Better One than Two
hetalia © hidekaz himaruya; written for entertainment purpose only, not claiming any rights. alternative universe.
On the first time she opened her eyes, she was greeted by Kiku's soft voice. "Mei. you are awake ..."
Mei blinked for several times, and realized that this was not a usual wake up she occasionally had. Not in her—their—room, not being woken up with the warm sunlight, not being woken up with the scent of lemon-scented room freshener she usually hung on air conditioner. She finally took notice of the cast on her right leg and thick-bandaged left arm of hers.
Her sight became fuzzy for a moment, before she regained her normal view of the environment. Once again Kiku kissed chastely her right arm's palm, and repeated the act on her knuckles (for the thousands time since he had found her unconscious in emergency room, he couldn't count anything but he believed he had been doing so more than he had ever done before). Mei didn't know that he muttered thankful words in extremely low voice, right above her hand.
"'m ... in ... the ... hospital?" she hardly turned her head, her neck felt so stiff and throbbed when she tried to move it for the first time. "How ... long?"
"Four days," Kiku answered. He moved his chair closer to her head's position. "Not exactly so. Almost."
And soon, she realized what had been lost from her.
"Baby? Where's my baby? Our child?!" she persitently tried to elevate her head from the pillow to make sure that she still had that slight baby bump she knew had started to appear not too long ago down there.
Unuexpectedly to her, Kiku pushed down her forehead in gentle manner, trying to soothe her by kissing her forehead. Then, he closed his eyes and tightened their intertwining fingers, right before her right ear he formed the words she didn't want to hear the most, "He's gone. He couldn't be saved."
Despite being too weak, she still could screech and it ended with a hurtful cry she couldn't hold. Kiku put her hand on his head and he only could bend down himself and lowered his head beside her. After all, he still felt an obligation to comfort her, even though he knew his inside was suffering too.
"I killed him ... I killed him! It's my fault that I didn't answer your call on that morning, being stubborn on my decision to go by bus by myself ... it's my fault ... I put him in danger ... I am a bad mother on the world—the worst one!" she grieved in shaky voice, and tears streaming down her cheek unceasingly—only made him raise his hand and wipe the liquid with his thumb.
"It was not yours," he whispered.
"Yes, it was!"
"Mei, crying would not bring him back."
She still weeped, and oh how she wanted to turned her back on him and to refuse gazing back to his eyes plastered with regret and sorrow, but her bruises and aching body hindered her doing so, then she couldn't do anything when their eyes meet as he drew his face closer to hers.
Being a persistent and disobedient wife had never been her intention, but that day Kiku had indulged himself too much on working and unintendedly ignoring her willing to go seeing her parents with his car, ended up with her deciding a sole trip by bus. Fortune had not been on her side, a crash had happened and it had burnt their wish of cuddling a newborn baby five months ahead into ash of grief.
"You are not the one who has right to decide our baby's fate and age," he held her hand now with both of his hands, hugging her cold fingers tightly as if tomorrow was going to be the end of universe and he would gladly make her the last thing he held before die.
She shut her eyes tight, biting hard her lower lip where not too far from it there was a slight diagonal wound under a layer of band-aid.
"You always be like that, as if you are the richest person on earth and have everything on your side, so when one thing is taken from you, you are still okay! As if you would be alright even when you lost your head!" shrieking, she balled her fingers inside his palm into fist. However, his grip was tightening and he didn't let her go.
"Then what we could do? We are only human and there are many things we can't do any attempt to. Couldn't do. But what exactly we could do is to accept everything we can put more efforts for ..."
She gritted her teeth, "You are not sad for just losing our child? You are not mad at me? Tell me that you are a human, Kiku!"
"It is an utter lie if I don't consider this as the worst thing I've ever experienced in my life, but, Mei, there is a line between things you can avoid and things you can work it out," he caressed her forehead again, reaching it up and planting a deep kiss on it. A longer one, that finally could be able to calm her down.
Mei was still sobbing, and he moved to her bed. Her hair was disheveled around her face, he took a strand and put it on his lips. All he could smell was just nauseating aroma of hospital and especially medicine applied to her, but he could not care less. He lowered his head and put his lips simultaneously on her corner of eyes, wiping away the last remaining tears she would shed.
When he raised up, he eventually took her hand in one of his for the millionth time and looked her in the eyes, "Better to lose one than two."