Chapter 8

I was waiting in the bed for what felt like hours but was actually only fifteen minutes when somebody finally walked out of the room everybody had abandoned me in. Sadly, he was not the person I wanted to see.

"What do you want Gally?" I asked in annoyance

"Just checking you were okay is all, you were out for a long time." He said as he walked further into the room and took a seat in the chair next to my bed.

"I'm fine." I said curtly

"That's good. Newt said he couldn't come see you by the way, said he was too busy." Gally said

I tried to hide the hurt I felt behind my eyes but I doubted I did very well. Knowing Newt didn't want to see me when I had been in a coma like state for two weeks hurt, not physically but emotionally. I thought we were friends. I thought he would want to know how I was after all this time. I guess I was wrong.

"Okay." I whispered, hanging my head to hide the tears brimming in my eyes.

I heard the chair next to the bed scrape backwards and Gally's footsteps retreating out of the door, signalling he had left. He had only come to tell me Newt couldn't see me which technically wasn't his fault if he had jobs to do but I had hoped he would want to see me as much as I did him.

Nobody else came to visit me after that a part from Jeff who would check on me every few hours to make sure I was okay and not slipping into another coma. It was the middle of the day when I had woken up but I was so tired I barely had any energy in me to keep my eyes awake even though I had
literally been sleeping for a fortnight.

I was terrified of closing my eyes again in case I was dragged into more memories I did not want to see. You would think I would be happy to be getting my memories back but it was actually the opposite. Knowing my past had me questioning every little thing about myself and I was genuinely scared to have the knowledge that should define who I am as a person. I had seen so much in such a short amount of time and had been forced into reliving what I could only presume was the worst times of my life.

While my eyes were drooping and I was fighting to stay awake I had a sudden thought related to the last memory I had before I woke up. I carefully swung my legs off of the bed so that I was sitting on the edge of it and then I pulled up the hem of my t-shirt slightly so I could look at my right hip and just as I had expected and feared to see, a small circular scar was there, standing out on my already pale skin.

I couldn't stop gaping at it once I saw it and I was reminded of the searing pain I had felt in the memory. I slowly reached down and touched the scar, not sure what I was expecting but not getting a reaction anyway. The skin was much softer where the scar was than where the rest of my skin which made me think of how delicate a single bullet wound could make me.

I heard someone walking up the creaking staircase of the homestead so I pulled down my top so it covered my scar and sat back in the bed so that the person who was coming up wouldn't know I had been up to something if they did come into the room. Alby walked in not ten seconds later with a sad smile on his face when he saw me.

"How you feeling Soldier?" He asked as he walked into the room

"Soldier?" I asked He looked surprised but then coughed awkwardly before answering.

"While you were uh... sleeping, everyone just sort of started giving you a nickname while you were out to try and get you to react while we talked to you." He said

"Oh, okay. So you chose soldier?" I laughed

"No actually, I was going to call you Low but Newt wouldn't let anyone call you that." He explained

I blush crept onto my face at the mention of Newt even though it shouldn't have affected me. I cleared my throat and begged for the blush to vanish but I could feel the heat on my face like a permanent reminder of its appearance.

"Speaking of Newt, can you tell him that I want to see him, when he has the time that is." I added at the end

"Sure thing but, why wouldn't he have the time?" Alby asked, clearly confused

"Because he's been really busy." I said

"Busy? Newt hasn't done anything for the best two weeks. He's been by your bed day in and day out, waiting for you to wake up. Actually, I think this is the longest time he has been away from you in those two weeks." Alby said

"But I thought the reason he hasn't come to see me was because he was busy." I said, not bothering to hide the hurt in my voice when it was written all over my face.

"Sorry Willow." Alby said

I only nodded my head and finally, allowed my eyes to close so I could drift into sleep. No dreams or memories were waiting for me when I gave in to my fatigue so I was able to have a few hours of peaceful sleep, all but dead to the world as I finally relaxed.

It was a hand clamped over my mouth that woke me up from my once peaceful sleep and to say I was startled was an understatement. I tried screaming bloody murder in hopes of scaring off the person that was in the room with me but that only made them tighten their hold on me until I finally gave up.

"Bloody hell Willow!" Someone hissed in the darkness. I had been asleep for a few hours because the entire Glade was silent in the darkness, meaning they were all sleeping soundly apart from me and the person that had decided to scare the klunk out of me.

I stopped screaming and just stared at the dark silhouette in front of me, hoping to get a glimpse of their face so I would be able to tell who the person was. It was too dark for me to see their face but I could easily identify the person was very tall and that was about it.

"Will you scream again if I remove my hand?" My attacker whispered

I realised who the person was and slowly shook my head silently, already knowing that Newt would have a reason for wanting to see me in the dead of the night. He removed his hand and I sighed in relief at being able to breath properly again. Newt moved back slightly from where he had previously been hovering over my body and quietly cleared his throat before he took my arm and pulled me out of the bed. I almost fell to the floor with the sudden movement, partly because I wasn't prepared to actually stand on my own two feet and also because I hadn't actually walked anywhere for two weeks since nobody would let me walk around after I had woken up.

Thankfully, Newt caught me before I could hit the floor and helped me stand as I tried to get used to walking again. It was hard considering my legs felt like they were so stiff so Newt had to help me walk a lot of the way out of the Homestead but I didn't know why because he had refused to see me all day. I was confused but didn't say anything as we walked around the empty Glade and headed towards the deadheads, probably so nobody would wake up while we talked, because we would be talking whether he liked it or not.

Once we were deep into the growth of the trees we both sat down on a log and sat in silence for a while, listening to the distant sounds of the maze changing behind the four walls in fascination. I couldn't help but notice Newt put as much distance as the log allowed between us and I didn't know why which was incredibly frustrating. I thought we were friends.

"How are you feeling?" Newt asked, breaking the silence

"Okay." I said

He nodded his head once.

"Why wouldn't you come to see me?" I asked at the same time he opened his mouth to speak

He closed his mouth and looked away, probably contemplating what he would say before hand. I waited patiently, wanting to know why he had ignored me ever since I woke up.

"I thought you would want to spend more time with the others." Newt said after a while

"Why would you think that?" I asked almost immediately after

"When you were ... asleep you reacted to some of the things we said." He said

"Like what?"

"Well we tried different techniques to get you to wake up and well one of them was uh me and Minho said if you wouldn't wake up we would punch each other." He explained

"Okay..." I drawled out

"And well, when I said I would punch Minho you squeezed my hand a bit and then when Minho said he would punch me you didn't do anything." He explained

I could see where this was going but I wanted to make sure I knew what he was saying.

"So why would you think that I wouldn't want to see you?" I asked

"Well, because you reacted when Minho was getting hurt and I wasn't so I just thought you preferred him to me." Newt said

"You're really stupid, you know that?" I said while laughing slightly

"Uh What?" He asked

"I wasn't reacting to Minho being hurt I was reacting to your voice you idiot." I said, taking hold of his hand and weaving my fingers through his.

"Oh." He whispered

"As if I would prefer Minho to you." I whispered

I gently put my head on his shoulder and closed my eyes, taking comfort in his closeness. I had decided that I didn't care what me and Newt where before the Glade because a lot of things had happened to me before this. I only cared about what we were now and even though I didn't know how he felt about me I knew I felt something for him, something more than just a friendship.

"I'm happy you're awake." Newt whispered into the night

I hummed quietly although I wasn't really paying attention because I was slowly slipping into another sleep that I wasn't fighting off. I think Newt could tell I was tired because he softly chuckled and slipped a hand to the back of my legs and took his hand out of my own so he could put it to my back. He lifted me up and carried me bridal style to the homestead and I snuggled into his chest, absorbing his warmth in the cold night air.

The walk seemed to be over in less than five seconds and before I knew it Newt was placing me on the bed and covering me in the blankets. I felt him put a soft kiss on my temple before he slowly walked out of the room but I groaned in protest and he walked back to the bed.

"Stay with me." I whispered with my eyes still closed

He didn't say anything but I felt the bed dip as he crawled into it and then felt his arm snake around my waist and pull me closer to him so that my back was pressed against his toned chest.

"We don't usually go to sleep like this." I whispered

"I thought we could try something different." He whispered next to my ear which sent shivers down my back.

I hummed another response and fell asleep with Newts strong arms wrapped around me.

The next morning I woke up to the sounds of people whispering around the room and I could only guess that Minho would be one of them.

"They look so cute!" One person mused

"I wish I had a camera." Someone else said

"I want to wake them up." Another person said

I cracked my eyes open to see who had woken me up from my peaceful slumber and came face to face with three of the boys in the Glade who I had grown quite close to. Minho, Jeff and Chuck.

"Don't bother I'm already up." I mumbled as I sat up and rubbed the sleep out of my eyes.

Newt was already awake too but was staring up at me from where he was lying in the bed still. I smiled down at him and he gave me a lazy grin in return which made my heart do a weird fluttering thing again.

"Can I get out of this bed now? I want to be useful and do something." I sighed

Minho, Chuck, Newt and I all looked at Jeff and he shrugged his shoulders and went to go find Clint to ask if I was able to leave or not. When he returned I was told I would be able to leave and if I wanted I could work in the gardens but I wasn't allowed to do anything too challenging which I scoffed at.

Everybody cleared out of the room when I told them I wanted a shower but Newt stayed behind with me so that he could guard the door when I was in there which I found really nice. Before we went to the little hut in the deadheads Newt let me grab the small box from under his bed with all of the sanitary things I needed. I was also informed that the box had brought up some new clothes for me while I was in my comma so I was able to grab them from his room as well.

I tried not to take too long washing my hair and scrubbing my body so Newt wouldn't get annoyed so I was only in the little hut for ten minutes and that included getting dried off, getting dressed and doing my hair in a fishtail braid to keep it out of the way while it dried. The clothes I had chosen to put on where a pair of camouflage green baggy pants and a white tank top. I walked out of the hut with my box and old clothes in hand and let Newt take me back to the homestead so I could drop of my things before we went to breakfast. Frypan gave me a larger portion of food than he normally would have and told me he was happy to see me again which I smiled at. While Newt and I ate at an empty picnic table more and more of the gladers started coming over to me to say they were glad I was okay. I could tell it bothered Newt every time someone would come over to me but every time they did I only smiled at them and then continued my conversation with Newt. I didn't want to be rude but I also didn't want Newt to be angry all day.

We went to the gardens straight after breakfast and a boy called Zart who was the keeper of the Track-hoes and gardeners showed me how to plant seeds and how to properly pull up roots and other things. I was told I would be working at this job all day which I didn't mind because Newt was also working in the gardens even though he didn't need to since he was second in command to Alby.

By lunch time I had planted countless amount of seeds and had picked too many vegetables out of the ground so I was relieved when Zart relieved me from my gardening duties for an hour. Newt joined me for lunch but instead of sitting at a picnic table we wondered into the deadheads because of its calming demeanour.

Once we got there I was quick to jump into a tree while Newt only strayed a few branches up before residing to sitting down beneath me. As we ate I contemplated if I should tell Newt about the dreams and memories I had remembered while I had been in the coma but when I couldn't think of a good answer I decided to question Newt on what else I had done while I was unconscious.

"I mean, I know I responded to some of the things you said and everything, but I was wondering if I did anything else?" I explained when I saw Newts confused expression.

"Well not really. You barely did anything which made a lot of us more bloody worried about you but apart from that nothing really. Apart from that one time before you woke up you sort of had a fit I guess where you just shook a lot and then started jerking around a lot and screaming." He said

Newts POV

I didn't know if I should tell Willow about the other things she did while she was in the coma because I didn't want to scare her. She did have a right to know but then again if she knew what she had done she probably wouldn't have wanted to know.

I wasn't hiding that much from her anyway because I had told her mostly everything she had done while she was unconscious. The only thing I left out was what she had said while she was sleeping but that was because I knew she would be embarrassed if she found out. I mean, I think any girl would be embarrassed if she found out she had screamed and begged for a boy to help her while she slept.

I knew if she found out she would get the wrong conclusion and think that I thought she had been screaming out for me for a completely different reason than what I already thought. Any other boy like Minho or Gally would probably say that she had been begging for something more intimate when I heard her pleas but I knew different. Her screams where bloodcurdling and filled with a frighteningly scary pain that would definitely not be from the dreams Minho thought she had been having.

When she screamed it was like she was being attacked and I felt helpless, hearing her begging for me to help her and knowing I could do nothing. I hoped it would only be a one time thing but during the two weeks in was almost a daily occurrence and every glader could hear it because of how loud she was.

It was the type of scream we have heard when someone was stung by a griever and they went through the changing but it was much worse which was why nobody said anything about it to me when they heard it. Not even Gally.

While Willow was unconscious I had stayed by her bedside every day and talked to her to try and get her to wake up but to no avail. When she reacted to what I said about Minho I had been furious because I had tried so hard to get her awake and she had done just that when Minho was involved which was why I hadn't seen her. I was so relieved when I found out she was reacting to my voice because I did like her a lot.

The other gladers had guessed that I liked her the first day she arrived but it was only when I saw her fighting Gally that I realised that what they were saying was true. I did like her more than I cared to admit but I would wait for her. She had been through too much already and I didn't want to add more stress to her by telling her I liked her when we had such a good friendship already.

I just had to hope she doesn't make me wait too long.

A/N so today is going to be a double update day because I'm going away for two weeks and don't know if I will be able to update anything while I'm gone. Sorry for the wait but I hope you enjoyed this chapter.

Please tell me what you think and follow this story if you like it,

thanks.