Disclaimer: I don't own CSI: Miami, it's characters or all related logos and trademarks, et cetera. I own the characters I made up and most of the plot, if not all. If you find any plot parts you recognize from the CSI: Miami TV show, then those parts are not mine either.
Author's Note: A Ryan Wolfe one-shot. Sorry if you don't like it.
Of Rain and Tears and Awful Things
by The Last Llama
I just kept going and going in the rain, flashlight in hand- no neon here... Wherever here is. The rain pelted me unmercifully, but I didn't care. I just wanted to go for a walk. A walk that just so happened to be on a night that Miami finally had bad weather. To top it all off, it's Christmas. I'm sopping wet and shivering, alone, my flashlight battery is dying, and it's Christmas.
Sure, there are plenty of hazards on a rainy, dark Miami night, but I'd rather be here than back in the apartment, waiting for Ryan. I'm sure he'll never come anyway.
As you have found out, or deduced, or whatever, I'm coping with that fact in my own way. Leaving a sticky note on the fridge (one that will probably never be read) and getting lost in the wide American land called Florida. That's dignified- and at least (although extremely unlikely) if he actually comes, he won't find a large salty puddle of tears with me right beside it, tired out from crying. He'll find a neon yellow sticky note (he hates those, but I don't think he'll know I did it just to spite him) that says: "Out for a walk. I'll take long, don't wait up." in black ink. If he gets home. Pfft. Like that would happen.
The glow of the flashlight became dimmer, and I smacked it on the side hardly. Don't you die on me, I thought. Pitch black darkness in rain tops my enemies list, along with gravity. I groaned when the light suddenly got noticeably dimmer after I smacked it. So instead I stroked it. That didn't work, though, so I threw it at the ground. The plastic casing broke, and I stomped on it. I stomped several times and jumped on it, too. I almost broke my neck by slipping, but that made me jump on it even more. When I finally started getting tired, and my jumps were less anger fueled, I stopped and started walking again in the dark. The battery was going to die anyway, and the flashlight was getting kinda heavy in my hand. So I cut my losses and ditched it.
I don't know when it started, but I sniffed. I sniffed and something hot leaked out of both my eyes. My chest started shaking and the breaths I took became ragged. I stared at my shoes, even if I couldn't see them, I knew where they were. I stared quite a long time. I don't know if my eyes started adjusting to the dark, but little by little, I was able to see the outline of my sneakers and a small bit of their color. It was like looking at a badly taken picture.
Then, more rapidly, my sneakers came into view. Now I could see the laces and how they weren't the same in color. That used to bug Ryan too, but I think he got used to it. I could also see the bottom part of my pants, but then I realized the reason for my new found eyesight was a light... or lights, rather.
As quickly as I realized, my head snapped to my left. Both lights blinded me, they were so bright. I don't even know why I didn't just get out of the way of certain death. I didn't hear the brakes squeal and the car skid out of control. Maybe the driver was thinking the same as me and just as scared.
The car sped toward me and hit my side hard. For a second there, I think I went flying and landed even harder than I was hit on my other side. I could taste mud in my mouth and feel it, the cold, mucky substance on my shoulders and most of my back.
What you experience is always different from what they say in books and what they show you in movies. I didn't black out from the pain, as unbelievable as that sounds. I stayed in a state of mental and physical incapacitation.
I waited for the car to pull over, and I waited for the driver to collect his wits and dial 911. I waited for the ambulance to come, the driver and his passenger by my side. The ambulance looked so pretty when it came, red and blue flashing in my partially blinded eyes. I waited for the paramedics to lift me onto the stretcher. One of them reached in my sweatshirt pocket for identification. He, I think, or maybe she, managed to get their hands on my cellphone. Miraculously, it was still in one piece. What a strong little cellphone, if only I was just as sturdy.
The medic speed-dialed one of my emergency contacts to notify them, and the other was catering to my broken bones and wounds. The interior of the ambulance was also blindingly white- my eyes hurt a lot and they released a steady stream of tears.
I waited till we got to the hospital. They wheeled me in. My eyes took even more abuse from the fluorescent lighting in the hospital. I couldn't take it, so I closed my eyes. I think this made everyone else around me worry, because their words seemed more rushed and urgent.
They put me in a room, I opened my eyes again, even if the lights were still as bright. It kind of bothered me to lose my sight. Doctors and nurses were crowding around me passing shiny metal instruments around. My vision blurred. At some point, a woozy feeling spread throughout my body. It made me sleepy. My head lolled to the side, and if I could've gasped, I would've.
Some minuscule part of me waited for Ryan, and there he was, on the other side of the glass window. I couldn't name the expression he had on his face, mainly because I couldn't see properly, but I knew it was Ryan. I gave him a smile while my respiratory system gave out.
The main thing was, he was there, and I think I died happy.
