that's love.
love
noun
a strong feeling of affection.
I saw him quickly stagger out of the door, struggling for breath, his vision blurred, the baby wrapped in his turncoat. Boden and Severide trailed behind him, rushing to catch up with him. The flames inside danced, engulfing, devouring all in its path, the ribbons of red, orange and yellow licked the floor, smouldering, leaping out of the door periodically. From the minute I heard his PASS alarm go off, I knew something wasn't right, I could feel it in every inch of my body and the very thought of it terrified, but I didn't think it could actually become a reality…dammit. Why did he have to go back in for that baby? Why did Boden let him? The fire flickered, showering the doorway in illuminating embers, showering sparks in a fountain. He walked out of the door, the plumes of dark grey smoke, emitting choking clouds of noxious smoke, the inferno continuing to blaze out of control. The ash began to float to the ground like giant, dirty black snow, spilling onto the ground. He collapsed onto the patch of grass, a crimson liquid drenching his mask, covering his sandy-blonde hair, staining it brick-red.
He collapsed down onto the grass, Shay taking the baby from his grasp and loading her onto another ambulance. His breathing was staggered, his heart slowing as he finally managed to take off the mask. Severide and I had finally managed to get him into the ambulance, slipping in and out of consciousness, blood continuously dripping off his head and staining the white sheets underneath. He was hyperventilating, his breathing strained even with the oxygen mask, his heart rate and blood pressure striking and bottoming out. It took all of mine and Severide's strength to keep him fixed on the stretcher.
In that moment, all I could think was how much pain he was in…how worried I was.
I'm must have blacked out in the back of the ambulance from my crippling anxiety, because the next thing I could remember is waking up, tears staining the top of my jacket, making my mascara run down my face like words off a page in a book. Shay was sitting next to me as I curled up into a ball in the chair, surrounded by the whole of 51. I wanted to stay in that ball and wait for someone to come and save me from this nightmare; I wanted him to come and save me from this nightmare.
All we knew, was that he had head trauma. Severe or minor, we didn't know. They didn't tell us anything. They were keeping us in the dark, and that just made the whole situation more unnerving, and all of us were more on edge. I got up and rested my head against the wall, rocking it forwards and backwards, gently bashing my head into the wall, trying to wake myself up from this nightmare. My sanity had left my body and danced off in the wind. It couldn't be real. I couldn't believe it was real.
A resident walked into the waiting area, her face painted with naivety. "He had an epidural haematoma and he's in emergency surgery…but that's all I can say." That was just so helpful. Wow. Maybe, I'd wanted to know, if he was okay? If he was going to pull through, survive this mess?
She continued, "Just be patient…it might be a while."
I momentarily felt hope, but then, a wave of anguish, misery and heartache hit me like a brick wall. I walked out the room with many unsaid world tagging along behind me, straight for the OR.
She saw me walking away, towards the OR, and sighed, "Gabriela." She began to run after me, in the hope of stopping me. Well, there was no hope. No hope for either of us. As soon as I heard her pace quicken, I began running too, and I was faster.
I stood there, in front of the OR door, in a state of shock. I couldn't move, speak, anything. I lifted a hand to my mouth to stop myself from bursting into tears. I felt my heart speed up like a race car. It felt like something was choking me.
I saw him there, lying on the operating table, his pale, lifeless body, motionless, hooked up to so many machines…they didn't know if he was going to survive. I almost collapsed to my knees, covering my face with my hands, crying, the tears seeping through the gaps between my fingers. It felt like I'd seen a ghost. The blood drained from my face as I began shaking, again. I felt like screaming, yelling, and just dying. He couldn't leave me. Not so soon. Not like this. I zoned out on everything, only focusing on that moment until I felt that same resident tap me on the shoulder and softly say,
"Gabriela. You can't be here." Clearly she hadn't had the lesson on how to tell relatives, friends, that their loved one is probably going to die.
Words were indeed racing through my head in a blast of confusion, deciding on what to say next. Time ticked by and my eyes grew dimmer by the second. So I just stood there, held my ground, and refused to move.
"Let's go back." She said, trying to lead me away from the door. My eyes were fixated on him, his body. This may be the last chance I get to take in all of him, alive.
"No." I finally managed to squeeze out.
"You have to. Like I said, you can't be here." She seemed to grow angrier by the second.
Without removing my gaze from his body, I managed to string together words that somehow then formed sentences.
"Did you know we've only been together for two weeks. Hmmm. But you see, the thing is, we've loved each other for eight years. Can you believe it? Eight years of love and we've only been together two weeks? I don't want to lose him yet, you can understand that, right? It's because we were both too scared to admit our feelings for each other, afraid of rejection from the other. That's how much we cared about each other. We didn't want to disappoint the other, feel rejection from the other. We have so much further to go in this relationship, soon, he could be my fiancée, my husband, the father of my children. That man is all I think about, every second of every day. It's love. Even if it may seem like it's only been for two weeks on the surface, for me, we've been in love from the moment we met, for as long as I can remember. I'm not letting him go yet. I can't let him go yet. The job we do is so unpredictable, I mean, as you can tell. We run into burning buildings for a living, and each time we do, there's a chance we won't come out. I just didn't think it would happen to us. I don't want to ever let him out of my life. I can't. I love him. So, I guess, what I'm trying to say is that this may be the last time I see him alive, and I love him too much to let that feeling go. So no, I'm not moving."
"Gabriela." She tried to reason with me.
"No." I remained adamant. I was not moving my gaze off him in that OR, let alone moving away from the door.
"I'll call security." She'd reached her breaking point.
"You can try. They can try. I. Am. Not. Moving." I said, bitterly.
"Right, I'm going to tell you something that I shouldn't be. They say, he'll be completely fine, and it's a routine operation and that there's zero risks and he'll come out of it fine. Now, will you move?"
"No. Because you're a liar. You thought you could feed me with lies to get me to move? I'm a paramedic. I know what an epidural haematoma is and I know that it's not routine and there's a chance, a moderately sized chance, that I will not see him alive again. So please, just go away, and leave me here, in peace." I said, indignantly, trying not to yell.
"You know I can't do that, Gabriela." She remained there, trying to convince me to move.
"And if you'd had any experience with grieving loved ones, you'd know that I can't move either." I said, to the point.
"You know what, forget it. I'm going." I think she'd finally reached the point where she realised that she wasn't getting anywhere with me.
"Thank you." I whispered, rolling my eyes. I kept looking, watching the surgeons every move. Every move until they'd finished the surgery, 5 hours later. I was the only one still here.
He saw me outside the door, and immediately came outside.
"You've been here the entire time?" He said, staring into my eyes.
"Yep. I have not moved my eyes from him from start to finish." I retorted.
"Ah. You're the girlfriend." I thought he was rudely sarcastic until I saw him remove his scrub cap and his glasses and smile.
"Yes." I replied. "I haven't moved. I couldn't bring myself to. I know the dangers of the job…I know how we rush into burning buildings expecting to come out, but sometimes the harsh reality is that we don't. Sometimes we don't come out, sometimes something goes wrong. I just didn't expect it to happen to him. I love him. I'd never really thought of the possibility of him getting hurt…it was stupid of me."
He stood there dumb-founded by what I had just said, and left me there, more terrified, wondering what was wrong with Matt.
"Wow…that's love." He smiled, then continued, "As you know, he had an epidural haematoma. We did a craniotomy and suctioned out the bleed. He's up in the ICU and we think he'll be fine…this time. There don't seem to be any deficits." For the first time in this whole mess, I felt a glimmer of hope, even though I knew there was still more.
"What's the bad news?" I said as the doctor gave me a confused look, "there's always bad news. I'm a paramedic. I know."
"Well…" He said, a perplexed expression crossing his face.
"Just spit it out." I yelled angrily. "Sorry. I know I'm a paramedic and I've had experienced with people I love getting hurt badly… I mean, my brother was shot nearly fatally twice in the past 2 years. He's a cop though. I expected that. But Matt, I didn't. I'm sorry." I tried not to let tears venture into my eyes but somehow they did, and I swiftly removed them with my hands before the doctor could see.
"It's okay." He stopped, waiting for me to regain myself. "The bad news…well, he's in a coma. And we don't know when he'll wake up." The news hit me like a train, and I didn't know whether to be relieved that that was it, that there were no deficits, or whether to cry and scream and yell and kick something.
I regained my composure and managed to utter, "Can I see him?"
"Yes. He's on the Neurological Intensive Care Unit. Floor 7. Ask the nurse at the desk for the room number."
"Thank you. For saving him."
"It's my job. Saving people. Just like it is yours, and his. Don't beat yourself up about this, getting injured like this sometimes, it's in the job description. The pleasure's all mine, Gabriela." He smiled, walking off back into the OR to scrub out.
I immediately ran to the elevator; the waiting was crushing my soul. I had to know that he was okay. He had to be okay.
I got up to the 7th floor, and, slightly out of breath, asked the nurse.
"What's the room number for Matthew Casey?"
"Room 404." She replied, not even looking up from the computer screen.
"Thank you." I managed to say, mid-sprint.
Room 404. I stood in front of the door for a while, debating whether to go in or not. I couldn't bear to see him in such a state earlier, and now, I didn't know how he'd look. But I loved him and couldn't bear to be away from him another second either. So I opened the door and slowly walked to his bedside, watching him, taking in all of him, alive. He had an oxygen mask on, and was hooked up to so many machines, but I couldn't care less. The most important thing, the only thing that mattered, was that he was alive. The constant steady beat on the heart monitor sent a mysterious warmth down my spine, and I sat down on the chair next to him. I held his hand and felt his warmth too.
I grasped his hand, and refused to let go, ever. I wouldn't ever let it happen again. I rested my head against his bedside and whispered in his ear,
"You know, you really scared me there… I refused to take my eyes off you while they were operating, I refused to move, I stood there, watching you. And Matt Casey, I don't say it enough, I don't, but I love you, I love you so much, and I never want to lose you again. I'm here, forever, and I'm never going to leave here until you wake up and walk out of here by my side. I promise you that and everything else, I love you. Please, come back to me. Please, Matt, please don't leave me. Please Matt." I said, spontaneously and periodically glancing at the heart monitor, seeing for myself that he wasn't dying "I love you. Don't leave me. We're supposed to be forever. It can't be over yet. It's our time now…you can't just leave me. Please Matt, wake up."
It felt like forever, sitting there, holding his hand, waiting. Waiting for him to wake up. I needed him to wake up. He couldn't die. Not like this. He'd told me we'd be together, always. That one night we spent together changed my life and I didn't want to ever let him go again. It had been two weeks. Two weeks. He couldn't leave her now.
I felt myself begin to cry, tears falling down my eyes like waterfalls, when I felt something grasp my hand back, and as I looked over, his eyes slowly, but surely, fluttered open. I could barely speak, all I could do is stutter, my words stumbled out of my mouth but fell off the end of my tongue. I sat up and looked him in his eyes. Those, sweet, innocent eyes. He took off his oxygen mask and stared at my face, which was a complete mess of shock and relief. He smiled and sat up slowly, and kissed my forehead.
"Careful? You literally just had brain surgery."
"Gabby, I'm fine. I'm a fighter. It's literally in the job description."
"If you think you are going back to that job for at least another month you have another thing coming."
"Gabby…"
"I'm the medical professional here. Even the doctor agrees with me. I already asked. It's not happening."
"Fine." He smiled. He squeezed my hand back and it felt like the most comforting relief I'd had today.
"You know, you really had me worried there. You had me feeling like we didn't have forever anymore."
"We'll always have forever. You know that." He paused. "Oh, and Gabby…I love you too."