Luka paid the cabbie and stepped out into the sunny street. The day was warm for late March. He walked slowly, very slowly, leaning heavily on his crutch, into the lobby of the small office building, rode the elevator up to the third floor.

He'd been out of the hospital less than a week, and was still weak and shaky, but he had told Susan he wanted to get back into therapy quickly. He'd missed three sessions, that was enough. He hadn't told her why he was in such a hurry to return. He was, he knew, running out of time.

Was the therapy helping? He wasn't sure. What was it they used to believe about medicine? That the worse it tasted, the more likely it was to work? Maybe it was the same with his therapy. As hard as it was, as badly as it hurt, it had to be doing him some good. There had to be a breakthrough soon. He knew he couldn't stand much more of it.

Brian welcomed him with a smile and a handshake. "Welcome back, Luka. I missed you."

"I was sick, in the hospital."

"I know; Susan called me. You're feeling better?"

"I don't bounce back as quickly as I used to, but I'm doing ok. Well enough to sit and talk for a while."

"Good." Brian sat down, opened his notebook. "Do you want to pick up where we left off last time?"

Luka shook his head. "I don't want to die," he began abruptly. "I was lying there in the hospital, in the ICU. I had a tube down my throat. I couldn't talk. I was looking at Susan. She was sitting in the chair by my bed, holding my hand; she'd been sitting there for three days, just getting up to go to the bathroom. And all I could think was that I was going to die. Not just then, I was doing better, getting better. But soon. And it would hurt her so much. I wouldn't hurt anymore myself, but she would still be hurting. I just don't know why she stays with me. What can I offer her but unhappiness ... more pain?"

"You were already sick, with the HIV, when you got together, right?"

"Yeah."

"So she knew what she was getting into. She could have chosen to not get involved."

"I think she felt sorry for me. Still does."

"Is that really what you see when she looks at you? Pity?"

"No." Luka had to be honest. "She loves me. Or at least she thinks she does."

"And what about you? What do you feel when you look at her?"

"I don't know. I think I love her. I know that I hate the idea of hurting her, I wish I could make her happy. But when I try to measure what I feel ... against Danijela, how I felt with her ... it's different ... and I'm not sure any more what it is."

"You're a different person than you were with Danijela. You're older, you've experienced a lot more of life. Love will feel different."

"Or maybe I'm just scared. Scared of being alone, of dying alone. So many people come into the ER, alone. Old ... sick ... or young and sick ... and they have no-one. They die alone, with just strangers around them. I don't want that to be me. But is it right to hurt her ... to use her ... so it won't be me?

"No matter what I do ... if I live a long time more ... or if I die soon, I'm going to hurt her. I hate that. All I do ... all I've ever done ... is hurt people. I know that this is all ... I can accept that it's all a punishment for me ... for all that ... but why does it have to go on hurting other people even now. Why does my punishment have to hurt the one person I care about?"

"Punishment? What do you mean?" Brian asked quietly.

Luka's mouth was suddenly dry. "Payback, you know. I've hurt people. Now I'm hurting. And I figure that when the balance sheet is equal, and I've had enough pain to make up for all that I've handed out ... it will end. And I'll have some peace."

"Who have you hurt?"

Luka shrugged. "People." Brian waited. "Too many, Brian. I can't even count them."

He stood up to pace, as he often did, then realized he didn't have the strength today, even with his crutch, and sat down again. "I don't know ... is it better to die soon, before I have the chance to hurt her even more ... or to try and live as long as I can, hope that I can make her happy, at least a little bit ... do a little bit of good with what's left of my life?"

"Tell me about the people you've hurt. Not Susan. The others."

God ... why had he brought this up? Why had he come in today? He could be home in bed, resting, getting his strength back. He could be peacefully dead and not having to go through this shit at all.

"I umm ... I killed my wife ...my kids ..."

"You said they died in the war. Your apartment was shelled."

"We shouldn't have been there at all! We should have left Vukovar months before, but I didn't want to leave. I felt like I couldn't leave. My work ... I was doing my internship. Danijela ... she wouldn't leave without me, take the kids somewhere safer. She wouldn't even send them away, to her parent's house, or mine. And then, after the shelling, I could have saved them ... I didn't. I was a doctor, I'd been working in the hospital for months, dealing with this kind of thing every day. Patients would come in ... injured, dying .. and I'd help them, save them. But when I got back to the apartment, I just panicked. I didn't know what to do.

"Marko ... I saw him first ... under the rubble. All I could see was his hand. Maybe he was still alive, I didn't even check. He was my son, and I didn't even check to see if maybe he was still alive ... in pain, afraid. Even if I couldn't have saved him ... I could have been there, let him know his tata was there with him ... but I didn't. I just left him. And when I finally went back ... hours later ... pulled the wall off him ... he was already dead. But maybe if I'd gotten to him sooner ..." Luka again started to stand, to pace, then sat down again.

"Danijela and Jasna were both alive, both breathing. Danijela was bleeding badly, shrapnel in her spleen. Jasna had a head injury. She ... stopped breathing ... arrested ... almost as soon as I picked her up. Maybe if I hadn't moved her ... or if I'd gotten her down to the street, to the hospital, she could have lived. But all I could think was that I had to do CPR, keep her alive ... bring her back to life. I did it ... for hours. I kept calling for help ... praying ... no-one came. When I finally stopped ... it had been hours ... she was cold. And Danijela was dead too. She had bled to death while I was trying to save our daughter. If I'd brought them to the hospital ... I'm a doctor, Brian .. I was trained to save lives, even then. I was young, just a student, an intern, but I'd been doing it for months. In wartime ... more is expected from students. I'd been saving lives every day. But I couldn't save the three people who mattered most to me ... more than anything. I didn't even try!"

"You couldn't save them, Luka. That doesn't mean you killed them. You are a doctor. And that means you know that we can't save all our patients. Some of them will die, whatever we do. You did the best you could, in impossible circumstances. Nobody could expect more."

"I expected more. I could have done more."

"If you could have, you would have. Do you remember what you were feeling when you walked into the ruins of your apartment, saw your wife and children?"

"Scared. I was so scared ..." Luka barely whispered it. "But I shouldn't have been!"

"Why not?"

"Because they needed me. They were dying. I wasn't hurt at all. A few cuts and scrapes. I should have been able to be stronger for them. I could have saved them ... if I'd been stronger."

"You couldn't. They died because a shell hit your apartment, not because of anything you did or didn't do."

"You weren't there! You don't know what happened." Luka rubbed his leg.

"And do you?" Brian asked quietly. "After all this time, are you remembering what happened, or what your own guilty feelings have turned it into? If you had gotten them to the hospital and they had died anyway, do you think you'd feel any different? Do you feel guilty because you couldn't save them, or because you're alive and they're not?"

"That won't be an issue much longer, will it?" Luka said softly. "One thing I won't have to feel guilty about any more."

Brian leaned back in his chair. "When you die, Luka, do you expect to see them again? Be with Danijela and your kids in heaven?"

"I ... I don't know. I hope I will. It helps me to bear it.. It's made the last 12 years a little easier ..."

"Do you think she will blame you, for letting her die? For letting your children die?"

"I don't know." Luka's voice broke. He felt like he was choking. "Can we talk about something else now?"

"Luka, why are you holding on to this?"

"I don't know what you mean." He rubbed his leg, couldn't look at Brian.

"No one else blames you for what happened, and it wasn't your fault. It's long past time you stop blaming yourself ... let go of the guilt. It doesn't do you any good and letting it go won't mean that you loved them any less. They are dead. You've spent 12 years of your life grieving for them, and carrying this burden of guilt. You don't have much more time left to waste on this, so why not let it go? You have another woman in your life who needs you, a lot more than Danijela needs you right now."

Luka heard Brian saying the words. Some small part of him knew they made sense. But they rolled off of him, couldn't penetrate. Had his guilt become so much a part of him now that he couldn't let it go, or was there still just too much else? Was this pain still buried so deeply under layers of newer pain, fresher pain, that he couldn't get rid of it until he had first excavated the rest? And how could he bear to do that?

He just sat, staring out the window. He couldn't think of anything to say. Finally Brian said, "I'm going to cut our session short today. You're obviously still tired and ill. Go home, get some rest, and think about what we talked about today. We'll talk some more about it next time."