Disclaimer: The regular, standard, if these characters belonged to me I would be an awful lot richer, blurb
Disclaimer: The regular, standard, if these characters belonged to me I would be an awful lot richer, blurb.
SPOILER WARNING – THIS CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR THE SEASON 15 OPENER.
Author's Note: I was a bit worried about posting this given the spoiler content, but I figure if I plaster it with warnings, you can make your own judgement. This sprang into my head when I read the spoilers for the first episode of next season, and therefore, as stated above, contains extreme spoilers for that episode. Although I would love it dearly if you would read this, if you don't want to be spoiled, stop now, come back in the autumn and read then! This is one of those little ideas that bug you until you write them so it's better just to give into the muses. It's also a bit of an experiment with a different writing style, so comments are doubly appreciated.
The chances are this will end up with a companion piece/second chapter from Neela's point of view, but in the meantime, please let me know what you think.
Rating Warning: M due to use of language.
An afternoon in Baton Rouge
The silence is the worst, he decides. It is an overwhelming, oppressive vacuum of nothingness that he feels himself being sucked into. The clock on the wall is ticking loudly, which not only is driving him crazy, but somehow makes the silence seem even louder in comparison, more brutal, more unbearable.
Worse than the pain in his hand – that was fucking ironic, he thinks bitterly, a year learning to walk again, only to fall over trying to get to the damn bathroom and break his hand; two hours of surgery to repair the mess of broken and displaced metacarpals he'd inflicted upon himself and another six months before the hand would be strong enough to use crutches again. Oh yes, that was ironic all right.
It is worse than the pain in his legs (stumps Ray, he reminds himself, stumps; those pathetic remains don't qualify as "legs") which is always there, so constant he's given up counting it.
It's even worse – just – than the pain in his heart.
This pain, which he can feel much more keenly than all the other, lesser ones that he's just grown used to, is so deeply engrained that the throbbing is starting to mirror the ticking of the clock. Tick tock, tick tock… throb throb…
He is alone; he has thought this through, having already sent his Mom out of the house, somewhere, anywhere, he doesn't much care where, insisting that he wants… needs to be alone for this. If he can't be in Chicago, then the least he can do is pay his respects in his own way, without her fussing around.
It is a hot day, even inside the house, and, agitatedly, he loosens his tie a little, and undoes the top button of his shirt. He hates wearing a shirt and tie, it has already taken him nearly an hour to do up all the buttons and knot his tie what with his hand in plaster, but he thinks it's fitting, right. Pratt was always smart, well turned out, wore a shirt and tie to work (was, wore, past tense) so Ray decides that for the funeral, even though thanks to his stupid, useless body he can't be there, he's going to wear the same.
He glances at the clock on the wall, still not ceasing in its torture of him. Two o'clock. In the hospital chapel they'll all be filing in now. The coffin will be lying at the front, half buried in flowers and some music will be playing. He's already thought about putting some music on himself, but he knows he and Pratt don't (didn't, Ray, didn't) share the same taste in music and he doesn't have anything his colleague would like.
Finally, when he knows the funeral will have begun, he allows himself, for the first time, to reflect on the loss of his friend. He hasn't, before now, because he's not sure he can handle the idea of Pratt being dead.
Pratt is his friend – he still can't let go quite enough to use was he decides – and now he's just… gone. He's simply not there anymore, and there's a vacuum of nothing where he used to be, exactly like this fucking silence that's ringing in his ears. There's going to be no more phone calls, just checking in to see how things were going, no more beers at Ikes (in the unlikely event he ever gets well enough to return to Chicago), no more basketball versus ice hockey debates to brighten up the dull abyss of a quiet nightshift. No more… Pratt.
Shit, Ray suddenly thinks, Greg is actually dead.
Death is something he sees every day, being a doctor, or saw at any rate, might see again one day, perhaps. But it's different when it's someone you know. He remembers the balcony collapse back years ago now, when so many of his friends were injured, killed, and he recalls how that changed his outlook on life. He wonders if this death, this next round of pain, is going to have some sort of deep, lasting effect on him like that did, but he can't be sure yet. At the moment all he feels is numb, maybe a little more battered than before, but hey, what is a bit more baggage to carry around with him? When your head is as fucked up as he knows his is, what harm can a little more do?
Christ, just when he thinks things can't get any worse, it does. It's Morris who calls him with the news, a week ago now. He's had three calls from Neela beforehand; each time she only lets it go for a ring or two before hanging up and now he knows why. Obviously she couldn't get the words out, and he more than sympathises with that. He is worried at first that she's trying to tell him that she's found someone else, God forbid, Gates, and absolutely loathes the part of himself that leaps with happiness when he realises that isn't the case.
When Ray hears Morris' choked up tone, and just manages to make out the words through the tears, he doesn't know what to say. There are no words of comfort there, not even for Morris, who must be suffering more than anyone with the loss of his best friend. Just a deep, black, bottomless canyon into which he falls head first, and is still falling.
Of course, what makes every thought he has even more poignant, sends that twist of pain a little deeper into his heart – and he feels more than a twinge of guilt at this – is that it so easily could have been him. If he'd hit his head on the road harder, maybe if the truck driver hadn't stopped and had left him lying there in a shredded heap on the tarmac, or if, three weeks after he'd returned to Baton Rouge, he hadn't been such a coward and put the knife back in the drawer, after letting it hover over his wrist for a full hour of indecision.
It could have been his coffin lying in the hospital chapel, flowers for him. Kind, moving and meaningless words about his too short life. Then, later, Neela crying over his grave.
Neela.
She must be… In truth, he doesn't know what she would be thinking, just that she would be hurting over the loss of her friend, of her husband's best friend. He knows how good she is with guilt, and worries that somehow she has made this into her fault again, just as she did with Michael, and with him. He wonders if, this time, if he was there, she might turn to him. If, this time, she wouldn't push him away.
But then he dismisses the thought as soon as he has it. Pondering the "what ifs" is going to make him crazier than he is already.
The time ticks by, and he wonders how it is going. He hopes Greg's dad will have turned up, he thinks Greg deserves that much – God knows his father hadn't managed to contribute much else to his life. He feels sorry for Chaz, he's a nice kid who deserves a break, not to bury his brother.
Ray knows that Luka is going to be doing the eulogy, and he can imagine some quiet, dignified words that will resonate well with the people there. Luka will find the right things to say, it might even salve some of the pain for a little while. He also knows that everyone will be thinking of when it was the other way around, when Pratt stood up for Kovac, as his best man, and he hopes that maybe, in some obscure way, it will help Luka and Abby remember that night. For them, it was perfect (admittedly for him, far less so) and if somehow this can return them to that, then maybe it won't all be wasted.
He thinks back to the last time he saw Pratt, at the wedding. He hates that that's sort of how things ended for them, although there's been plenty of phone calls and burying of the hatchet since then. God, he wishes he was at the funeral. Sitting on his own in a starched shirt and sombre black tie in his mother's living room, hundreds of fucking miles away doesn't count. He wants to pay his respects. He wants to be able to stand at his friend's graveside and say goodbye properly.
He wants the pain to go away.
Naturally, Pratt has told him about Betina. The last time they speak, Ray can hear the happiness in his voice as he tells him that he's booked a jeweller to come and see him. Engagement rings. Yet again, Ray's mind is drawn back to the wedding, and Pratt's easy dismissal of settling down. He turns out to be right, he never would settle down, although now it's because the chance has been stolen from him.
Then, suddenly, a realisation comes to him. It hits him with all the force of speeding truck – and he has a pretty good point of reference for that one – and leaves him almost breathless. He doesn't want his chance at happiness to be stolen away. He doesn't want some higher power to make the choice for him. For the first time in the whole year since the accident (yes, he can call it an accident now) he doesn't want to be dead, like Pratt is. He wants to be alive, and he knows how he can be.
Ray checks the clock, making sure the funeral service will be over now, then pulls out his cellphone. The number he wants is still on speedial – taking it off would have been too final.
He doesn't even wait for her to say hello.
'Come and see me.' Until now, he keeps asking her to stay away, puts off her visits no matter how much she begs.
'I…' There is a pause, and he senses that she is trying to swallow away the lump in her throat before she answers.
'Neela, please? I… I need you.' He tries not to beg, but now all he can think about is healing all the pain, and he knows she's the one to do it.
'I…' She tries again, taking a deep breath, and there is a quaver in her voice. 'I'm on the next plane,' she says at last. 'I'll call the airport right now.'
Already he feels the pain begin to ease.
'Ray?' she says, just as he's about to hang up.
'Yes?'
'I love you.'
And even though he's not sure he believes in heaven or an afterlife and all that, from somewhere, Ray can feel Greg smiling.