In the afternoon, I hear the worst thing of my life.
Well, okay, not the worst. Because the worst would be if the thing I heard came to pass.
I’m in the TV room, reading the climax of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, where they do a wizard version of prison break and fly up to a tower window. I overhear a couple of nurses mentioning something about Simon and my ears perk up.
“…I’ll let him know, yeah. I think he’s leaving for the day. Josie said they were gonna grab dinner together,” says the first nurse.
“Oh! Is it happening? The date?” the second nurse asks with a twinkle in her eyes.
The first nurse shakes her head, handing her a bunch of files. “Maybe. Who knows? I can’t wait to ask Josie all about it.”
They both laugh as I slowly lose all will to laugh. Ever.
I sit in my plastic chair, deaf and blind, as if I suffered an explosion. I’m not sure if I’m even breathing. But I’m definitely feeling. I’m feeling like I’m going to die. I want to die.
Actually, no.
I don’t want to die. I want to live.
Yes, I want to live. I want to live because…
Because if I don’t live, then I can’t stop this. I can’t stop them from going on a date. And I need to stop it. I have to.
I spring up, my already-abused-to-the-maximum book falling on the floor in two pieces. I wonder if it’s an omen. My book finally cracking in two, right in the middle. With surprisingly steady legs that bend down smoothly, I retrieve the book.
There’s no trembling or shaking or any nervous twitch in my body. It’s sure. It’s completely, absolutely sure and determined to stop this. I can’t help but wonder if I’m in a trance. If I’m drugged, or under hypnosis. Or maybe this is a different kind of insanity. A more rational kind.
I’m almost blind to the happenings of the hospital as I walk down the hallway, toward Simon’s office. I know people brush past me. I know they are talking. They are working. But I can’t see them. My mind’s on one thing: the man at the end of the hallway.
The hallway that’s not freely accessible to me, a patient. Although, I don’t seem to remember this until I’m stopped by a nurse. I tell her I need to see Dr. Blackwood but she says she can help me with whatever I need.
“I just… I need to see him. You can’t help me with it,” I tell her because that’s the truth. She can’t help me.
She goes to say something but the man I’ve been looking for comes out of his office – Thank God – and I call out his name to get his attention.
When he focuses on me, I take a deep breath and ask him, “C-Can I please talk to you? In your office?”
He frowns but nods. “Sure.” To the nurse, “I’ve got this.”
I don’t know what it is but every time he says, I’ve got this, something happens to me. Something tingly and warm and all I want to do is wrap myself around his strong, capable body and tuck my face in his neck and never let go.
We walk to his office and he opens the door, gesturing me to get in.
This is the room I never wanted to enter willingly. But now, all I can think about is being here. With him. Smelling his rainy scent and finding ways to touch his hot skin.
I turn around to face him.
He’s watching me, studying me, taking me in. “Are you still experiencing nausea?”
I wasn’t expecting him to ask that. I didn’t even know he knew that. Everyone’s been dismissing my ailment as imaginary, so I didn’t know if they’d chart it. “No. Not today. Did… did you ask them to give me… saltines?”
“I asked them to give you something to calm your stomach, yes.”
There’s such a rush of emotions inside me, inside my chest, my belly that I have to take a moment to calm myself.
He saved me from this too, didn’t he?
“Is there something I can do for you?” he asks, when I don’t say anything for a few moments.
So formal. So authoritative. So fucking sexy.
“Yes.”
“And what is that?” He crosses his arms across his chest, waiting patiently and impatiently at the same time.
“You… I… I haven’t seen you in days.”
“Excuse me?”
I shake my head. “I-I mean, I wanted to thank you. For, uh, you know, talking to me the other day. Helping me. Thanks for everything.”
Oh God, what am I saying?
Although, it’s the truth. These past few days have been hard, but his words have kept me going. And saltines.
“I was doing my job,” he tells me.
Job.
Yeah.
I know. I know he was doing his job.
But the thing is… I think that I could be his dream come true.
I mean, maybe. If he’ll let me.
He’s the fixer, isn’t he? He likes to fix things. Broken houses. Broken minds. And I’m broken. In the best of ways and the worst of ways.
So this doesn’t have to be his job. I don’t have to be his job. I could be more to him. Like he’s more to me.
“I want you to fix it,” I say.
“Fix what?”
“M-my book.”
What?
I didn’t mean to say that. I meant to say me. Fix me. Or rather he can fix me, if he wants to. I can be his willing patient, his playground, his experiment. He can analyze me, feed me meds, dope me up with drugs, whatever. I can be whatever he wants me to be.
“What?” he repeats my thought out loud.
I look down at the book in my hands, which has been broken in two. “Yeah. I mean, I dropped it again and well, it kind of tore in two. Right in the middle. S-so I want you to fix it.”
“Right now?”
Damn it.
This is going completely wrong. But I don’t know how to backtrack from here. Like, how do I tell him that I want him. That I’m here for him.
How does one do that?
“I…” I lick my lips, feeling the first stirrings of unrest. “You know what, yes. It’s, uh, it’s important.”
A frown forms between his brows as he scans my face. I bet he’s trying to figure out what I really want. And he’ll do it too because apparently I can’t hide anything from him.
“From what I understand,” he begins, his arms still crossed. “You came to me because your book tore in half and you want me to fix it. Right now.”
It sounds insane; I know it. I know he thinks it too. It’s in the way he’s looking at me. His expression as always is almost blank, but his eyes are so focused, so intense and so on me, that a shiver rolls down my spine. My very sweaty spine.
Actually, I’m sweating all over. Drops of sweat move down my body like rain, and I’m both heated and chilled.
“Yes. Because that’s what you said to me. In the hallway? When we first met? You said to me that I should fix my book. So here I am. I want you to fix my book. I’m only listening to you.”
“As far as I remember, you weren’t very receptive to it when I said that.”
My first urge is to lie but I don’t want to lie. Not to him. Not after everything. “How do you know that?”
He uncrosses his arms and thrusts his hands in his pockets. “You purse the left side of your mouth when you don’t like something.”
“I-I do?”
He doesn’t say anything. Neither does he acknowledge my statement. He simply clenches his jaw slightly.
“I didn’t know that. I didn’t know that… you noticed. I –”
“I noticed because it’s my job,” he says again, like he’s informing me.
Is it me or did he really emphasize the word job?
“Or you noticed because…” I take in a deep breath and jump. “You noticed me.”
This time his clench is longer, harder. The slant of his jaw comes alive with it. “Willow, there’s a thing called patience. And I’m running out of it. Very quickly. I’m giving you one last chance to tell me exactly what you’re doing here, all right? Here goes.” His calm voice belies the force of his words. “What the fuck are you doing here?”
“Don’t go.”
There. I said it. The truth.
My heart’s pounding. In fact, my entire body is a heart. Every part of me is pulsing and pumping blood. My throat, my stomach, even my toes.
“What?”
I’m probably tattooing my heartbeats onto the spine of my broken book with the way I have it plastered to my chest. “With her.”
“With whom?”
“Josie.”
I’ve genuinely baffled him. I’ve never seen that expression on his face. Well, I’ve hardly ever seen an expression on him other than either blankness, irritation, or a sort of ingrained arrogance. His brows are creased with confusion and his eyes tell me he has no clue what I’m saying to him.
Does it mean he’s not going? Or maybe he’s going and it’s no big deal.
Oh, fucking hell.
Did I jump the gun?
“I, um,” I begin awkwardly. “Are you going out? With Josie?”
“Out, as in?”
I’m melting under his steady gaze. He’s destroying me, cell by cell, with the intense way he’s looking at me.
Oh God, can I just run away now? Will he notice if I leave in the middle of this very awkward conversation?
He might. Not to mention, he’s blocking the fucking door.
“Out, as in…” I trail off.
Actually, fuck it.
Fuck all of it.
I’m not running away. I’m tired of running, feeling like I have to hide. I have to lie. I have to keep the peace because the alternative is unthinkable. It’s not.
The truth is that I have feelings for this man in front of me. He’s my doctor, my psychiatrist. A lot older than me. But I don’t care.
I’m taking a chance.
“Out as in, on a date. Are you going on a date with Josie?”
“Who told you?”
“I overheard a couple of nurses talking.”
His expression is unreadable. He’s gone from being confused to totally closed off, completely shut, and it hits me like a sharp dart.
“And what if I’m going?”
That dart was poisonous. I can feel it. It’s spreading everywhere. My legs, my arms, my chest, my stomach. It burns. Like my veins are on fire.
“I don’t want you to go.”
“Why?”
Okay, here goes. I can do this.
I can fucking do this.
I blow out a breath, and say, “Because I want you to go with me.”
The only reason I’m standing on my own two feet is because he hasn’t looked away from me. There’s power in his eyes. Maybe even in that beautiful, cold face of his.
“With you.” He makes it sound like a flat statement, and it’s not helping my confidence. Like, at all. But I’ve said it now and well, I can’t take it back.
I don’t want to.
“Yes. When I get out of here. In a little over two weeks.”
“Why? Why should I go with you?”
Taking another deep breath, I whisper, “Because I want you to. Because I want you. And because I think if you tried, you might want me, too…”
I trail off when I see a muscle jump on his cheek and he breathes deep. His shirt-encased chest rises and falls with it. I don’t know what to make of it.
Actually, I do know what to make of it. He’s angry.
This was a bad idea. A super fucking bad idea.
What was I thinking? He’s never given me any indication that he likes me. At all. He’s always been so professional and cool and what the fuck was I thinking?
I haven’t done anything like this before. I’ve never had the urge to. Not until him. Not until I heard he was going out with someone else.
Maybe I should backtrack, after all. Maybe I should –
“What about Lee?”
At his words, my thoughts come to a screeching halt. I feel a jolt. In my chest. Like something really heavy fell on me.
“What about the boyfriend you love? What was it he called you again? Right. Snow princess. He calls you that, doesn’t he? He called you that when he pulled you into a dark alley, pushed you into a wall and pressed up against you. What about him? I thought you were heartbroken. You were so heartbroken that you jumped from a roof. So, have you moved on, then?”
My vision’s filled with him, the line of his broad shoulders, the strands of his rich hair grazing the starched collar of his shirt. Somewhere in the past few seconds, Simon walked closer to me. So close that I have to crane my neck up to look at his face.
I’ve never seen him like this before. So angry. More than angry. More than furious even. He’s leaning over me, like a thundering cloud, all dark and dangerous.
“What about that love? What happened to that?”
“H-he cheated on me.”
“Right. He kissed someone. What was her name again?”
I shake my head but I can’t stop my lies from spewing out. “Zoe.”
“Yes. Zoe. Tell me Willow, is Zoe real or did you make her up too?”
A few moments ago, I couldn’t breathe because there was something heavy sitting on my chest. But now, I can’t control the breaths I’m taking. They are wild. Fearful. They are crazy.
Oh God.
“Huh, Willow? Is Zoe real or did you make her up like you did Lee?”
His face is flashing with fury. Heated, scorching. My eyes water. My skin stings. “I-I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Simon stays silent, but I feel something. I look down and watch him sliding my book out of my grasp. I want to tell him to stop but I can’t form the words. His knuckles are leached of any color. They look white, almost like the color of the walls surrounding us, this place. This godawful place.
“Interesting shirt,” he murmurs dangerously.
I can’t remember what I’m wearing. Something with a Harry Potter quote, I think. His eyes go through the fabric of my shirt. His intensity is so potent and all I want to do is hide myself.
Always hide myself.
How could I have forgotten that along with being a fighter, I’m a liar, too? I have lied to him so many times. I’ve made up stories, told him things that weren’t true.
I can’t believe it was only last week when I spun the story of my boyfriend calling me a snow princess.
How could I have forgotten that?
“A tip for you: if you want to make things up, don’t take inspiration from something you’re basically an infomercial for. It’s easy for people to figure it out.”
With the book in his hand, he straightens up and throws it at his desk, making me wince.
“You know my secret,” I whisper, tired of this charade.
“That’s the problem, isn’t it? That it’s a secret.” A vein is popping on his temple. “That you suffer in silence. That no one knows you’re imploding. Not one person knows what you’re going through. Not your mom, not your family. Why’s that?”
“I don’t –”
“Why’s that, Willow? Why’s it so hard to tell the people you love that you’re suffering? That you need help. Do you know how many people just don’t say anything? Do you have any idea how many people keep quiet, never ask for help? Do you know what happens to them?”
He grabs my elbow, bringing me flush to his body, making me gasp with how hard he is. How forceful. How the lines around his mouth and eyes are stretched taut.
“They die,” he spits out. “They fucking die. Because they think no one cares about them. Because they think they don’t matter. That somehow, it’s their fault that they are suffering from a disease, so they should just get it over with. But it doesn’t get over with, does it? Because when they die, they don’t die alone. They kill people by leaving them behind.”
“I’m –”
“You don’t want to leave anyone behind, do you, Willow? But you’re ready to die, aren’t you? You’re so fucking ready for your secrets to kill you one day. Isn’t that right?”
I shake my head, feeling the pinch of his fingers on my arm. “N-no… I…”
“You think it’s your fault. You think your mom should’ve had another daughter. Why? Because you’re ashamed of your illness. You’re ashamed of who you are.” His chuckle is so harsh, it reverberates inside my own body, inside my own soul.
“You’re ashamed that every day you have to fight to stay alive. You’re ashamed that you have to fight at all. So you lie. You lie every chance you get. To your family, to your doctors. To yourself. You lie because you’re a goddamn fighter. And instead of being proud of yourself, you’re fucking ashamed.”
Simon’s hazy. I guess it’s the water leaking from my eyes. It’s like I’m watching him through the rainy window of my room. The window where I write his name at night and watch the letters flow like rivers.
My throat is choked up, and I don’t think I can breathe for a long time. I don’t think I can even stand, my legs are shaking so badly. My entire body is shaking so badly.
He lets me go and steps away from me like he can’t stand to be close to me. Like, he can’t stand to touch me.
“No, Willow. I won’t go out with you. I will not go out with my patient. And that’s what you are. My patient.”
As I stand there, I feel like he sucked all the energy off my body and I have none left. Not even a drop.
But somehow, someway, I find the will to blink my eyes and clear my vision. He’s there, tall, dark and classically handsome, with eyes the color of my favorite clouds.
Formidable and unapproachable.
And thundering.
***
I don’t remember walking out of his room or walking down the hallway. I don’t remember splashing cold water on my face and leaning over the sink. But I’m here. In the bathroom and now, I’m staring at my pale, wet face in the mirror.
Oddly, I’m very numb. I’m thinking about the routine ahead of me. I’m thinking I could either go to the library and help Penny with flash cards, or I could watch TV with the others. There’s also an option to go to the rec room. Maybe I should ask for more ginger tea because suddenly, I feel nauseated.
A knock comes at the bathroom door. It’s a tiny space with black and white retro checkered tiles, and barely any room to stand in.
“Willow, you okay?”
Hunter. I know his sleepy, thick voice.
It must have been close to twenty minutes since I shut myself in here. They probably need to chart my location.
I close the tap and wipe my face and open the door.
“You okay?”
“Yeah.”
He studies me carefully. People are always doing that, aren’t they? They are always studying me, trying to decide if I’m telling the truth or what?
“You sure? ‘Cause it looks like you’ve been crying.”
Hunter manages to sound both angry and concerned, and I chuckle, surprising myself. I didn’t think I had it in me. Not right now.
“I have been, yes.”
His frown gets bigger. “Did something happen? You want me to tell the docs?”
“No.”
My non-answer answers are messing with his patience; I can see that. “Willow, I’m gonna have to ask you –”
“If I want to harm myself? If it’s a bad day?”
I don’t know why I said that but I did, and it seemed to have surprised him and apparently, me too.
“Well, is it?”
“Yeah. It’s a bad day and I do want to harm myself a little,” I admit truthfully. “But I’m not gonna do anything about it. Not today.”