CHAPTER 26 - When All I See Is Darkness Part II

Oddly enough, Layton was woken the next day not by Melanie, but by Dr. Pelton coming into the room.

"You're not doing your back any good sleeping in that chair, Mr. Layton." She stated.

"I'll keep that in mind." He answered her, grimacing slightly at the pain from that very region as he pulled himself back up in the chair.

"Well, you'll be happy to know that tonight you can sleep in your own bed."

Layton looked up at the news. "Meaning?"

"Meaning that while my staff will be heartbroken to see her go, Ms. Cavill, is being discharged back to her cabin as long as we can get any sort of assurance she will not be by herself for the first few days."

While struggling to pull himself out of the chair, Layton didn't miss one ounce of the sarcasm lacing the doctor's statement.. "She has plenty of people willing to stay with her if needed." He stated. "And I'm sure she'll be happy to know she's going back to her own cabin."

"Not half as happy as my staff, Mr. Layton." Pelton informed him as she handed him a sheet of paper. "Try to the best of your ability to see that she follows at least some of these instructions. And see that she keeps her check up appointments."

Layton looked over the sheet as Pelton left the room. But eventually he turned to the bed with a smile.

"So, you apparently irritated everyone into an early release. Good job." He told her.

Slowly Melanie rolled over in the bed as she pulled herself up. "Trust me, they're not even half as pleased as I am to be getting out of here." Helping her out of the bed, Layton left one of the staff assistants to help her get dressed.

As that cooperation spelled release in her mind, Melanie didn't offer up much resistance to anything the assistant asked of her, and in short order she was dressed and ready to go.

Despite his offer of taking her in a wheelchair, Melanie insisted on walking.

While Layton tried not to oppose her desire to do things on her own, he imposed several strict rules on her request. First, she had to listen to him. Next, she could not walk too fast, so he could warn her of any dangers. And lastly, she had to allow him to walk right next to her, so she could feel him as he walked and know what direction to take.

As they continued to move on, she appeared to begin to get bored with her new found freedom.

"How much further?" A disgruntled comment came as they walked down yet another corridor.

"Just three more cars." Layton answered her. "We could always take the subtrai..."

But Melanie quickly vetoed the idea. "No. I'd have to manage a ladder then, and I don't think I can do that yet."

Layton watched her as they walked along. He could hear the finality in what she said. She wasn't looking at this as a temporary state for herself. And she was planning ahead to what other obstacles she might have to face in the future.

"It's not forever, Melanie."

"You don't know that."

"And neither do you."

When they reached their cabin, he only informed her of their arrival, stopping just in front of the door for her. He understood her strong need to prove, if only to herself, she wasn't totally helpless.

Pausing for a moment, Melanie eventually reached out until her hand made contact with the wall.

With a great deal of restraint, Layton said nothing to help guide her to the opening mechanism. But after a few tries, she thankfully managed to locate it on her own and stood quietly while the door slid open.

"Welcome home, Ms. Cavill." He stated, echoing the words she had said to him so long ago when they had first started sharing the cabin.

Without offering any answer, Melanie paused for a moment, then stepped into the cabin and, miraculously, managed to make her way directly to the sofa without so much as a single mishap. Layton swore she had probably worked out some correlating equation that told her just how many steps it would take based on the size of the room while she was standing in the doorway.

Entering after her and closing the door, Layton walked over to the sofa and sat down next to her, letting her know where he was.

"You didn't get any breakfast." He reminded her. "Are you hungry?"

Usually he didn't give her an option on eating breakfast. It was the one meal she skipped most often. He figured as long as she had something for breakfast, even if she forgot to eat the rest of the day, her body at least got something by way of food that day. But right now badgering her about her eating habits he didn't feel was the way to go.

But to his surprise, she gave a small nod.

"I got some eggs yesterday." He happily told her, getting up and heading for the small kitchen. "I traded some of our pasta for them. How would you like them?"

"Scrambled on a sandwich, I suppose." She answered without much enthusiasm.

Layton refused to be put off by her tone as he started to cook them breakfast. Afterwards he cleaned up while she sat on the sofa, apparently just listening to his moving around in the kitchen. When he was done he went over and sat next to her.

"What would you like to do now?" He asked.

The look on her face matched her expressionless tone. "There isn't much I can do, is there." She replied. "I sit. I eat. I sleep. That's my world now."

"Only as long as you let it be." Layton told her.

Melanie didn't answer him, but continued to stare out at the darkness that surrounded her.

"Well, today is an 'in cabin' day." He finally stated. "So you're stuck with me all day. And don't even try to think of doing anything but relaxing and taking it easy."

"What else could I be doing?" She asked in the same flat tone.

"Knowing you," he answered with a smile, "it's hard to tell."

He had hoped for the smallest smile in return, but her expression and tone remained flat. "There isn't much I can do anymore, Layton. I'm pretty much useless as I am."

"You're not useless." He replied a little firmer than he intended. But he quickly soften his tone. "You're injured. Try to act like it."

The only response he got was her lowering her head slightly.

Layton gave her a small nudge, trying to draw her out again. "Hey." He softly said.

Melanie turned towards his voice.

"You don't know. No one does. Not even the doctors. So..."

"...hope for the best." She ventured.

Layton gave her a nod, but realizing she wouldn't see it, answered her instead. "It beats the alternative."

"I prefer to plan for the worst." She told him.

"All right." Layton replied, deciding to play along with her for now. "What would your plan be then?"

His question met with a few moments of silence from her.

"What would yours be?" She finally asked.

"What do you mean?"

The same silence answered him at first. "I'm blind, Layton." She finally replied in a low tone. "And I may be that way for the rest of my life."

"That's a very big 'maybe'." Layton answered her in a solid tone, getting his point across.

Melanie turned back to facing the room. "I'm not much good to the train blind, Layton. In fact, fixing problems and keeping the engine running is pretty much all I was good for. So now I no good at all."

"You still have a lot to offer this train and its citizen's, Melanie. You just refuse to accept it right now. You have a great many talents that don't require you being able to see. You can train others. You can teach. You can bring up a whole new generation of engineers to keep this train running."

"Engineers have to be able to see, Layton. We...they need to be able to see colors and shapes and be able to read. All things I can't do anymore."

"Then someone can do them for you. Bennett would likely be as happy as a clam if he could sit down and read a whole instruction manual to you. You're still the smartest person on this train." Layton paused for a moment, thinking of what else he could use to try and encourage her. To draw her out of the way she saw herself now. "You can literally 'feel' when something is wrong with this train. You don't need your eyes for that. And there isn't another person on this train who can do that. And that is just one of the many abilities you still have. So instead of focusing on everything you can't do, why don't you try thinking about the things you still can?"

Melanie didn't answer him, but continued to stare in silence at the wall opposite her.

Layton gave a tired sigh. He had given it his best shot to cheer her up. Maybe she just wasn't ready for that yet.

"Try and get some rest today." He advised her. "Give your eyes a chance to heal."

"And if they don't?"

"They WILL."

"And if they don't?"

Layton felt like he was just going in circles with her. She couldn't get past her fear no matter how much assurance he tried to give her. All she seemed to be able to focus on was how useless she felt she was. And her answer simply fueled his annoyance at her negativity.

"Then we'll deal with it if that's what comes. All right?"

"You told Ruth you kept me alive because I could fix the train. Because I was useful."

He wasn't ready to get back into this with her right now, so he stayed silent.

Melanie turned back to his voice. "And now I'm not either. So what will you do now, Mr. Layton, with a blind, useless engineer?"

Layton paused for a few moments. "I'm not going to go there with you, Melanie." He stated finally. "I've told you where things stand. You just refuse to listen. You are NOT useless to this train or to me. And it's only been a few days. Why don't we give your eyes just a little bit of time to heal. And then we'll decide our next move."

Layton gave her the laptop to work with instead of fighting with her, which she spent the rest of the morning working to set up so it had voice recognition and voice caption props to tell her what was on the screen.

Layton was actually glad to see Knox when he showed up for his shift to stay with her. After their run around that morning, he and Melanie hadn't had much to say to each other since he wasn't going to feed her fears and that seemed to be all she wanted to talk about up until he gave her the laptop.

Heading out the door for a little reprieve from his morning, Layton hoped Bennett would have more success in cheering her up.

It wasn't that he didn't understand how she felt. He actually thought for someone suddenly losing their sight, she was handling it remarkably well. What he couldn't grasp was her total negativity towards her situation. Melanie usually faced adversity head on. This time she seemed to be utterly crumbling under it.

It was all of this that he took and dumped on the bar in front of his favorite seat as Ms. Audrey stood behind the counter, carefully cleaning glasses as she listened to him.

"She's apparently still hung up on what I said to Ruth," Layton finally wrapped up his rant, "and now that she's blind, she thinks she's lost her 'get out of execution free' card, and in her mind, I'm just planning which door I'm going to accidentally trip her out of one day just to get rid of her."

Audrey never missed a beat as she set one glass down and picked up another. "Well, surely you can see her point, Andre?" She asked.

Layton stared back at her as he kept his fingers slowly turning a glass of whiskey on the bar.

Audrey sighed to herself. When were these two ever going to settle down and just get on with business?

"Melanie already has it firmly planted in that brain of her's that you meant every word you said to Ruth Wardell. That the only reason you ever kept First Class from carrying out her execution was because she was useful to the train."

"She is useful to the train, Audrey." Layton stated. "That part of what I said is absolutely true. But that isn't the only part of the truth. It isn't the only reason I stopped her execution. She just refuses to see the rest of it."

"So tell me something new." Audrey suggested. "Why keep her alive in your opinion?"

Layton thought for a moment. "She's smart..."

Audrey quickly stopped him. "Not new. Try again."

Layton sighed, but a small smile came over his features as he thought about his enigmatic roommate. "She's funny..., when she wants to be, even though she would deny it. She cares about every single person on this train. She fuels the hope that keeps everyone going. She keeps me on track. She encourages me. She pushes me when I need it, and she's there when I just need someone to listen to me. And all of that helps the train overall." Layton sighed softly. "She may not think so, Audrey, but without her, I doubt we'd survive a year."

"And as you said, she doesn't see any of that, Andre." Audrey told him as she set the glass down and leaned over the bar. "All she sees now is how useless she is. And she just sits around worrying when you're finally going to see that, too." The woman pulled back again, staring down at the concerned face of her friend. "I told you once before that Melanie wasn't angry with you over losing control of the train, she was afraid. That fear never left. You may have thought it did. But it was always still there. And now she's more afraid than ever, because she feels she's at the ultimate disadvantage. She has nothing to fight back with anymore. Nothing to offer you."

Layton gave an exasperated sound at the statement. "It's not a trade off, Audrey. She doesn't have to GIVE me something in return. The woman is my friend. Not because of what she can DO for me or the train or anyone else. Friendship doesn't have a price tag."

"And Melanie doesn't 'do' friendships, Andre. You want to talk about words she doesn't know the definition of? Try getting her to give you one for that one. When she was Head of Hospitality, what did you say she told you about herself?"

Layton thought for a moment. "She said she 'was friendly to everyone, but no one's friend'."

"And she lived that way for nearly seven long years. Keeping everyone at arms distance. And why? Because she could never be sure if someone was nice to her just because..., or because they wanted something from her. That can make a person very callous towards friendships. And yes, she tends to look at any relationship as a give and take equation. Even the one she has with Knox has a scale attached to it. It's just...easier for her to understand and work with a relationship on those terms."

"So what do I do?"

"You have two ways to deal with this." Audrey told him. "One, you can prove to her she isn't as useless as she thinks now. Or two, prove to her it doesn't matter to you even if she were. Bonus points if you can manage both."

Layton sat at the bar, slowly taking a sip from his glass as he watched Audrey walk off to go serve another customer on the other side of the bar. Slowly a small smile crept onto his lips as he thought over what Audrey had said. Finally he downed the rest of his drink and headed off back to the cabin.