Part Four

Jim sat in the family waiting room, his back stiff and aching. He'd been listening in, trying to hear what was happening beyond the walls between him and Blair.

Melissa was whispering words of encouragement to his partner, Angie's sweet voice filtered through the cracks around the swinging doors and the low pitched sound of machinery hummed in the background.

He sat back, trying to calm himself, not really sure why he was so nervous, it was a routine surgery after all, still an uneasy feeling settled in the pit of his stomach.

Blair's heart rate seemed a little elevated, confirmed by someone calling out his friend's vitals. Jim could hear the steady thump, blood rushing through veins and the slight rattle of air being forced into Blair's lungs.

"Can I get you something?"

Jim jerked, surprised to see an elderly woman standing in front of him, a pleasant smile enhancing the deep wrinkles around her pale blue eyes, "um…sorry?"

She shook her head, smiling even wider. "I said can I get you something, a cup of coffee maybe?"

"Oh," he looked around the room, finding other people sitting in the cluster of chairs. Some families sat together, some people were on their own, but all had the same look of worry. Several other women dressed in the same yellow smocks moved around the room, talking with the other people waiting to hear word about their loved one's operations. "I ah...coffee? No thanks. I'm good."

"Okay, than." She gave a little wave. "I'll be back to give you an update on Mr. Sandburg as soon as I hear something."

He watched her as she stopped to talk to a few other people before settling in behind a desk near the front of the room. It took a few minutes for him to find Sandburg again, amongst the noise and smells of the hospital.

Dr. Ramanatha was talking to Melissa, explaining something about the intestine, asking her to hold some sort of instrument, but Jim tuned them out, instead concentrating on Blair and his heart beat. The muscle still pumped steadily, but something was off…something wasn't right.

He stood, moving to the desk and the friendly elderly lady. "Um, excuse me, Ma'am?"

She looked up from a magazine, quickly closing the cover. "Yes, Mr. Ellison? How can I help you?" She fumbled her glasses, finally folding them with shaky aged hands, sitting them on top of her copy of Cosmopolitan.

"I was hoping you might be able to find out about my partner…Mr. Sandburg. See how the surgery's going?" He didn't know how to explain what was going on, just knew that something was wrong.

She looked at him for a second then slowly rose to her feet. "I'll be right back."

He followed her progress as she disappeared through the double doors at the end of the waiting room. She shuffled her feet, a slight limp as she favored her left leg. He could hear her stopping at another set of doors, using her card key to access the rooms that lay behind them. On the other side people whispered and moaned in drug assistant sleep, nurses tended to their needs, some doctors talked with their groggy patients, explaining their recovery to the family members permitted in the recovery room for five minutes every hour.

She bypassed the curtained cubicles and went to the doors at the other end, using her card key again, entering into a quiet hallway, soft shoes scuffing the waxed tile floor. She stopped with in a few feet of entering, and Jim could hear a metal scraping sound and a small buzz. "Hello Ethel." A voice echoed through a phone receiver, a young man greeted her.

"Hi, Jake. I need an update on Mr. Sandburg."

"Be right back." His voice bounced around the room, a strange echo followed and Jim realized that the woman must be standing at the window over looking the operating room. She could probably see Blair from where she was standing. A few minutes later he heard, "Dr. Ramanatha is in the process of repairing the hole in his scrotum now. She's already removed a piece of the dead intestine and repaired the lining. He's vitals are normal; he's tolerating the procedure fine. Barring any unexpected complications, he should be done in about another sixty to ninety minutes and be in recovery by noon."

"Thank you, dear."

Jim stopped listening as she made her way back down the hall and through recovery; instead he concentrated on listening to his friend again, the worry in his gut growing with each passing second.

He tried to tell himself that he was imagining it, that he was worrying for no reason, that he allowed himself to get caught up in Blair's childhood fear, but his ears…they were telling him something else. Every fiber of his body hummed with the truth that he couldn't explain, couldn't even understand.

Blair was in trouble.

~*~*~

Time had long ago lost its meaning. He floated now on a river of pain so intense that he was sure that his heart was going to stop, that his body must be pulsing with it, but the sounds around him remained calm, a soft melody played on the radio, people's voices floated over him, sometimes muffled, sometimes loud and clear.

"So, he's more then a friend than?"

"Yes…well no." A soft giggle escaped followed by, "Blair and I have been dancing around each other for years now. He's such a sweetie, but he's busy…I'm busy."

Missy's voice faded, the sounds drifting away as a new wave of agony engulfed him. He could smell his own flesh burning, could feel something pulling on his hip, could tell that his flesh was opened and his insides were laid bare, exposed…but he couldn't move, couldn't get away from the constant pain.

He tried again to move his finger, just an inch. Get the attention of someone, anyone, but the digit didn't move.

How much longer?

Bile churned in his stomach, but his breathing stayed steady, air was forced into his lungs then drained away by a machine. He could feel it, so he tried to concentrate on that sensation instead of the all consuming pain.

He some how knew that if this didn't end soon, he wasn't going to make it. How much more could his body handle before it started to shut down.

Even as those thoughts drifted away his mother's face appeared in his minds eye, her sad eyes looked down at him and then Jim appeared, jaw set and face hard, but they both quickly disappeared to be replaced by utter darkness.

A fleeting sense of sadness overtook him.

I'm going to die.

'Come on Sweetie…don't think like that. You have to remain positive.'

The muffled voice floated to him…Mom…that was his mother's beloved voice. He tried to see her through the darkness, to hang onto something other then the pain.

'You're strong Blair…you can do this.' As Jim's voice faded into the blackness he floated along, but now the pain seemed to recede, still there, just not as…intense.

A bright light beyond his tightly closed eyes drew his attention and then in the darkness of his mind eye he could see his grandmother's smiling face looking down at him. She held out her hand, so he reached for it, surprised to feel the solidness of her hand. "Come on, darling. I've got some cookies and milk ready. De Dad is waiting for us."

Pushing up from a field of brown and dying grass, devoid of any other vegetation, and a red streaked alien sky, he held her frail and wrinkled hand in his and followed behind, yet his feet didn't seem to touch the ground...he didn't even know if he had feet.

Together they stepped through a dark doorway and he found himself in his grandparent's brightly lit kitchen. His grandfather sat at the butcher block table, reading the evening paper. But he put it aside and smiled, "Hello, son. It's so good to see you again."

Blair found himself sliding into the opposite chair and it felt solid against him, yet when he looked down he could see nothing but shadows and shades of grey. Strangely he could smell the fresh baked almond nut cookies that his Me Maw laid on a cooling rack in front of him, his favorite and he could hear her ancient refrigerator door creak shut then the pouring of cold milk into a glass of crackling ice.

He watched, it's a dream, someone whispered as she sat the first glass in front of his grandfather. Sweet pearls of laughter floated passed him as his grandfather wiped at the milk mustache that clung to the older man's whiskers.

His glass was cool in is hands, yet he didn't remember picking it up and when he reached for a cookie from the plate she sat in the center of the table they were pleasantly warm and tasted just the way he remembered them, but he didn't remember lifting one to his mouth or even taking a bite.

"I need some suction here, please. Can you retract a bit more? I've got some bleeding…"

'So, sweetie…' his Me Maw slid into the chair beside him and he focused on her warm and open face. Her eyes were still a bright blue; a riot of curls escaped the bun at the base of her neck. 'Tell me a story…I want to hear all about your latest adventures.'

So he talked, pushing the other voices away, telling them both about his life, about the university, about Jim. 'And he's the real thing…you would love him. I wish you were still…'

Alive.

That was going to be his next word, but as he looked into his grandmother's vibrant eyes, he couldn't bring himself to say it.

If my grandparents are dead, what does that make me?

His grandfather suddenly pushed back from the table, snagging a few cookies. 'I've got something for you buddy…picked it up at the antic shop in town.' The old man turned to see if he was following. 'Come on, Blair. You're gonna love this.'

He floated through the door that led to his grandparent's living room, but the old floral sofa and his De Dad's comfy lazy boy chair weren't there. Just an old oak bookshelf, then the shelf was sitting in a window display surrounded by other used furniture, a camel back sofa and he knew this place…had seen it before. He pressed his hand against the cool glass of the store front.

But it shimmered and started to fade away quickly, only the top shelf with an open and blanked page book remained and then a sea of black engulfed him and when he turned back to look, his grandfather faded into the mist.

*~*~*

A moment late, a year later he heard a new voice…

'Hello, Blair.'

A feminine voice called to him over a rolling wave of darkness.

Familiar, yet strange.

'I'm so glad to see you…'

Its gentle cadence drew him in, held his attention before other voices invaded his ears.

"I need another sponge, please…let's get the suture gun ready…" These voices intruded into his murky existence from time to time, bringing with them icy pain that waxed and waned, but now he had to strain to hear them.

He knew he had no perception of time or distance or even self, as he seemingly drifted over a great expanse of nothingness, free from his body, free from worry, an overwhelming sense of peace settled over his soul, taking away the last vestige of uncertainty and fear.

'I've been waiting for you.'

TBC