Disclaimer: As before

Author's Note:

Baton Rouge

June 9th 2007

To My Roomie

There, happy now? You're right, I'm never going to let you forget that. Whenever you moan at being called a nickname, I'm going to remind you of that request for the rest of time. It seems kind of strange calling you that now seeing as we're however many hundreds of miles it is apart, but you'll always be my roomie.

I know it's been a few days since your letter hit the mat, but I wanted to wait until after I'd seen the specialist before I replied. And then after I'd seen him, I wanted to wait until after my PT session today. Guess why? Yep, that's right. I have legs! I got the go ahead from the specialist on Thursday then had my first fitting for prosthetics straight after – they're very keen on getting things moving quickly here, which is kinda good. Gives you less time to think or dwell on things. You're so focused on overcoming the physical barriers you sort of don't really notice the emotional ones until you're past them.

Anyway, it's taken a couple of days to get the prosthetics quite right, but they are now, and in PT today, I took my very first steps again. It was absolute agony, and I could only manage three steps (two with my right leg, one with my left) before I had to sit back in the chair again – I couldn't believe how exhausting it was. But what does that matter? I was walking. Walking Neela. I never dreamed it would be so soon. It's only just over a month since it happened, and already I'm on my feet again (so to speak!) It was amazing, completely worth the pain. I don't think I've ever been so proud of myself for something. I know there's still such a long way to go, but already I feel more positive about it. It's as if I can see a time when I'm going to be able to get something like my old life back, and it's not as far away as I thought it would be.

Now I feel like I'm being selfish in my letter writing. I haven't even asked how you are yet. You poured out all that in your last letter and all I can respond with is me me me. I'm not sorry though – I'm too excited, and besides, I know you want to know about all that stuff. But onto your letter.

Neela, I… I'm not quite sure what to say. I agree on one point certainly – it is hard seeing the words on paper in black and white, there's no escape from them. Not that I want to escape from what you said. Damn, this is coming out all wrong. What I'm trying to say is thank you for telling me, explaining. So much went on between us that was never alluded to by anything more than a long look, a smile, maybe a brushing of hands that lasted a little too long that most of the time, I was sure I was in this alone. It's really good to hear I wasn't, even though now I'm kicking myself (metaphorically of course – sorry, I've developed rather a dark sense of humor. My Mom hates it but it amuses me) for all those missed opportunities.

I appreciate your explanation about Michael, I really do, but I never blamed you for any of that. You were married, he wasn't there, and things between us were getting complicated. I get all that, it's okay. It's after he died that it really began to fall apart. Sure, I was devastated when you left, but I understood your reasoning; that's why I let you go. In my more altruistic moments (few and far between, I know!) I even agreed with you. When he died though, all I wanted to do was help you, be there for you, to be your friend, and you wouldn't let me. That hurt. Badly.

As for when we were up on the roof, if I'd had any idea that was how you were feeling, I swear to all that is Holy I'd have taken you in my arms and held you and never ever let you go. But I didn't have the slightest clue. You see, when you tell me things, I tend to believe you. "Stay the Hell away from me." "You won't have to wait long." I have to tell you, and I hope you can see why, I don't trust you like that now, I can't. But then, you also told me I'd get through this, and I will, I am, so… I want to trust you again. In time, I hope I can.

Before that though, I'm going to need an explanation about Gates. Not that I want to ruin these letters by having his name in them, but I need to understand, why him? I know you told me at the wedding, he was new, there was no history, and that I get, but why for so long? Why did you get so involved? Why didn't you just cut him loose when you knew I wanted you to? After we kissed, I hoped, I truly believed, it was going to be the start of something between us, a real relationship, but in fact it was just the start of the next round of heartache. I'm sorry that I have to ask you this, to rake up all the bad feeling (I've never felt as awful in my life as when we had that shouting match in front of everyone. I hated us both then. I couldn't believe we'd let things slide that far.) but I have to get past this before we can move forward. I should tell you, I saw you on the balcony with him. That's why I started drinking, picked the fight. If you have some explanation for that that doesn't involve you lying to me, or going back to him behind my back, or cheapening the things you said before Hope interrupted, then I really need to hear it.

That's all I'm going to say on that for now. I'm not blaming you, or criticising or anything like that. I just need an explanation and I think you'd agree; you owe me that much. On a different note, I don't know to where I'm thinking about travelling. It depends on a lot of things, time, fitness, money. Although money might not be too much of a problem. Apparently you're not allowed to go about mowing down pedestrians even if they are too drunk to haul their sorry ass out of the way, and my lawyer says the truck company will be keen to settle out of court – I could be looking at a pretty big payout. Not that I care about the money, but it would be nice if I could help Mom out financially – she's had to give up one of her jobs to look after me, and I still have some med school debts to pay off. Where was I? Oh yeah. I thought perhaps Europe, expose myself to a bit of culture. Or Australia. I don't know.

As for medicine again… one step at a time. I promise you I haven't ruled it out, I just kind of haven't ruled it in either. To be honest, I haven't given it a lot of thought yet, not as much as it deserves anyway. At the end of the day though, I'm going to have to do something, and I am still a doctor, so…?

I'm glad you listened to the CD. Yeah it was track four. I'm assuming from your comment about playing it on repeat that you liked it? Tell Abby I say you can play it as much as you like and she's to keep her hands off it! It wasn't easy to write, but it said a lot of things that I was too scared to tell you face to face. Singing made it easier somehow. As for some of the other tracks, just so you know, my computer will be traumatised forever. But hey, anything for my roomie.

Man, I just made the mistake of looking back and seeing how long I've been rambling on for; I don't think I've written so much since I was at med school! That'll do for now – I don't want to be tearing you away from those cheap novels for too long! Take care Neela, and good luck for being back at work.

R

PS I miss you too.