Toddlers Until Teenagers

Chapter 42

I'm greeted by the smell of medicine and a really awful smell of blood hitting me hard, knocking the breath out of my lungs for a split second. The door closes, I don't know who does it, though, but I know someone is behind me. I look at the tiny white bed, with the sheets covering a pale body. I'm too far to see the face, but the structure regards me of Alex.

An Asian nurse is working quickly through some cabinets at the edge of the room, near the closed curtains of the small window. There are two blue plastic chairs but they are pushed against the wall, and there is a lot and lot of machinery collected beside and around the bed like a force field. I edge my way through that force field, finding a gap in which I can squeeze and suddenly, I'm trapped. And I'm up so close to Alex than I've ever been before in this past, well, month I could say.

"Alex." I breathe, looking at the face. Closed eye lids. One purple, one normal. Even eyelashes and eyebrows, with full and even lips with a bandaid running down the corner of his mouth, and his nose is somehow caked with dried blood, and somehow smashed inwards a bit. There's no space for skin, except for that one eyelid. The rest is gashes or bruises. Gasping, I look away.

"Alex, I'm here. I'm sorry I couldn't come earlier. But this is the only time I can meet you, then it's goodbye. They're shipping me off to a nearby mental building, because they think I'm disturbed and I should be treated there for calling a very well nurse a slut. She was a slut. Stupid. Anyway, I've missed you so much and...god. Please, Alex, come back," and suddenly there's no room for words in my mouth because I'm sobbing, full on sobbing, as tears leak out of my eyes and drop into his pillow, and I wipe them quickly, but more replace them.

"Please." I realize I'm talking to a nearly dead person.

"You know, everything we've been through, I would never betray you. And I know you might be able to hear me, so I'm gonna make you hear me out. I didn't do it with Ben. He drugged me, but made it seem like it was all that I wanted. I'm not a slut, and Alex, I love you. I'm purely in love with you..your presence, it's just so warming. So comforting and as if life is right. So please, make my life right. It's okay if you don't forgive me for leaving you to suffer. And im sorry for coming into your life, and I'm sorry about Dina, and I'm sorry about my parents and your father, and I'm sorry about Ben being a total arse. I'm so sorry. I wish we could have had a normal life. This is all just a big mistake. This isn't supposed to be happening. We're so young." I wipe my tears.

"I just want you to come home. I love you." A teardrop falls into his face and possibly mouth, as I lean down, and kiss him right on his mouth, tracing his lips and eyes and nose. Everything I've missed.

"You know, all we ever wanted was to love each other. That's all I wanted in life. And, look where it brought us. I never knew loving somebody could be so hard. Our love story, Alex, will remain. I love you. I love you so much." I close my eyes, and rest my face on his shoulder, ever so gently. I hear tiny sniffles in the back, guessing it's Fiona.

"They're sending me away, to a mental hospital. I slapped a slut of a nurse." I laugh, wiping my tears. "She deserves it. They think I'm mental. So..I guess this is goodbye." I sigh, turning toward the doorway, giving him one last squeeze on the hand.

Just then, as my hand is slipping away from his, a faint motion happens. His fingers link through mine, and, ever so slightly, he squeezes back. I start to scream, and Fiona rushes beside me through the machinery. So do Josh and Ethan, and the nurse does too. "I felt him squeeze back! Oh, God! Alex!" I lightly shake him, but his eyes remain closed.

"He can hear you, but, I'm afraid you were hallucinating. He hasn't been gaining progress and he cannot simply just squeeze your hand back, child. I think you should be going now." The nurse informs me, and Fiona bites her lip.