…”
“Come,” she
says, her voice calm.
She takes a
step forward, bends down and strips the white coat off me. I wear a plain white
T-shirt underneath and it comes off as well. She kisses along my chest, her hot
breath tickling on my skin. I suck in my breath and try to stifle the tears
that want to well up again, my face hot.
“Come,” she
says again, leading my arms over her shoulder and heaving me up, efficiently as
a nurse, and I take the few staggering steps to the examination table leaning
on her, all fear of falling gone although I barely feel my feet, I am numb all
over, a puppet without will or if so, then only one, a single wish. Stay.
Rachel
guides me to lie down and lifts my legs up before she slowly removes my white
shoes, white pants and the braces underneath. I wince as she rolls the long
socks down and her fingertips follow the lines of scars along my legs, but then
I force myself to breathe through my nose. Rachel knows. I can see her
countless scars from where I am lying, my head supported by the
height-adjustable head portion of the table. She knows and she does not mind.
The thought is so overwhelming I have to fight against tears again.
She climbs
over me, frees my straining cock and throws my shorts on the floor to my other
clothes. She smiles as her fingers gently close around me. “You are beautiful,
Noel.” Before I can answer, my chest expanding on yet unknown words, she has
scooted down and taken me in her mouth, and I moan surprised and because the
moist, the heat, her lips sealed tight around me and her tongue flicking against
the head nearly makes me lose my mind.
“Ra-Rachel!”
She does
not stop, her head starting to bob up and down in a tormenting slow rhythm, and
I fight against the overwhelming urge to grab her head or to buck up into the
beautiful heat because I do not trust myself to be gentle anymore, my muscles
stiff and uncontrollable and my movements jerky. My legs start to spasm, the
left ankle crossing over my right, and I gasp from the pain until she gently
places a hand on my knee, somehow making it better, never stopping the
delicious torture she inflicts upon my cock.
For a
second I think that anyone could come in on us at any moment, the door is not
locked and I am not even the only doctor using this room. But I decide I do not
care at all when Rachel picks up her speed and I yelp, my hands forming fists
at my side, convulsing into the white paper sheet covering the table and my
orgasm in plain sight already.
The moment
only lasts for short because when I think I cannot withhold any longer she
pulls off, grinning at me madly and then kisses her way up to me.
I suck air
into my lungs, trembling with desire. “Ra- Ra- Ra-...”
“What?” she asks, and I cannot believe she
mocks my inability to say her name and I cannot believe I am so happy about
that. I will my fists to unclench and place my hands on her sides, the right
shivering over the rose tattoo the meaning of which I never dared to ask but
always suspected, and slowly, carefully slide them up, following the gentle
curve of her hip, in and out, admiring her perfect body, towards her breasts,
trembling thumbs caressing the hardening nipples, her heartbeat fluttering
under my fingertips.
“C-come
c-c-closer,” I beg, the back of my head bumping against the headrest with every
repeated consonant and she does, her breath ragged like mine.
She gasps
as my tongue meets the first nipple, slowly slides around the hard nub,
flickering over it, until I gently bite into it, only a little, and she moans,
high-pitched and surprised. I change sides and slide a hand between her legs at
the same time, feel the moist, the warmth as my fingers tremble over it with
the tremor inside them, and enter her with two, carefully stroking her insides,
causing her closed eyes to fly open.
“Fuck!”
I grin at
her, increasing the speed as much as I dare, trying not to overwork my muscles
and provoke more severe spasms. It seems to be enough because she squirms on
top of me, tiny moans falling from her lips, her hips gyrating down onto my
fingers, meeting them, following my rhythm.
“Noel,
shit, Noel!”
“Promise,”
I insist, cupping one of her breast with the other hand, clenching my teeth in
an attempt to stay gentle. “Promise you'll c-come back, Rachel.”
Rachel
hisses, then grabs both of my hands, pins them down next to my shoulders and
pierces me with dark eyes. “Noel...”
“P-please...
I'm sorry.”
She shakes
her head, mute.
“Rachel...”
“I’m sorry, Noel” She releases me.
I press my
trembling hands over my closed eyes, seeking to compose myself. I try turning
towards her but my legs are still locked. “L-let me c-come with you, then.”
She smiles,
her fingers trailing over my arm and I shudder from the small contact alone,
the muscles in my trunk and thigh taking it as cue to go into another round of
spasms, causing my rigid legs to lift off the table for a few seconds.
“Okay.”
“W-what?” I
gasp through clenched teeth, trembling.
“Okay. If
you really want to. Come with me.”
Despite the
pain I nearly laugh at that. This is so ridiculous, she cannot actually want to
take someone like me on a freaking hiking trip through the Pyrenees. She is out
of her mind. Well... more than usually.
“I mean
it.”
I shake my
head. “I c-can't.”
“I think
you can.”
“No...
w-what I mean is... I... My place is here, Rachel. I am needed here.”
And it is the truth. I want to stay here, work with the children, more than
anything. “I can... come visit you.”
“Yeah...”
She lies down next to me, molding her hot body against my stiff and hurting
one, the warmth of her loosening my muscles, the pain seeping out of it with
every beat of her heart against mine.
“You know I
cannot promise you to come back. But I'll try. Okay, Noel? I'll try.”
Slowly, I
nod. In a way I have always known that my time with Rachel would be limited.
From the first seconds on, when I had seen her dancing, her naked feet moving
over the dirty floor in a strange trance-like pattern, I had known that she
would step out of my life as suddenly and abruptly as she had stepped in.
However, I had never thought it would hurt so much and I had never imagined she
could have such an impact on me, leave traces that are deeper trenches than the
scars on my skin.
I take her
arm and sling it around me, imagine for a second she might never leave, we
might stay like this, wrapped around each other forever, until my muscles have
gone lose and normal and my body free of pain, and for a moment I feel
universal happiness.
“I visited
him.”
“Who?”
“The
guard.”
I relax my
arms around her as she gasps, only noticing then that I have pressed her
against me.
“I told him
that I am sorry.”
“Did he…
did he s-say anything?”
Rachel
makes a strange sound. “Noel, he probably won’t say anything ever again.”
I knew that
but somehow I had hoped it would be different, and dreaded it at the same time.
Picturing that monster in a power wheelchair so different from mine, hooked up
to machines and his eyes void, as far away from hurting anyone ever again as
possible has been the only comfort to me in the darkest hours. I shiver now,
thinking back to it and wonder how Rachel feels about it.
“I’m sorry,
Ra-Rachel… for e-everything.”
“I know. I
am too.”
She says
nothing for a while and when I think she fell asleep, then “Noel?”
“Mmm?”
“Can you do
me a favor?”
“Y-yes.”
“Fuck me.”
And this is
what we do.
As she
orgasms on top of me, her eyes locked with mine, screaming (later I spread the
story of a mother losing it when I have to tell her that the stomachache of her
fourteen year old daughter is caused by pregnancy) I try to store the moment
away in a place of my mind that I can visit later, and hope I will never forget.
We clothe
each other gently, taking our time, she watches as I struggle with grasping the
tiny zipper on her pants but does not make a move to help me and I am grateful
for that, then we kiss and I inhale the scent of her hair with my eyes squeezed
shut, trying to memorize it, the feeling of her lips on mine, her warm body in
my lap, to remember it forever, until she wriggles out of my arms and
straightens.
“Goodbye,
Noel.”
She heaves
the backpack onto her small frame and turns around one last time to me sitting
in the wheelchair, motionless, before she vanishes, the door falling shut
behind her as it does behind all the other patients. Only she has never been just
a patient, she has been special from the very beginning.
“Bye,
Rachel,” I whisper to myself, staring at the white door, willing it to open
again, her telling me she decided otherwise. But it does not happen.
It will
never happen.
Years later
I still sometimes sit in front of that same closed door and think about her. I
never got to know what happened to her, although I stayed in touch with Karl
and Helen, but they know as much as I do. I do not know if Rachel found Reagan.
I do not even know if she ever set foot in Spain. I like to think she lives,
happily, somewhere, surrounded by people who love her like I did.
The years
have taught me to be grateful for the moments I shared with Rachel. It was only
a brief time that I have known her, but it left me with an endless stream of
memories. They still come up sometimes, unexpected, the pain dulled over the
months and years but still to be felt, the joy bittersweet. Someone rolling a
cigarette like she did, fingers moving determined, nimble, submerged in a task
like only she could. A remark as sudden, honest and direct, and so precious, as
they used to come from her. Her laughter and her sadness, a dam breaking and
sweeping everything away. Her eyes on mine, the trust in my ability to reach
out and pull her out of the foaming waters, when I did not believe I could stay
afloat myself.
I never met
anyone quite like her, but I had not expected to. Somehow I knew that meeting
someone like Rachel is a chance only given once in a lifetime, and it will either leave you shattered on the shores, or rising so much stronger. In the minutes
after she had left I very much felt like breaking, the hollowness and pain she
had left behind unbearable, the wound open and fresh and tearing me apart. I
did not think of what was still left of her, in me and everyone she had met, of
what I had learned of her and with her, about me. I only thought of what I had
lost.
A few hours
later, when I fished for a pen in one of my coat's pockets my fingers brushed
against something smooth and cool and when I pulled out my hand a small stone
was sitting in my palm, black, with a white streak across it.
“That's a
nice stone,” the slim girl with the violent rash over half of her face said,
stepping closer boldly until she knocked into my knees.
“Yes...” I
mumbled.
“Can I have
it?”
“Nope, I'm
s-sorry.” I ruffled up her hair, smiling. “It's mine,” I said, and I placed it
back into the pocket, close to my heart.
I was so happy to read such a long chapter. But then I was so sad to see it was the end :-(
ReplyDeleteI love your writing, your characters, your stories.... I hope you will have another story to share.
Thanks for staying until the end, chandelier! Means a lot :) I have thousands of ideas... and not enough time at all. But I'm doing my best and I just love writing too much to ever give it up, I think.
DeletePlease let there be a bonus chapter
ReplyDeleteSorry! I'm afraid this story really said everything it had to say. Don't worry, there will be other stories in the future.
DeleteOh wow, already the end, that was unexpected... But this chapter was really wonderful and somehow it makes sense as well. Thank you so much for your great and mature story and I really hope to hear from you again soon. Take care!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much! I'm glad it makes sense. I often have multiple possible endpoints for a story, and different outcomes. Not for this one, though. It always ended at this point and in earlier versions it was only slightly less happy (this IS a happy ending, even if it might not totally look like one ;-)). Thanks, you too!
DeleteOh, that was so very great. Sorry to see it end though. Love your writing.
ReplyDeleteThanks, blueskye. Thanks for sticking with it until the end, as well, and thanks for your comments! I've always been looking forward to them :)
DeleteOh, this was the last chapter, wasn't it? It came somewhat unexpected... Creating such a wonderful setting to this story would have enabled so many different twists and turns which are now left to our imagination... Of course, I'm sad that the story ended but I also respect the writer's choice to keep it short and compact. :)
ReplyDeleteI don't dream about an epilogue but I would die to read Noel's version of their first meeting in "Blue"! :)
The beginning of the chapter was so sweet that I was totally blown away! You created such a perfect future for Noel as a doctor in children's ER! This was really the place where his caring and compassionate nature could shine! The interaction with the small boy was precious!
It was also kind of you to give Noel and Rachel a farewell.
The part where Noel repeatedly apologised to Rachel made me feel bad for Noel because despite his moment of doubt, he still helped Rachel out. Also, I would have expected more gratitude from Rachel but I can't hold it against her given her possible mental health problems.
Okay, I do understand that she had another way of expressing her gratitude and from Noel's point of view, this was probably the best way anyway! ;)
I truly hope that you have more stories in store to be shared with us! :) Just love your writing!
Thanks and all the best to you!
Wooow! Thank you for the amazing comment! Totally made my day :) It is sooo very important to get feedback of this kind because it is hard to tell what people think about a story in detail. And I cannot even sweet bribe my audience to talk to me here, which is what I usually do :D I'm super glad when readers like it but I am even more happy when they tell me why and also what they struggle with.
DeleteYes, the story was short but I never intended it to be a long one. Haha, yes, Noel's version of Blue... maybe when I am in the mood I will indeed write it. Also, I am super open to hand the story over to someone else because there sure is potential for an extension. If you can think of a sequel, please feel free to write one, I would certainly love to read it.
Thank you, thank you, thank you for all the kind words! Someone goes to bed happy tonight. All the best to you, too!
I love this story so much! Thanks for writing!
ReplyDeleteThanks, ano!
DeleteGood ending. Loved it.
ReplyDeleteThanks so much, ano!
Delete