This is a short one. I wanted to tell you that if any of you are Twilight fans (hardcore, mild w/e, or having it as a guilty plesure like me), I'm participating in the Twilight big bang over at lj! I'm still unsure if I will be able to finish it in time - but there will be a Twilight ff from me sometime this year! (I remember when writing a fanfic wasn't a big deal
Please review, I put a lot of effort into this story, and I would love to hear from those who have read it!
The crumbs on the table stuck to Dana's sleeve as she sat down on the chair heavily, thinking about the day facing her. John stood by the sink, yawning while staring down at the dishes with an empty look. It hadn't taken long for Dana to understand that John was not a morning person.
"Maybe we should… see if it is possible first," he said distracted, blinking as he turned around. There was still sleep in his eyes.
"I'm sure that it is. I mean, it is not the Stone Age anymore, they have therapy for dogs!" She said animatedly.
"Just don't say anything to Ally before you have looked it up," he said with a sigh, blinking again. "I need a shower and then I'll wake Les. Is there anything you have planned today?"
"No, I'll be home by half past five." She stood up from the table and brushed away the crumbs from her sleeves.
"Ok, good to know," he answered before turning to walk to the shower.
--
The summer was getting closer, leaving the winter behind, and everywhere the trees were finally growing leaves. The grass was getting greener, and children were running around. It reminded her a lot of the place she had grown up in, only this place was closer to a city and this was not the seventies.
She stood by the end of the street and stared at the forest, a piece of untouched land. It would be so easy to find a metaphor, she thought, and decided to just watch. It had taken a while to get here; she just walked straight until the road ended. Outside the house to the left of hers two children were running around, screaming in delight, just as the children had at Leslie's birthday party. It had been a while since then, and she hadn't seen House once.
She figured it was best that way, far away from each other. Neither did anything good in each other's lives.
The sun was high on the sky, shining down at her. It was all such a contrast from what she felt inside, this was sunny, perfect. Birds were singing, children were laughing, and flowers were fighting through the ground. Everything was abundant of life, but she was still dead alive. She was more living than this fall, but sometimes the pain crippled her, when she realized her own isolation, discovered the bars of her prison again.
House made moving on seem so simple, but he of all people should know the need to hold on.
(
Noise, it was everywhere, attacking her from all sides. It pressed her into a corner. Everyone demanded it from her too, they ran around, their eyes wild as a man was rolled into the ER on a stretcher. Her feet stuck to the ground, she knew it was time to act, to talk, but her mind was tired, and she was scared. What would happen if her husband came in here, and saw her talk? The fear crippled her even more.
Her breathing got louder until it was all she could hear, her head was spinning and her legs were tingling. She vaguely recognized the signs of a panic attack, as her eyes swept over the entrance door, but he was not standing there. Quickly, she closed her eyes, trying to block out all of the noises, trying to concentrate on work. Two seconds later she was running through the ER. Green, blue, pink, red, purple, white, flashed by her. Color dots that she needed to escape, needed to flee. Seek refuge.
She sat down on the toilet lid in one of the stalls, her breathing still fast and irregular. Tears were springing to her eyes as she slammed her fists into the walls separating the stalls.
"Dr. Stanley, are you ok?" She recognized the voice as Nurse Paula, not a woman she often had a shift with, only on rare occasions. When she opened her mouth to answer the question, she found that no words would come, instead of tears violent silent sobs wrecked her body and she doubled over. This was the end, she knew it: there would be no more second or third chances. This had happened one too many times.
"Dr. Stanley?" Nurse Paula seemed genuinely worried as her knocks became more insistent. Before she had at least answered when spoken to, this was not how they would ever have thought she would act. Dr. Cameron who worked under House and was the kind one, the Dr. Cameron that married the charming Mr. Stanley that used to work in accounting. They were such a lovely couple.
)
As she turned the forest her back, and looked at the houses that passed her again, she thought of the apartment she had before she married Charlie. It had been the perfect apartment for one person, big enough to allow her to have a visitor every now and then. In that apartment she had grown so much as a person, many things that Charlie would strip her from in only a few months.
Having her own apartment was a liberty that she hadn't appreciated until she moved to New Jersey. Before, it was always associated with the loss of her husband. New Jersey had been her new start. She was finally smelling the roses again, hearing the birds in the trees, and nothing would take that away from her.
It was probably time for her to get her own apartment, to start her own life again, stand on her own feet. It scared her to go out alone to face the loud and violent world again, but she needed to do it. House was right, she needed to move on. First, she needed a job though, to pay for the apartment, since what she had in the bank would only cover the rent, and not food and other necessities
(
"Dr. Ca- Stanley," Cuddy said with a cough, looking at the woman in front of her, a woman that looked like she was seconds from a breakdown. "I think that it would be best for you and this hospital if you took some time off, to deal with whatever is causing this, to give you time to seek medical help without your schedule interfering with it," she said with a sigh, trying to keep it all business. This woman in front of her was one of the doctors she had met the most at this hospital, mostly due to the fact that she had worked under the nuisance Dr. House who caused more trouble than any other doctor she had ever met. She wanted to ask her what was really going on, but that would be highly unprofessional.
"And I advise you to seek help, because I know this is not something you are known for doing." Despite her tries to keep too much sympathy to show, it was impossible to hold it back when the woman shrank further back into the seat she was sitting in. "And we want you to get better soon, not just because you are very valuable to the ER, and not to mention this hospital," Cuddy pointed out, smiling kindly at the woman.
"Ok," Cameron said with a nod, staring at the desk where a picture of a young child sat, a beautiful little girl.
"You can take vacation, see a doctor and get him to approve of a sickness leave, and once that is taken care of, we'll see when you can be estimated to come back to work," Cuddy, said, watching Cameron with concerned eyes as Cameron avoided Cuddy's eyes.
"That, that sounds good," Cameron pressed out.
When Cameron walked to her locker and changed, shaking hands with Cuddy who wished her well, neither of them knew that Cameron would never return to this hospital as an employee. Neither knew that Cuddy was sending Cameron to hell.
)
When she rounded the corner to John's and Dana's house, she saw the three of them standing outside. Leslie was jumping up and down in front Dana, still in her pajamas, and Dana was standing there with a hand on the car door, looking down at Leslie with a smile on her face.
They were the family she had longed to have, the one that should have been hers. Her two marriages failed, the first one ending like expected, they knew he would die, and it happened in their apartment with a nurse living with them. Even though his death was expected, when his heart stopped beating the grief that struck her was more paralyzing than anything she had ever felt at the time. Now, she knew that not only physical death could paralyze you, but also when everything inside of you slowly falls away and turns to ashes.
Everything went wrong in her life; most of her dreams went unfulfilled. The dream of having a child seemed impossible now, because she was not sure she would ever let herself get near another man again. Her husband had ruined every living part inside of her, and now there were not much ground left to sow on.
She looked down when John leaned forward to kiss Dana, looked down at her left hand which was void of a ring. Before, she had been so proud. She was Mrs. Stanley and that meant something. When she left her husband she left her ring with him. The ring finger was naked now, as if she was completely free from him, as if he had never existed.
Divorce would be the next step, she wanted it. She wanted to be free of his name, and just be Cameron again. The only obstacle was that no one knew of this. No one knew that she wanted to divorce him. As long as she locked herself into this prison, as long as she wasn't talking, no one would ever know.
To be free again, she had to do what scared her more than anything; speak.