Obligations
Chapter 4

Category: Angst.
Summary: Luka. Luka. Luka.
Disclaimer: Don't own Luka/ER.

Happens around Season 9.

A/N: Carter and Abby have broken up some time ago in this story, because I didn't like that. So they're just friends.
A/N: So here we go again! The second last chapter and the last long (Long for me) chapter. The last chapter will be just a short epilogue of some sorts. But anyways a thank you to the reviewers, Mrs. Eyre, Amy and Ella. You made my day!

-Virva

I could stare at that wall for a very long time. In a way I'm challenging it. Challenging myself. It's quite a beautiful wall. I don't know.

My therapist doesn't know either. I guess.

It's my first day back. At work. I'm supposed to work, so I came. I'm obliged to work. To live. Weaver thought it was a little too early. I thought it was a little too late anyway.

I don't know.

I don't care.

Abby has come around my place every evening. Is she afraid of what I might do? What I did? What I will do? Will I?

It's quite nice, actually. But in a way it makes me.

I don't know.

I go back to my patient with chest pains. I can see the others looking at me. The rumor mill of the ER has gone crazy, I guess. The foreign doc who goes nuts and tries to off himself sells much. Why did he do it? Will he do it again? Why is he back to work so early?

I never was quite the drinker. Never, before. Maybe.

I don't know.

I don't know a lot of things.

I swirl the liquid around. I can see my reflection from the surface of it. My eyes are a little sunken.

The door bell rings. I'm almost used to it now. I'm almost expecting it.

Almost expecting her.

She smiles at me when I open the door. She doesn't question the half-empty bottle on my kitchen table. Or the two empty ones beside it. Or the few cans littered on the worktables. Or the fact that I'm a bit drunk. A bit. A bit more than a bit, perhaps.

She sits down on the sofa. Makes herself comfortable. I swirl my drink around. Swirl, swirl, swirl.

It's been like this for a while now. I drink and she watches. I swirl and she watches. Sometimes I talk and she listens. Sometimes she talks. But more of the drinking and swirling and watching.

When did we become like this? Were we always like this?

She talks. "Luka, I… I'd like to know, need to know, if." She pauses, searching for something. The right words? There are no right words. No right thing to do. No right nothing. "If you're planning to do it again, if…"

If I'm planning to kill myself? If I'm considering the different options right now? Different ways in which to have an ending?

Do I want an ending?

"I don't know. I didn't plan it. If, then I don't plan it again. Maybe. I don't know." But I know that I'm not making any sense. I know. She knows.

"If you didn't plan on killing yourself, then why did you do it? Mmm, why did you, Luka?" Her voice has hitched up an octave. She wants to know. She has wanted to know for a long time. I don't know is a bad answer. I don't know is the least right set of words. I don't know is for my therapist so that he can curl up his brown shoes and pretend not to be exasperated with me. Not to her. Not her.

"I just… woke up one morning and realized that all I had was lost. Lost or broken." Unfixable. Unreachable. Un-everything. Unalive.

She has that expression again. That expression.

She reaches for my hand. Squeezes it. Makes me feel.