Chapter 70

Things were quiet at the hospital during Kiri's recovery period.

During Wufei's shifts he helped her to study for her GED. He was pleased with her progress and thought that she might be able to take the test very soon, perhaps even before she was released from the hospital if he could arrange it.

Duo was glad to watch movies with Kiri. He loved finding obscure classics to watch with her. The more ridiculous, the better. He felt bad that she couldn't really laugh out loud, though. She smiled a lot during the funny movies but he found himself looking forward to hearing her laugh.

Quatre and Heero let Kiri do as she pleased since she usually wanted to watch television or study.

Trowa brought in cards and played with her to keep her occupied. They could all tell how tired she was of being in the hospital but there was nothing any of them could do about it.

Cathy came by a few times. The circus would be moving along soon but for now she had permission from the manager to visit Kiri when time permitted. Everyone at the circus sent their love and told Cathy to make sure Kiri knew they would love to have her back when she was able.

Sally checked Kiri's eye every day. She was afraid that Kiri would lose her sight but at this point she had done everything she knew to save it so it was all up to fate now. Sally only hoped that Kiri wouldn't be too upset by the news.

"Hey, Hilde! How's it goin'?"

Duo had decided to check up on Hilde now that she'd had a chance to settle in. He thought she was looking much better. The bruises had faded and she had that pregnancy glow about her.

"Things are going really well, Duo."

"Good. How's Amal treatin' ya?"

Hilde blushed. "He's been a perfect gentleman, Duo."

"I expect him to be. You let me know if you need anything, okay?"

"I will, Duo."

"Love ya, babe. I'll talk to you soon."

"Love you, too, Duo. Bye."

Hilde hung up the vid phone. She thought about how Amal had been treating her since he and Rashid had picked her up from L2. Had it really only been two weeks ago? It seemed so much longer than that. Amal had taken her to dinner and shown her around L4. When she had shopping to do he accompanied her and carried everything so that she wouldn't have to. She had even invited him to come over and watch a movie this weekend.

The thought struck her that she was starting to fall for him.

Was she ready for that? She wasn't sure she was. What if she was wrong about Amal? What if he was just being nice to her because Duo and Quatre had told Rashid to make sure she was safe? What if she got her hopes up and then had them dashed to pieces? She wasn't sure she could handle that with everything else that had happened to her. She needed some stability in her life and getting involved with someone who didn't have feelings for her wasn't going to fit the bill.

"No," she told herself. "I am not getting involved."

A knock on her front door drew her out of her thoughts. She opened it to find Amal standing there.

"Good afternoon, Miss Hilde. I was wondering if you would like to go out to dinner this evening."

"Um…I don't know," she said slowly. Truth be told, she would love to go out with Amal. But she had just had this conversation with herself. Getting involved was not in her best interests.

"Oh." Amal sounded disappointed. "If you are not feeling well, is there anything I can get you?"

"No, it isn't that," Hilde told him. "It's just…"

She wasn't sure how to explain it. She didn't want to hurt his feelings and she didn't want to offend him.

"You can tell me," Amal told her. "I cannot help you if I don't know what is wrong."

Hilde sighed. "I just don't want to take advantage of your kindness, Amal. You've been so nice to me and I know that Rashid told you to help me so I don't want you to think that I don't appreciate that. But I don't want to keep you from your family or your girlfriend or whatever else you want to be doing instead of babysitting me."

Amal blinked at her in surprise. "I do not consider spending time with you 'babysitting,' Miss Hilde. And Rashid has not asked me to supervise you or entertain you in any way. I enjoy spending time with you but if it bothers you that I do so I will not force my company on you."

"Uh…um…" Hilde stammered. "I didn't mean it like that. I enjoy spending time with you, too. I just didn't want to overstep my bounds or…" She sighed. "I'm not explaining myself very well. I think I may have started to develop feelings for you and it scares me a little because I don't know how you feel about me and I don't want to get hurt again. And I don't want you to feel obligated to have feelings about me just because I said I might have feelings for you. Does that make any sense or am I just making this even more confusing?"

Amal chuckled. "I think I understand what you are trying to say. I like you Miss Hilde. I would like to spend more time getting to know you if that is okay with you."

Hilde smiled. "I'd like that very much, Amal."

"Good. Would you like to go out to dinner this evening?"

"Yes, Amal. What time would you like to go?"

"Kiri? You okay?"

Kiri nodded but Quatre wasn't sure she was telling the truth. She seemed really keyed up.

"Sally should be here any minute. Do you want anything?" Quatre knew that sometimes the worst part of anything was waiting for it to happen. That probably held true for Kiri this morning. Sally was supposed to take off Kiri's bandages today and then they would be able to tell how her sight was affected.

Kiri shook her head.

"Hmm." Quatre could feel that the reason she didn't want anything was because she was nervous but if she wasn't going to bring it up, he wouldn't call her out on it. He had hoped that she would want a distraction of some kind. It would help her relax. Instead they both sat in silence for about ten minutes while they waited for Sally.

Quatre wasn't sure if Kiri was relieved at all when he let Sally in but he knew that he was glad she'd finally shown up.

"Good afternoon, Kiri," Sally said as she came into the room.

Kiri nodded a greeting.

"I have some good news and some bad news. Which would you like first?"

Kiri shrugged.

"Okay then…bad news first." Sally wanted to get this over with. She took a deep breath. "I can't save your eye. I mean, you'll still have it but you won't see out of it again. I'm sorry."

Kiri looked down for a moment before writing, 'It's okay. I kind of expected that.'

"You did?" Sally hadn't tried to get her hopes up but she hadn't tried to dissuade her from wanting to be able to see out of the eye again.

Kiri nodded.

"Oh. Well the good news is that I think I can fix your voice."

'Really?'

Kiri's expression said that she was excited about that idea. It made Sally feel better to know that she could give Kiri something in exchange for her sight.

Sally nodded and smiled. "I've been doing some research and after looking at those scans we took a few days ago, all it should take is a simple surgical procedure. But there are some risks involved. If something goes wrong, you'll never talk again." Sally wanted Kiri to know that it wasn't guaranteed to work. If something went wrong, Sally didn't want Kiri to hate her.

Kiri didn't respond for a few minutes. When she finally wrote her answer, Sally was surprised.

'Okay. Let's do it.'

Sally gave her a serious look. "You're sure?" She didn't want Kiri to regret the decision if it didn't work out.

Kiri looked her in the eye and nodded.

"All right. I'll go set up the appointment and I'll let you know when we can do it. For now, let's go ahead and get this bandage off your eye. It's as healed as it's going to get."

Sally carefully pulled the bandage off and cleaned the sticky residue off of Kiri's cheek. Now for the tricky part.

"Okay, Kiri. I want you to keep your eyes open and stare straight ahead while I remove these stitches."

Kiri held very still while Sally removed the tiny stitches from her eye. There was a scar above and below her eye, but there wasn't anything that Sally could do about it. It was likely that the scar would fade in time and Kiri could always use makeup to cover them if she really wanted to.

"There we go. Do you need anything?"

Kiri shook her head.

"All right. Take it easy tonight and let Quatre know if you need anything."

As soon as the door closed behind Sally, Kiri was off the bed and heading for the bathroom. Quatre followed her, feeling her emotions start to take off.

"Are you really okay, Kiri?" Quatre asked less because he needed to know how she was feeling and more because he wanted to make sure she wasn't shutting down.

Kiri stared into the mirror. Quatre watched as she dissolved into tears. He put his arms around her, offering what little comfort he could. He couldn't give her her sight back. He couldn't take back what Carter had done to her. He couldn't take back what Chase had done to her. He could only hold her while she cried and try to help her understand that she wasn't alone anymore.

"Shhh…it's okay. I know it sucks but it'll be okay," he soothed.

He carefully led her back to the bed and sat next to her. She leaned into him, still bawling. He rubbed her back. "That's it…get it out," he murmured softly.

It took a while but Kiri finally managed to cry herself out. They sat in silence for a while. When Quatre felt like she'd calmed down enough not to be set off again he spoke.

"Why don't we get some dinner?"

Kiri shook her head. Quatre wasn't very surprised. The shock was enough to make anyone lose their appetite.

"Well, Trowa's on duty tonight so if you get hungry, tell him."

Kiri nodded. Quatre hoped that Trowa would be able to cheer her up. The best that Quatre could hope for was to distract her enough to keep her from shutting down any further.

"Why don't we see if there's a movie you want to watch? Get your mind off of things for a bit?"

Kiri nodded to Quatre's relief. He got up to find the remote and was glad that Kiri seemed to be making herself comfortable. Quatre found the pay movie lists and went through them. Kiri didn't indicate that she wanted to watch any of them so he went through the lists again. After the third time Kiri waved with her hand and Quatre interpreted the motion as "You pick."

Quatre sighed. He knew Kiri was still upset but had hoped that a movie might cheer her up just a little bit. He picked a slightly older animated movie because the storyline wouldn't be something that Kiri would have to focus on. Quatre was growing frustrated because Kiri was still upset but she wasn't admitting it and he didn't want to push her so he didn't say anything about it. Quatre was grateful when Trowa showed up.

"How are things going?" Trowa asked as Quatre let him into the room.

"As well as can be expected, I suppose."

Trowa looked at Kiri, who was staring at the television. She seemed to be really into the show.

"What're you watching?" he asked.

It took a moment for Kiri to respond and when she did, all she managed was a shrug.

That concerned Trowa. Kiri's eyes were still glued to the screen.

"Quatre?"

Quatre glanced at Kiri. "She's upset about her eye. I don't know how responsive she'll be tonight. I think Sally is going to set up an appointment for her throat to be fixed tomorrow morning so if you can get her to relax and sleep tonight that would be ideal."

Trowa nodded. "I'll see what I can do. Has she eaten yet?"

Quatre shook his head. "She said she wasn't hungry."

"Okay. Go ahead and go home. I can take it from here."

"Goodnight, Kiri," Quatre said. She didn't seem to hear him so he shrugged and said goodbye to Trowa, leaving his friend to figure out how to get through to the upset girl.

Trowa watched Kiri stare blankly at the television for a few minutes before deciding that enough was enough. He stepped in front of her and said "Hey." She didn't respond so he knelt down next to the bed. "How are you doing?"

Kiri shook her head. Trowa gently wiped a tear from her cheek and then sat next to her on the bed. He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close.

"I don't blame you for being upset." He really didn't. He would have been upset at the loss of an eye, too. Making Kiri feel bad because she was upset wouldn't fix anything and he wanted her to know that he didn't expect her to be happy about the situation.

Kiri just wrapped her arms around him and leaned against his chest. She didn't try to communicate and Trowa was sure she wasn't watching the movie, either. She just needed to be comforted and Trowa wasn't going to complain about it. After a while, Trowa felt that she'd calmed down enough to try and get her to eat something.

"You should eat," he told her gently.

Kiri shook her head, still staring off into space.

Trowa gently ran his thumb over the scar across her eye. Kiri finally looked up at him. He kissed her forehead.

"You should eat," he repeated. "If Sally sets up your procedure for tomorrow you won't get to eat again until it's over with."

Kiri seemed to think that over before sitting up. Trowa took that as a positive sign and handed her the hospital menu. It took her a while but she finally pointed out a chef salad. Trowa called in the food order and got her a piece of chocolate cake as well. He was glad she could eat whatever she wanted now and he knew that she was so distracted she wouldn't have thought to order the cake for herself. When she started to eat the cake, Trowa was glad he'd ordered it for her. At this point he didn't care what she ate as long as she ate something.

Trowa found another movie to watch while they ate. Kiri seemed to pay a little more attention to it than the last movie and Trowa hoped that she was coming out of her funk. When they were done eating, Trowa passed the trays to an orderly and then sat next to Kiri on her bed again. He leaned against the pillows and gently tugged Kiri down next to him. She snuggled up next to him and used his arm as a pillow. It wasn't long before she fell asleep.

Trowa didn't move. He was comfortable. Kiri was apparently comfortable. He wanted her to sleep as well as she was able in case Sally managed to set up Kiri's operation for tomorrow.

They stayed that way for a several hours and Trowa was glad to note that Kiri slept peacefully and didn't so much as move. A soft knock on the door prompted Trowa to pry himself off the bed. He carefully laid Kiri down and answered the door.

"Hey Trowa," Duo greeted as he came in. "How've things been?"

"She's finally sleeping so try not to wake her. If she does wake up, just turn on a movie and let her do what she wants."

Duo frowned. "What's going on with her?"

"She found out that she's lost the sight in her eye. She's trying to put on a brave face but she's been really upset about it."

"Poor kid. Why don't you head out? You must be tired."

Trowa wasn't really very tired. He'd spent the last few hours lying down, after all. He was about to leave when Kiri let out a strangled whimper. She tossed and turned on the bed, kicking the blanket off.

"Crap. Another nightmare," Duo grumbled. "Why does she always have those when I'm on duty?"

Trowa didn't answer. He went over to the bed and rubbed Kiri's arm while he talked to her softly. "It's okay, Kiri. You're safe here. I won't let anyone hurt you. Settle down. That's it. You're safe and you can sleep."

Kiri settled again and Trowa put the blanket back over her.

"Thanks, Trowa. I hate when she gets those. Seems like everything I do to try and stop 'em just backfires," Duo said.

Trowa thought for a moment. "I have an idea. I'll be back in a little bit."

Duo made sure the door was secure after Trowa left and settled into the chair with the television remote. He'd finally picked a movie when there was a soft knock on the door. Duo opened it to find Trowa holding a stuffed lion. Trowa set the lion on the bed next to Kiri and gently nudged her arm until she wrapped it around the stuffed toy. She settled a little deeper into sleep with a sigh.

"That should help," Trowa said softly.

Duo wasn't so sure but he didn't see how it could hurt, either. "You should get going. If she wakes up you might not get away at all."

"I don't see that as a problem."

Duo smirked. "Yeah, but if Une found out, she might."

"I don't care what she thinks. But if it makes you happy, I'll go home. If Kiri wakes up and you can't get her to sleep again, call me."

Duo said he would and secured the door again. He settled in to watch his movie and wait for his shift to be over.