Oh Hello, again! You still reading? You brave people! I wrote most of this on the bus today. I hope you like it! A special thank you to every lovely person who reviewed (especially WelshClaire and Immortal Spud Thief who are brilliant and I love!).
A lot of the medical stuff is accurate to google standard, but if I've got any wrong and it offends anyone I am so sorry.
Tissue warning for this.
Disclaimer: I own nothing, it belongs to the BBC.
Darkness – Part 2
The pain was excruciating.
It was engulfing her.
It felt as if she was being torn open from the inside out.
She wanted it to stop.
But she couldn't even open her mouth to speak.
She wanted to tell Harry she was sorry, that she loved him.
She wanted to thank Leo for being a father to her.
She knew this was coming.
She did expect it to be this quick.
It felt as though it was killing her.
Literally.
You were told it was looking good and you had passed out. Leo woke you up. He slapped you. That didn't surprise you. He knew you need the shock to get you to be there for Nikki. You were petrified. You hadn't spoken to the doctor yet. You had no idea what was going on. No idea why Nikki was so unwell.
You couldn't help but pace up and down the corridor, off which was the room in which they were treating Nikki. You weren't allowed in. You weren't family. You had tried to explain. You were as close as it got to family. Her parents dead. No siblings. Not a family member in sight. You told them that if they wanted her family they were looking right at it. You'd been fairly vocal in your argument.
The Doctor finally let you in to see Nikki. She looked pale, very pale. You were petrified. It was so scary seeing her lying there, so still. The only movement was the rising and the falling of her chest as she was ventilated. That was your girlfriend, the women you loved with all your heart, just lying motionless, almost on the edge of death. You weren't going to let her slip away from you yet. Not this easily.
You realised you were crying. You weren't meant to cry. You were meant to be strong for her. Leo was holding your shoulder. Supporting you, comforting you. Tears trailed down your cheek. You couldn't even comprehend the situation. It was just hell.
The doctor pulled you aside in to the relative's room to speak to you about her condition. Leo continued to hold you, hugging you tightly. Telling you it was going to be okay. He was trying to hold you together whist inside you were falling apart. The doctor explained that Nikki had collapsed and that they were running tests to find out exactly why. You started to block what he was saying out, not wanting to know what they had to do to her.
"...It has metastasised from the primary tumour to the intestines..."
What? What!
"What?" you couldn't breathe. You didn't believe what you were hearing. It wasn't true. It couldn't be.
The doctor explained it all again. Talking to you as if you didn't have a medical degree, as if you had no medical knowledge what-so-ever. You still didn't believe him.
"No!" You yelled, "It's not true!"
Leo pulled you closer as you sobbed in to his shoulder, staining his shirt with your salty tears. You were almost having a panic attack. You were gasping for ever breathe. Just like Nikki would be right now if she wasn't being ventilated. It wasn't good. Thinking too much about it all just made you sob harder.
"When?" You asked through sobs. The doctor knew what you meant.
"Three months ago." You were angry. Very angry. 3 months and she hadn't told you the life shattering news she had been given. "We said she'd have at least 6 months, she refused treatment so that was the expectation."
So that was why she was so adamant about booking your dream holiday. She had seemed so full of life. Wanting to do everything you possible could together. She'd been determined to make the most of every minute she spent with you. You had discussed having children, agreeing that you wanted at least one, not now but in the future. How could she do that to you? Knowing she was never going to be able to give you that beautiful baby that you both wanted!
You pulled away from Leo. Standing up, you walked out of the stuffy little room you were in. Well more of stormed out. You walked down the corridor. You kicked the plastic chair outside one of the rooms, breaking it and sending it clattering across the hallway. You punched the wall. Fuck. That hurt.
But the pain wasn't as bad as Nikki's. You knew that. She'd refused treatment. Why had she done that? The treatment would have been intensive and horrible and made her awfully ill. So there was your answer, she wanted to be happy and not ill to spend time with you. So she had suffered silently. But the treatment would have given her another year at least. A whole year together. Just you and her. You would have quit your job to look after her. It would have been perfect. No matter how ill she was.
Why hadn't she told you? Why didn't she tell you that she was dying? At least then you would have known to appreciate every second. You'd yelled at her, argued with her and ignored her in the last 3 months on more than one occasion. You regretted every second of it now. You wanted to turn back time. Take away all the horrible things you had said.
Cervical cancer. Late stage IV. She was never going to survive it. It was fast growing and it was always going to kill her. But it spread. And that just made it a million times worse. Her intestines were constricted. She couldn't digest properly. It was killing her slowly and painfully. You'd almost prefer if it was a short and painless death. That explained why she had lost weight. And all of it was causing the "period pains" she had been suffering so badly from. You were a doctor. You should have seen it.
You somehow found yourself in Nikki's room, holding her hand tightly, squeezing it, urging her to wake up. You sobbed in to the sheets covering her, keeping her warm.
"Fight for me, Nikki. Please don't give up." You could barely breathe. You hated the fact that you knew she was in pain. Excruciating pain. And even the morphine would barely dull it.
She wanted to scream.
She wanted it to stop.
Harry was here, she knew that.
She didn't want him here.
She didn't want him to see her suffer.
She loved him.
She wished it would end soon.
She wished she could just die.
That was preferable to the suffering she was enduring at the moment.
She felt a weight lift off her.
She sighed.
You heard her sigh. Followed by the monitors beeping. Going crazy. You looked up at Nikki. You panicked. The nurse who was in the room caring for her rushed to her side and hit the emergency alarm button. She started CPR. You were petrified, backed up against the wall. Watching this scene play out in front of you. You were going to lose the woman you loved if her heart didn't start again soon. Tears couldn't be held back, your face was tear stained. You couldn't move. And as much as you wanted to yell at them to go faster you couldn't even breathe.
"Clear... Nothing? Shall we call it?"
"NO! Keep going! I need her!" You didn't even realise it was you who'd yelled until the doctor and his team stared at you before carrying on with CPR. Shocking her, trying to restart her heart.
And then... a pulse. You sobbed and stumbled through your tears from the wall to her bedside. You squeezed her hand. Nikki. Your Nikki. You had her back. You needed her to get better. You hoped that you'd have those 3 more months or that you'd convince her to have the treatment.
You needed her. More than anything. She was your rock. Your rock in the stormy sea. To think of her dying, of her leaving you, was like the rock being swept away from right under your feet and you were drowning in strong tides.
You woke up. No idea how long you had been asleep for. You must have cried yourself to sleep. Leo was sitting in the other chair in the room. He was watching over you and Nikki. You looked at Nikki. Her face was paler than you'd ever seen it. She was wired up to so many machines. On life support. On morphine. Yet her face was still contorted in pain.
You wanted it to stop for her. You wanted her to be comfortable and happy, to know how much she was loved. Yet you'd stopped them from letting her slip away quietly, peacefully. You had allowed her suffering to go on. And for that you hated yourself.
Leo, seeing you were awake came over to you, placing his hand on yours.
"It's time to let her go, Harry, she doesn't want to be here anymore, she doesn't want to suffer." How did Leo know exactly what to say? You wanted just to curl up in to a ball and cry. Or possibly die, that might be preferable to going on without her.
3 hours later and you'd spoken to the doctor. You'd spoken to Nikki's lawyer as well. She'd left most stuff to you and quite a lot to Leo. There was a letter address to you that was marked "Only to be opened when I'm gone". But amongst her papers was a note saying she didn't want to be artificially supported if she was dying. You knew that meant she was ready to die.
You were prepared for them turning the machine off. Or so you thought. You could barely see her face through your tears. And within moments she was gone.
Gone.
Forever.
You ran.
So Hi, I hope you liked it, and I would love it if you could drop me a review in that funny little review box. :)
Lizzi
xxx