Dislcaimer: I do not own Inception. Reviews are not only accepted and encouraged, but really positive ego buffers.
Beneath the world of violence, breaches, and gratuitous crime, there was the small crust that people kept hidden. That crust carried the important thing that life had to offer: love. It was no secret that if you wanted to avoid true terror, you didn't mix your career and the people you care about. That was just not how it worked...that's not how it works. If you wanted to keep your job, you gave up people and if you were smart enough to know when you were getting to close to someone, you ended any but of relationship you could consummate with them and left.
She made that hard for him to do and by the time he realized what was happening, it was far too late.
No.
He tried to leave. So many times...but each time he tried, the stone in his chest that most people would call a heart would begin cracking. The pumping would accelerate and the pain was too much to convey. He'd clasp his fingers over his chest and slide down to the floor, knowing that leaving her would be as hard as trying to move Mt. Everest. Then he gathered whatever energy he could, stand to his feet, and forget everything. From that pain, he knew - not just felt - but knew that he was in love and he couldn't, no matter how many times he tried, leave her.
He tried leaving again when Natalie was born. The night before his mind went awry, she was born. A soft, ethereal creation that could only be described as heavenly perfection was sleeping over his ostensibly large hands. He loomed over her like a giant and it was the first time he'd ever felt inferior to anything so much smaller than he was. He tried to figure what he was feeling as he stared at her, the tiny figure in his hands. Excitement, anticipation, distressed, apprehensive? As those words strung a line through his brain, he realized that he wasn't feeling any of them. Of course, he was nervous. What new father wouldn't be? And as for excitement, that was a given. But what he was really feeling, what was really stirring up in the depths of his gut was fear. Fear that he wouldn't be able to provide properly for his family. Fear that his daughter would hate him as much as he hated his own father. Fear that he wasn't good enough for them. But more than that, under those phobias was the underlying fear that the life he once had, the world he once lived in would ressurect and everything he had would vanish. Like a vampire exposed to the sun. Before long, all that would be left was a pile of ashes representing a once unfathomable monster.
The fact that hours before, he was on the verge of not having his family with him, prevented him from walking out the door like he so much wanted to, like he needed to. At once, he was regretting everything he had done. All of his mistakes flooded into his brain like a tidal wave capturing the dry sand into tumbling essence.
Ever since that moment, he'd been numbering his mistakes.
Natalie stirred and slowly, her little eyes opened and Arthur's heart almost stopped at the sight of her dark brown eyes much like his own. She was real.
Mistake #99: This wasn't a dream.
The automatic doors slid open with absolute ease and Cobb stepped inside the hospital, his heart heavy and the hairs on his arms standing up at the receeding temperature. The white tiled floors were half-assedly decorated with little splotches of blue and green. He quickly walked up to the front counter and tapped his shoe as he tried to wait patiently for the visitors in front of him to finish.
He thought back to when he got the first phone call. Arthur's voice was panicky, yet stable.
"Cobb," he nearly yelled through the speaker. "It's time. The baby's coming. I know you've got Phillipa's recital, but when you can, I really need you to drop by. I have no idea what I'm doing."
Cobb smiled. That was the first time he'd ever heard the point man so confused and abashed. "Arthur, calm down. Everything's going to be fine. I'll meet you there in a little while, alright?"
They agreed on that and everything was fine. Then there was the second phone call, in the middle of Phillipa's recital, the one that really changed everything. After whispering apologies and stepping out of the auditorium of the elementary school, Cobb answered his phone.
"Hello," he said in a low voice.
"Cobb," Arthur's voice was strained. "Something's wrong."
Now Cobb was here, awaiting the news. Whatever it would be.
"Sir?"
The former extractor looked up from the floor and into the eyes of a teenaged girl who was smiling politely at him. He stepped up to the counter and said Arthur's name. She checked her clipboard and nodded at him, told him he could sit in the waiting room.
There he was. Waiting.
Arthur caressed her hair and held her hand tight as she pushed and screamed. After another blow, she fell back onto the plush pillows, there were tears in her eyes. The EKG machine next to the bed alerted him that her heartbeat had accelerated exponentially. She was taking deep panicked breaths.
She turned her head to him weakly, her eyes fluttering. "I can't do it," she whispered.
Arthur nodded. "Yes, you can. Yes, you can-"
"No," she shook her head. "I can't do it. I really can't, Arthur."
He leaned forward and kissed her forehead. "One more push, that's all."
She believed him. She tried to smile at him. She was too feeble. She pushed again.
There was a lot of noise. The beeping of EKG, Ariadne's screams, the doctor's demands...but all of it was silenced out when he heard the cry of the newborn baby ripping through the air. His heart skipped a beat. He smiled happily and turned to Ariadne, but she wasn't there. Her beautiful brown eyes were rolling back before the fluttered closed and her firm, piercing grip on his hand loosened. He could feel the blood rushing back, and that was the worst feeling. He reached out and touched her cheek lightly.
"Ari?" He breathed out to her. He could feel the tears burning through his eyes.
"She's not getting any oxygen," someone called out behind him.
Arthur turned around and saw the doctor yelling at a nurse. "What's going on?"
"She can't breathe!"
"What happened?" Arthur asked, referring to his wife. "What's wrong with her?"
"The chord's wrapped around her neck," the nurse said in a rush.
Arthur froze. His wife and his daughter were in trouble.
The same nurse looked over Arthur, at Ariadne and ran forward. "She's passed out."
"Can you feel a pulse?" The doctor asked.
"Barely."
Then chaos erupted and all that Arthur could hear was the deafening beep of EKG machine at a dead still. The nurses pushed past him and ran to his wife, the doctor stayed focused on his daughter. One of the nurses ran up to him, placing his hands on Arthur's chest and pushing him back.
"You need to leave," he said gently.
Cobb and Arthur sat next to each other in the waiting room, both holding steaming cups of coffee, but neither of them bothering to actually drink it. Cobb watched Arthur from the corner of his eye, his worry eating away at his insides. Arthur was pale, purple bruises under his eyes and his face was padded with a thin layer of perspiration. Cobb hadn't spoken a word since Arthur walked out, only telling him that they kicked him out.
"They won't let me see her," he said in a low voice, sinking down into the chair.
Now, Arthur was riveted on the poorly designed floor, his coffee steaming up over his glasses. Cobb looked away from him, afraid that the more he stared at him, the more worried he would become.
"What if I lose them?" He asked Cobb in a whisper.
Cobb turned to him and watching him warily.
"I mean," Arthur continued in a mumble. "What if she dies? What if they both die? What am I going to do? I won't have anything to live for, not without them."
"Don't say that," Cobb spoke in a furious whisper. How could Arthur of all people be giving up? And on the one thing he loved most, for that matter. "If you give up, it's over."
Arthur scoffed. "I'm not a child, Cobb, don't lie to me. Don't fill my head with false positive things to make me smile. Tell me the truth...Am I going to see my family alive?"
It was in those dark, brown eyes that Cobb found more than just a neophyte in dream sharing who had to be taught the go around. More than just a young man who he felt obligated to protect. More than someone who he depended on. More than a friend, a brother, or a point. He saw a man ready to do anything for his family. And it was in that that Cobb found the answer.
"Yes," he said in a firm, yet gentle voice. "You are going to see your wife and your daughter awake and healthy. You're going to live a long life with them. I promise."
That day, Cobb had been half right.
