While the walls did not close in, and the ground did not shake, it felt to Delphine as if the space around them had been sealed and every last bit of air had been vacuumed out, making it impossible for her to breathe and in turn, impossible to think. "I…" Her voice trembled over the lone letter, the notes in her tone fluctuating unevenly with the swell of emotion that had risen in her chest. "I… I'm not…" She swallowed down the rock that felt lodged in her throat and gave a slight shake of her head. "I didn't know… I swear. I'm… not family. Without your permission, I can't know anything." She sounded winded, like she had run a mile, but it felt more like a swift roundhouse across her midsection, leaving her lungs searing, in search of oxygen to right the chaotic spew of thoughts roaring inside her mind. How was it that this woman, this woman who she did not really know all that well, deserved this much agony and torment in her lifetime? She'd been pulled through hell when it had come to things with her sister and yet, she came out on the other side of it with an ability to at least hold her head up, but this? This was something that was going to not only change her life, but it was going to change her, too.
"Twelve percent." Her voice was flat, devoid of any emotion, as though she had already accepted it as her fate.
Slowly, Delphine edged her way into the room, but stayed relatively close to the door, in the case that Cosima wanted her to leave. "But Cosima…" she started, biting at the inside of her lip. "I… You don't… Seem like the type to let yourself be defined by a statistic."
In an instant, her eyes found Delphine's across the few feet of space between them and the blood in her veins instantly ran cold. There was no malicious intent in her gaze, but instead, there lived a hollow sadness, one that had finally come to understand the hell she had been through on that freezing highway. "You don't know anything about me." The words, in an indescribable way, struck Delphine, spearing through her heart and swimming immediately for her head, ripping her mind apart, pulling it in every direction. Maybe Cosima thought she was right, but Delphine begged to differ.
"I know that you're a good person, and that watching you… Watching your car… And holding your hand… And then finally realizing it was you…" As she spoke, a small dimple appeared just below the left side of her lip as she pressed them together, giving a valiant attempt at containing the emotion that was causing her voice to waver like a sheet in the wind. "I know that you have not done enough in your life to warrant that kind of fear, the kind you had to live through, the kind you never forget. I know that this bad… this horrible thing has unfolded right in your lap while you could not do anything, and I know you feel powerless. I know… that it probably seems like the easiest thing in the world to give up, to throw in the towel, but there's still options. There is still that chance, but only if you want to take it, that you can work through it, that you can get back to where you were. And even if you don't, or you choose not to, it doesn't change who you are." Delphine glanced away, feeling as though she had overstepped a line, overstepped Cosima's personal boundaries yet again, but she wasn't sure how to stop. "I know that you're still a teacher, a daughter, and… and a grieving sister. What happened to you, it doesn't define you. Only you can do that. Only you have that power. It's you that gets to dictate who you are, not anyone else."
In a single breath, the room had grown eerily still and it caused a chill to ripple up Delphine's spine, turning her stomach over in knots. She knew that she had no rights, no entitlement to the words she was speaking, but she felt like she had to do something, anything.
The silence had encapsulated them, tucking them away in a small cranny that seemed to exist outside of any natural progression of time. The world felt still, empty outside of that room. There was a pulsing, though, of light that seemed to grow with every word spoken, and that was Delphine. The pain and the medications were quite the one-two to Cosima's thoughts, but she was fighting the best she could to put them together, to think through what it was she was hearing, what Delphine was saying.
"Maybe I'm not strong enough." Cosima's voice broke through the silence like a spear piercing through ice, causing Delphine's heart to nearly stop in her chest.
"I don't think you believe that," Delphine countered quietly, evenly. She had to believe that Cosima had no stock in her own words. There was something deep down, something that was pulling so irrevocably hard for Cosima to pull through, and to do whatever it was she needed to get herself to a place of peace in her own life once more.
No matter whether she believed it or not, it was more than obvious that Delphine did not. More than that, she was not even sure how she had gotten it in her head that she could never be strong enough. Didn't she know the hellish fields she had struggled across in the passing months? Did she not know that she had poured pieces of herself out in hopes that it would make her feel better and, with no help from Delphine herself, it had only recoiled, hitting her full force. She had exhibited a strength unparalleled when she was willing to let go of the hatchet and watch as it was buried stories beneath their plane of existence. Those were just the intangibles, the strength of her personality, of her character. The physical strengths only seemed to blow those out of the water. Her body was battered and bruised, cut open and sewn back together again, but she was still there, still so able to sit there and think she was nothing more than weak. There was no way that she could blame her, the state she was in, but there always came the calm that rolled in after the chaos of the storm.
Slowly, carried by the most hesitant of steps, Delphine ventured forward into the room, gently pulling back one of the chairs near the side of the hospital bed and placing herself in it, resting on the edge of it, her long legs angling beneath her to tie together at the ankles. She should have left and she knew it; there was no right or entitlement for her to be there and if anything, she was starting to realize that perhaps she was the last person Cosima wanted to see in those moments.
Everything that she had known was changing, even faster than she had probably anticipate and yet, there was Delphine, not even swaying in the gusts of lawlessness and pandemonium. What was her place there? What purpose was putting her there, so steadfast in the face of turmoil beyond comprehension? Although her throat felt like sandpaper and her thoughts juggled in cycles, hardly staying still long enough to be exploited, Cosima's brow knit closer together, a line of confused curiosity stitching them nearer. "You're still here," she stated in a soft tone, far from abrasive. It almost felt like reliving a memory, but she pushed it aside. "You don't owe me anything."
The resignation in Cosima's tone was like an axe, slicing straight through the shield of resilience Delphine had been inwardly clutching onto. The horrors she'd lived through were nothing to those that Cosima was still enduring, but in darkness, there still required light. Without a flicker of light, the shadows would not dance or fight or jab and without the darkness, without the shadows, everything came forth and nothing could hide, not even those who carried fear with them in their every step. Maybe she was right, and perhaps Delphine owed her nothing, but did that negate the insatiable pull, the magnetism that she felt pulling them together? Maybe it was only pulling her, and Cosima could not feel it. Maybe Delphine's consistent appearances were nothing more than a daunting nuisance, weight added on top of everything else Cosima had to be thinking and feeling. She couldn't find a solidity in her voice to ask, though, and she was not entirely sure that Cosima would care enough to make it known.
"You're right, I don't," she responded, pushing a few wild curls away from her own face, tucking them carelessly behind her ear. "But selfishly, I'm here for me." Her chin tucked down toward her chest and she began nervously picking at her cuticles.
Cosima's head lulled to the side and her eyes fell to the mop of blonde hair mere feet away from her. Delphine's answer perplexed her and although her mind felt as though it had run through a marathon, she focused every bit of energy on those words, on what they could possibly mean. After a few moments of tense silence, Cosima opened her mouth to speak, but Delphine, somehow without even knowing, beat her to the punch.
"Every time I try to sleep…" Her voice shook over her words, a mixture of fear and sorrow tying her up around the throat, "I… I hear you…" Though she could not see it without her glasses, Cosima could almost hear the tremble of Delphine's lip. "I hear you crying. And when I close my eyes… I just… Dieu. I see your hand… scratched and bloody… in the snow…" A hand raised to cover her mouth, and it had become obvious that she had started to cry, causing a pain sharper than any she'd experienced because of her injuries, somewhere in her chest. Delphine lifted her head, wiping at the corners of her eyes with her knuckles. "I'm here because… I don't want you… to feel alone… like you did in the cold. Or when… when your sister died." Cosima's eyes stung and before she could stop herself, she felt the tears leaking out of the corners of her eyes. This woman, this stranger, essentially, was pouring her heart out, displaying a selflessness that Cosima had never truly seen firsthand in any form before. "I'm here… because I need you to know that you have a friend."
Ever so slowly, Cosima's hand inched toward the edge of the bed, limply sliding off to hand at the side, her fingers flexing the tiniest bit. Delphine's puffy, red eyes fell, not understanding at first. As the realization began to dawn on her, though, she became very obviously apprehensive, but as Cosima gave a slight flick of the wrist, she knew not to ask. Instead, she moved the chair forward, making it easier to wrap Cosima's smaller, colder hand in her own. The tears were still leaking out of each of their eyes, for some of the same reasons and yet, also for their own. Just as the silence had settled over them, though, Cosima gave a gentle squeeze on her hand and forced her eyes open, a serene smile curling her lips as she spoke. "You will never know how much that means to me," she managed in a soft, but still audible whisper. Although she gave a nod of agreement, she still couldn't completely agree. If it meant even half as much to Cosima as it did to her, she had some idea.