Wounds to Bind
Chapter Four
It was not until a few hours later in the Quantico Hospital's Intensive Care Unit that I awoke from my state of unconscious. When I did, I felt as though I was in a daze, everything foggy. I had no idea where I was, or what had happened. I look around, seeing a vital machine and SAT monitor. I looked down at my arm, IV's inside me. I then turn my head to the right, seeing Derek sitting beside me.
"What happened?"
Doctor Chamberlain, meanwhile, was outside of my room at the hospital with Penelope, explaining my condition.
"I am afraid that she is not well. Ziva does not seem to be more than ninety pounds and given her past…" He says, rifling through the sheets of paper within my file. "We recommend that she be admitted for further treatment."
"Further treatment?"
Groaning sleepily, I rub my eyes a bit with my IV free hand.
"Derek? Where am I?"
Penelope's brows were furrowed. She was confused. She did not know what had happened to me, or what was happening to me.
"Well, I don't know about much of her past, however she did not tell me a whole lot."
Dr. Chamberlain frowned, knowing he could not tell Penelope due to doctor-patient confidentiality laws. Derek was speechless for a while, unsure of what to say to me.
"Well, sexy, you collapsed at the B.A.U. Baby girl and I drove you to the hospital. How's your head?" The jock-like Supervisory Special Agent asked before leaning in a bit closer to me.
Meanwhile, Penelope and the doctor parted ways and she had gone to the bathroom. Trying to calm herself down, she felt as though she was going to lose the only person she had in her life, the only thing that made sense in her life at the moment. She pulled out a broken pair of glasses from her purse. Sighing, she reluctantly broke them. With a shaky hand, she picked up one of the shattered pieces of lenses, and took it to her arm. She cleaned the wound after a while, making sure nothing could be seen through her sleeve. She quickly left the bathroom and returned to my bedside.
"Ziva, you're awake!" She said happily, leaning down and kissing my cheek softly. "You scared me!"
The feel of her lips on my cheek lingered on my flesh, and I savored every second I got to feel it. I watched her with wary eyes as she took a seat in the chair next to me.
"Derek, will you tell the doctor I would like to speak to him again? Please?"
With a nod, Derek stood, touching her shoulder before exiting. What Penelope said next broke my heart.
"Ziva, please do not leave me…" She said softly, a feeling of vulnerability and helplessness washing over her.
This was evident in her tone of voice and it hurt me, emotional pain so strong it felt physical. However, I was also tired, fatigued in fact.
"Mm, no… I have no intention to do such a thing." I murmured tiredly.
I groaned slightly as I turned onto my side. My eyes remained on Penelope and the two of us stayed silent for several moments, not sure of what to say or scared to say the wrong things… or perhaps both?
"Can you get the doctor to take these things out?" I asked, referring to the IV's. "They're so annoying."
I begin to pick at the tape holding down one of them, growling a bit in frustration. I ceased my actions when I felt her hand go over my own. She soothed it with her thumb before moving her hand away nostalgically. Just as this happened, Dr. Chamberlain walked back in.
"Ms. Garcia? You wanted to speak with me?"
Just as the doctor leaves with Penelope, Emily and Spencer walked in and I looked to them, feeling terrible that I had fainted in front of them. They had seen me so sickly and weak.
"Hello." I murmured in a tiny, seemingly insignificant voice.
The doctor looks to you with a questioning expression.
"So, what seems to be your concern?"
Penelope took a breath, calming herself and steadying her emotions. She was then able to speak her mind.
"I want to know if she's going to be okay. I am so worried doctor… I can't lose her. I just can't." She said, trying oh so hardly to hold herself together though she feels her façade cranking as she notices the doctor's solemn expression.
"Well, you gave us a little scare…" Emily said with a slight smile, trying to light the mood with her facial expression.
As this was going on, I began to pick at the tape aimlessly, hurriedly. Emily must have noticed my actions.
"So, you going to escape?" She asked, taking notice of me attempting to remove the IVs. "Here, let me help you."
She then stepped towards me, tucking some of her black hair behind her ear before squatting down to me. Looking at it critically, she gently removes the tape and expertly removes my IV's. She did this because she did not want for me to rip them out of myself due to frustration.
"There. All better." She chimed with a smile.
"Mm, thank you Emily." I say in a sort of groan as I sit up in the bed. "I just moved too fast and lost my footing. I really do not see the problem… or why I am still here. I am fine."
My insisting mustn't have convinced anyone because no one wanted to say anything. I did not notice the look on Spencer's face as he shook his head in disbelief. He looked at me and figured I was a good twenty to thirty pounds underweight and I looked as though a bus ran right over me. As I stand, Dr. Chamberlain walked in. He obviously disapproved of my actions.
"Ah, ah, ah, Ziva; you shall go nowhere." He said sternly.
"Why? You cannot hold me here. I am over eighteen and have every legal right to leave this hospital, and I can assure you I have every intent of invoking that right."
Dr. Chamberlain sighed. He knew he could not legally stop me but I was so sick and he knew what would become of me. He had experience with this before.
"Ziva, you are not well!"
I shrug on my jacket.
"Says who? I am doing alright. I should be allowed to go home."
I look to Penelope, telling her with my eyes that I was ready to go. Penelope did not say a word, grabbing her purse before taking my hand within her own.
"I'm not going to stop her from coming home." The blonde said to the doctor, tears stinging her eyes as she walked with me out to the hospital room. She then escorted me to the car, silently driving the thirty minute drive to her apartment. Parking the car, I watched worriedly as she got out and take my hands again, fearing that if she did not hold onto me that I may faint once again. She remained silent even once inside the apartment, scared to speak as she felt that if she did, her pain and sorrow would show through her voice, and honestly it probably would. I sat down on the couch, resting back on it as I look up at her. A tiny frown seemed to be permanently etched across my face.
"I am sorry." I murmur in a barely there voice.
When I heard her yell back at me that she did not want to hear it, I could not help but to cringe, inching back into the couch, hoping that somehow it would swallow me whole and never spit me out, so that I would vanish, disappear.
"Ziva, I didn't mean it like that… It's just, you have nothing to be sorry for. I'm sorry. I think I am going to lie down." She said softly, lying through her teeth as she looked me in the eyes.
She then walked into her bedroom and closed the door, locking it quietly behind her. An hour later she lied back on her bed, having just finished with a long shower. The depressed woman's mind was a whir. She began to feel as if the room was spinning and she had no control. Her life no longer made any sense and the one thing that seemed to keep her from falling apart was crumbling before her very eyes. Without hesitation, she took out her kit and pull out the razorblade. This time she lined it up with the center of her left wrist before dragging it down vertically. She gasped as she watched the warm, red, liquid rush out of her artery and onto her flesh. Dripping down her arm and onto the bed beneath her, she then switched hands, proceeding to do the same to her other wrist. Dropping the blade to the floor before collapsing backwards onto her bed, Penelope felt as if everything was slipping away from her, that the whole would was beginning to engulf her in an everlasting darkness, a euphoric feeling coming over her as she began to feel for once in complete control over herself, free. This was her choice and she had chosen to give up, to quit battling with herself and the world. As Penelope began to drift in and out of consciousness, she started to feel incredibly dizzy. Seeing shapes move within the room as her eyes glance from left to right, for a moment before completely blacking out, she thought she saw me, though she was unsure and in no way able to tell if it was really me or just a side effect of what she had done.
She had in fact seen me. I had been sitting on the couch, my heart slowing down to a dangerous level. I had to do something. I had to get her, and I had to have her take me back to the hospital. I managed to get myself to her bedroom door and then when I opened it, I saw Penelope lying on her bed with her arms sliced open in a callous manner. Though I barely had the strength to, I found it within myself to rush over to the phone, dialing 9-1-1. As I did this, I rushed off to the bathroom, grabbing several towels and compressing her arms with them to stop the bleeding.
"Penelope, stay with me! Stay with me, love."
Emergency response answered within moments of me dialing.
"Yes, my name is Ziva David and my roommate… she just attempted suicide. Please, I need an ambulance and fast! Hurry!"
When the paramedics arrived a mere ten minutes later, they were rushing the nearly dead technical analyst into the ambulance and I was sitting in there with her. I looked between her and the medics with fear in my tear-shimmered orbs. One kept eyeing me, worrisomely.
"Is she going to be okay?" I ask the medic, my voice cracking. "Please… she has to be okay."
"So far we have stopped the bleeding, ma'am, we will do everything we can." The medic said in a soothing manner, though he was unsure as to what exactly condition Penelope was in.
This is what scared me most.
