Note: I know the formatting is all screwed up. I've tried to fix it a few times and it just goes back. Sorry.
Denial. Hour 1.
"John!" Sarah's voice echoed down the corridor, staccatoing off the walls. It announced her arrival before she appeared in the small waiting room off the morgue. "John!" Her calls neared-he could tell by the way the Doppler Effect slightly raised the pitch of her voice.
Sarah turned the corner through the door and saw a man wrapped in a hospital blanket and slumped over in a waiting room chair. He didn't-couldn't-even lift his head to acknowledge her. She rushed to his side.
"John?" she said softly, more gently, kneeling beside him. She placed her hand on his knee, shook it slightly, as if to wake him, though he wasn't asleep. He lifted his head to meet her eyes, and his face was a mess. His eyes and nose were red from crying, his cheeks and chin tear-stained. Her eyes searched his. "They called me at the clinic-when they found out your name-because of who he-and you still have the clinic as your employer-" She tried to explain her presence, but couldn't finish a sentence.
"They won't let me see him," he whispered, barely audible. "I'm...I need to..." She rose to sit in the chair next to him, wrapping her arms around the defeated, blanketed man next to her. His body shook like he might be sobbing, but no sound escaped. She waited, hugging him tightly, until the shaking subsided.
"John, maybe it's for the best that you don't see him. He suffered a massive head trauma, crushed skull, his spine is snapped-" She tried to say this both like a doctor and a lover, both truthfully and gently.
"I need to see him, or...or...it didn't happen. He taught me that-go beyond seeing. Observe." She sighed, feeling helpless.
"You saw him, when he...he fell-"
"He jumped"-here John's voice took a slightly manic tone-"and I don't believe for a second he was committing suicide. It was some great prank on us-on all of us-and I know he's not there-he's gone-taken off or something-" His voice cracked and he had to stop talking to keep from crying out loud.
They sat like that for a few minutes, Sarah with her arms around John, praying someone would interrupt them, say something, do something, give some air of finality to the moment.
Slowly, the door to the morgue opened, and Molly stepped out. Her hair was disheveled, and it was evident that she'd been crying as well.
"Um," she started in a small voice, staring down at her chartboard. "There's nothing to be done. He's gone. For good." She looked up, first at Sarah, then at John. "I'm sorry, John. I'm so sorry, I-" She couldn't finish, her face crumpled. She pivoted and dashed back through the doors.
"John?" Sarah asked gently. "Maybe we should go, get you cleaned up, maybe get some food in you? Make some calls-Mrs. Hudson, Harry...?"
"He'll text, he won't leave me hanging like this..." John mumbled, dropping his head into his hands. No, he won't. Sarah thought dismally. He's dead. Dead dead dead. Even if he wasn't, he wouldn't text you, John. He is-was-ruthless like that.She shook her head, ridding herself of the poisonous thought.
"Well, let's not wait here," she suggested. She sort of pulled him up by the shoulders as she stood up. He let the blanket fall.
"I can't go back to-the flat," he whispered. "Not now."
"It's fine, we'll go to mine," she said. "It's closer, anyhow." She guided him out the door, down the hallway. He shuffled like a catatonic, not once looking back.