"Without Him: Part IV"

By: Adrienne

Disclaimer: I don't own any of these characters.

Author's Note: This deviates from the actual storyline of season eight. This chapter is again narrated by Elizabeth and takes place directly after part three.

The rain is still falling when I walk out of the ambulance bay with Ella in my arms. The weather is unusually warm for late February and the remnants of the dirty snow are melting away and being washed into the sewers.

We walk across the street to Doc Magoo's and as always the restaurant is swarming with customers, most clad in lab coats or scrubs of varying colors. When we get in there isn't an empty seat and I consider going elsewhere, but Luka Kovac spots me and beckons me to his booth. "Have a seat," he says congenially. "I don't think there are any open tables."

"You're sure?" I ask cautiously. Kovac and I have had our share of arguments and tiffs in the past over patient care and surgical consults, but he nods and I accept the seat.

"She's getting big," he says, gesturing to Ella. I remember hearing rumors about Kovac's past, that he had a wife and two children. We're alike, the two of us, in many ways. Strong-willed, both foreigners and soon widower and widow.

"Ella just turned ten months old a few days ago," I tell him, bouncing Ella slightly on my lap. "Isn't that right, baby?" She looks up at me and smiles. I look across the table and Kovac is looking at Ella with a smile, but his eyes are wistful, longing.

"Is Mark all right? I heard he had a seizure today," the heavily accented doctor asks.

Is he all right? Well, he's not dying today if that's what you're asking. I muster a smile and answer with a non-answer, "He should be able to go home tonight." Kovac nods, understanding that "all right" was something he will never be again.

The waitress comes to the table and I order a coffee for me and a juice for Ella. We sit in silence for a few moments. "I hear that your step-daughter moved in with you?"

I'm grateful for a question to answer. I don't want to be left alone with my thoughts right now. "Yes, Rachel. She was in St. Louis and decided to come and stay with us for a while."

"How old is she?"

"Um, thirteen. She's a big help with the baby."

"Thirteen?" He asks with a slight smile. "That's how old my son would have been."

I'm slightly taken aback. On the rare occasions I've talked with Kovac on a non-medical subject, he's never revealed anything personal. "What was his name?"

"Marko. Marko, and Jasna was my daughter's name… She would have been sixteen now," he tells me with that same wistful look.

"I'm sorry," I tell him. What else is there to say?

"No, no, it's okay," he says. "It's not often I get to talk about them… Danijela, my wife, used to say that I'd never talk about anything but them. What they did, what they ate, what they said…anything… I miss that."

I smile at him. Will I be able to talk about him like that ten years later? Will I have made peace with the fact of his death, will I have accepted it and moved on? Kovac pulls a picture out of his wallet. I take it and study it. It's a woman and a little girl, with dark eyes and dark hair like his. The woman is quite beautiful; happiness is apparent in her radiant eyes.

"That is Danijela and Jasna at Jasna's birthday party," he says.

"They're beautiful," I reply. "Do you have a picture of your son?"

He hesitates. "No," he shakes his head. "No. Our apartment was destroyed in a bombing and there were many fires and thefts afterwards. I'm lucky to have this one picture."

Kovac's eyes are so full of sorrow that I regret asking, but they're also so kind and understanding that before I can stop myself, I blurt out, "How did you get through it?" It's a horrible thing to ask, but I need to know.

He looks at me again across the table with that same wrenching look, and omnisciently comprehends everything. "One day at a time… That's how I've lived the last ten years, at least… In the beginning for me, I didn't have any time to grieve because of the war. And I wasn't the only one who had lost his family, husbands and sons and wives and mothers were dying everyday. And then after the war…I didn't let myself grieve. You have to give yourself time to do that and to say goodbye, which is always the hardest part. You still think of them everyday, and everyday it's a little bit less. They start to fade, but you never forget them, not completely. You can never forget someone you loved that much…And I still love them. Love is the one thing you will always have left."

I'm surprised to feel tears running down my face and Kovac hands me a handkerchief. I'm embarrassed to cry in front of him, in a public place like this and wipe the tears away quickly. "Can time really heal wounds like that?" I think. I can't imagine that it does. I wipe some more tears away, and realize that my face is smeared with mascara. "Excuse me for a moment," I tell him.

"Let me hold Ella for you," Kovac offers. I hesitate, but she goes to him willingly, taking an immediate liking to this foreign doctor, so I relax a little and make my way to the bathroom. The tears have slowed and come to an end as I wipe the mascara from my face with toilet paper and water. My eyes are still red and swollen, but at this point I don't care, and make my way back out into the diner.

The waitress has brought my coffee and Ella's juice along with Kovac's order, an ice cream sundae. Ella is smiling and laughing in his arms as he tickles her. He looks so natural with a child in his arms. All traces of sadness are gone from his eyes as Ella claps her hands on his cheeks.

"I'm sorry about that," I say as I sit back down.

"Don't apologize," he says. "I hope you don't mind, but I gave Ella a little ice cream."

"No, no, that's fine," I reply. She looks content in his arms and in no rush to come back to me, so he continues holding her.

"Do you know how much time he has left?" Kovac ventures to ask.

"I don't know… A few months at the most, I suppose."

He nods, and doesn't say anything. "Are you going to be taking time off work for a while?"

I hadn't even thought about that. "Perhaps," I reply, "It's just that… I…" I can feel the tears coming again. "I'm so angry with him!" My words surprise me. I hadn't realized it until I said it, but now that I have, I'll admit it. I am angry with him. And to my surprise, Kovac doesn't look shocked or appalled. He simply looks like he understands.

"I was very angry for a long time, for many years. How could I not be? I was angry with God for taking my family away, I felt he had forsaken me, forsaken all of Croatia. I was angry with Danijela and my children for leaving me… But most of all, I was angry with myself, because I had not taken my family to the market that day. I thought it would be too dangerous, so I made them stay home… And then I didn't take Danijela to the hospital because I couldn't leave Jasna. If I had done that she might be alive today… But then I realized that being angry doesn't help anything, it just hurts me more."

"…I don't want him to leave me," I whisper desperately.

"But you still have time," he replies. "Don't let it go to waste. You still have time to say goodbye, to say all the things you've meant to say. Make sure there's nothing left to regret."

I look out the window and see the rain flooding the streets and know he's right. Nothing short of a miracle will save him now, whatever happens, I'll have to live the rest of my life without him. But he's still here, and that's time that shouldn't go to waste. I just don't think I'll ever be able to let go.