Author's Note: I really wish that ffnet had a photo upload option, but since it does not, the best way to read this chapter is on my blog, (evelyneboochu . tumblr dot com / post/100859878497 ...without the spaces). If you cannot, it's probably best to point out that this chapter is in journal form, from Delphine's point of view.

24/12/2013

4:38am

It has been far too long since I took a pen to paper. That

most likely has something to do with the insane work sched-

ule that I like to so solidly maintain. After the night I've had,

though, I couldn't stop myself from buying a notebook in the

giftshop. I just needed an outlet, somewhere I could put

down all of the buzzing and swarming inside of my head. I

think that perhaps I'm still in shock; my hands are still re-

covering from being numb and cold; One of the EMTs told

me that if I would have been in the snow much longer, I

could have gotten frostbite, but I don't care. I would have

done it all over again in the blink of an eye.

The last month has been... well, what the hell can I

even call it? I've been holding it all in, bottling it all up like

I work at a winery and it's my fucking job. And for what?

What good has it done? I've just worked myself to the point

of exhaustion and shut out anyone even remotely close to me.

At first, it was like losing Jacques was the most senseless tra-

gedy in the world, like nothing in my entire existence made

sense. Is that not what everyone experiences when their life

is suddenly filled with so much sorry and sadness that they

barely know how to function? I'll admit, coping is not my

strong suit, but my insatiable desire to not hurt is enough to

trump that out. Working seemed so much easier than tackling

those pesky five stages of grief, and I probably would have

carried on like that and insisted that I was just fine. It took a

serious wake up call, and a good slap in the face- so to speak-

to make me understand that the way I was living was, indeed, no

life at all. I was filled with so much resentment, and so much

anger. I thought that by being angry, it would solve my problems.

I thought if everyone was impossibly aware of how my brother

was so unjustly taken from me, it would help me sleep at night.

In all of that, though, I have realized that my suffering was cloud-

ing my better judgement. Pain shaded the light of the potential

my life could have, and I see that now.

There's something about being so close that you can see how thin

the line of life is, and how easy it is to cross it, to fade into some-

thing darker, something trapping, something no one can pull back

from. That something... it's a terror, a horror that has seeded in the

deepest pits of someone's stomach lining, of my stomach lining. It

is one of those things that urges you to see life for what it is, to

understand that none of us, absolutely none of us, are guaranteed

one more minute, or a little while. We don't get to choose where our

paths take us, but we convince ourselves that we do. We make decis-

ions on a daily basis, thinking we are the ones that decide what

happens to us, but it couldn't be further from the truth. No one

knows, and no one gets to decide. It's not just a decision, not some

conscious choice that gets to be made. They're works of the world,

the way it happens and the way it has to be. There's no intervening,

no way of predicting, and as humans, that leaves us feeling ultima-

tely vulnerable and unconfortable. We have lived so impossibly long

with a stiffening fear of our own mortality, but in being so

scared, we still manage to take those minutes, those seconds for

granted.

No matter how much I wish I could stop thinking about it, I

can't. I just keep seeing the snow fall in the light of the street

lamp, glancing up for just a second, and then looking back to

see... Sheer horror. I've seen car accidents happen before, but the

way it just rolled and rolled, my stomach only lurched with each

revolution. It seemed like my only option to try and help, to see

if there was anything I could do just to help. I never could have

known. It never would have even crossed my mind; how could it

have? How could I have ever, in my entire existence, predicted that

I would be on my way home and end up working as hard as I

possibly could to save someone's... no, not just someone, to save

Cosima's life. Holding her hand in the snow, I just wanted her

to live. I just wanted to make it okay, to make her okay. I wanted,

in that moment more than anything, to be able to pull her

through it, to make sure she made it. Her parents... they had

already lost so much... They did not deserve to lose her to.

I met them a few hours ago; I went home for a change of

clothes and immediately turned around, heading back to the place

I never leave. I've been here since a little after ten, and they

arrived some time around eleven when Cosima was still in

surgery. then a little bit after. I just stood out in the hall, feeling like I

had no real right to be there, but I heard her mother sobbing

when Doctor Manning went in to brief them about post-op. I didn't

ask any questions when they left a short bit after two, because I

know that not only did I not belong there, or have any reason

for being there, but I did not have the right. I don't even think

that they knew who I was, or had any idea of the exchanges that

Cosima and I have shared over the past. I know I may be selfish

in thinking it, but I'm glad. I'm relieved that I can just be a

supportive bystander to them. What they did tell me, though, was

that the doctors weren't sure when she would come to, and that

after losing their other daughter, they couldn't bear to sit around

to watch it happen to the remaining one. It was an emotional

breaking point in the conversation, but her mother took me by the

arms and thanked me. She told me that I was her darling daugh-

ter's guardian angel and though I dismissed her almost immediat-

ely, I did promise that while they could not stay, I would. I knew,

just by the softened looks on their faces, that it was a gesture

they both needed at that moment in time.

I've been at the end of her bed for the last two and a half

hours and the nurse in me can't stop from checking her vitals

every five minutes, just needing constant assurance that she's

going to be okay. I know nothing I do at this point can help, but

I just keep hearing it, over and over again, like a faint whisper

in the back of my head that calls out to dust my ears, to

remind them of what it was like to have to hear someone so

fear-laden with the prospect of dying and knowing there was not

one logical thing in the universe that I could do to ease those

terrors. I think I have spent my life striving to help people, to make

their life, in any way, easier and so finally coming to fully face

the idea that I could not, it distorted my perception of how 'pure'

the world really can be.

I cannot stop thinking about her parents, about the holes they

carry with them constantly in their hearts. I cannot stop thinking

about the way Cosima called out her sister's name as she was

squeezing my hand. I cannot stop thinking about how maybe none

of this would have had to happen. I cannot stop running over in

my head how different things could be if the world was a just

and fair place. I cannot stop wondering, at which point, the world

had to come with a how-to survival guide just to make it through

the day.

When I look at her in the dim light of the lamp next to her

hospital bed, I feel this surreal, strange feeling at the sight of all

the bruises and cuts that mark and brand her face. It hurts,

causing a pain that is far too expansive to form into words that

originate in any language. All of the ache, though is wrapped

snugly by the realization that she is alive. In a split second, her life

had to change, but she still has it. It is still hers, no matter how

trying and how difficult it is about to become, if she can just

somehow find it within the deepest confines of her soul to open

her eyes again.

A 'miracle' is that doctors like to call something that should not

be, or should not happen. It is that word that only substitutes

'impossible' because obviously, it is possible. All of the RNs and all

of the doctors keep telling me that it was a miracle that I was

there at the exact right time in the middle of such a raging

storm, but it was no miracle. I do not believe in miracles, nor do I

believe in the art of coincidence. It has been a very long time,

perhaps since I was old enough to form cohesive thought, that I

was conscious enough to believe in the very thought of something

happening simply because it should, because it needed to. I believe

that our lines, the ways we walk through our lives, are not linear,

they do not, in any way, make the slightest bit of sense. We, as

human beings, are far from singular, or linear, in the way we

perceive... well, life. Nothing is every a 'one way' trip, because

there is absolutely no logic in justifying a straight path, with

no deviations. It simply does not exist. That is where the beauty

of being human comes into play. We are far too impossibly com-

plex to make things simple, to reduce them down into a more

manageable state of consumption. It is not in our genes; even in

the beginning, those first signs of human life, despite how

'barbaric' it may have been, the complexities in wanting to build,

to grow, far exceeds the claim of simplification of pre-maturely

established intelligence. As generations pass, it's a progression of

collective knowledge that has only ever grown. In being so

intricate, we weave in on ourselves, creating quilts of emotions so

complex that they then become strong, durable, like they could

the weight of the world that falls down around them. In that, we

grow. We work toward any adaptations of that strength that we

can humanly manage.

I suppose the later it gets, the more candid I get with myself.

When she finally wakes up, I will probably be the very last

person that Cosima would ever want to see in her hospital room.

More than that, she most likely will not even remember the acci-

dent at all. I do not have motives for being here, outside of

wanting to know that she is going to be okay. I guess more than

that, even, I just want her to know that someone is there for her,

no matter what has become of her past. Despite all that has

happened, the one thing I am absolutely certain of is that Cosima

Niehaus is a good person, who more than anything, deserves to

live out the life she was blessed with. Maybe I am nothing shy

of selfish in being here, in staying, because I want to assure

myself that I did not let her down when she was in need of

someone to rely on. I can hear her crying, in my memories, and I

can hear her saying that she did not want to die. So please do not,

Cosima. Please do not die. Your family, your parents need you.

Your students need you. Your fellow teachers need you. In some

strangely weird connected kind of way, I think... No, I know that

I need you, too. It's so strange, and it's impossible to articulate, but I

know it to be true. Life has pulled us from different directions,

and I would not be true to myself if I did not believe that it was

for very distinct reasons. However parallel our roads have been,

their inevitability in becoming perpendicular has changed things

for both of us in ways we might never understand. Maybe when

she comes to, she will want nothing to do with me, or anything I

have to say, but until then, I will not give up. I will not give up the

hope, or on her. She has come so far, through so much, and I

refuse to believe that this is it for her. Her path does not end

here. However hard things are going to be here for her, I suppose

it is important for me that she know she will not have to endure

them alone.

I just looked at the clock.

It's 7:49.

It's Christmas Eve.