This is really short. It was originally with the next chapter, but then it would have been OBNOXIOUSLY long. I like to keep chapters around 3,000 words max. Always leave them wanting more ;).
But I promise this really was the best place to leave you off.
This story is almost done, and I was thinking about starting another story after this when I have time again. If you have any ideas shoot me a PM or review, because I don't have much.
Chapter 6
SPOV
Everything felt kind of numb. Like she had been outside in the cold a little too long. She wasn't sure what exactly was going on with her, but she knew it wasn't right. She didn't feel right.
The worst part was that she couldn't even open her eyes. If felt as though two weights were attached to her eyelids, constantly pulling them down. She had no idea what was going on, but she knew that it was imperative that she opened her eyes.
But maybe she didn't want to. This was comforting. It was warm. She felt safe here, and it had been an uncomfortable amount of time since she felt safe. Her gig as Spencer Hastings wasn't going too well as of late, so maybe it was time for her to try something different. Maybe it was time to stay in this dreary, colorless void.
Her whole life had been noise and excitement, pain and heartbreak... this nothing, this bleakness- it felt good. It felt relaxing. It felt like coming home to a warm embrace after a long day.
A quiet beeping started to fill her ears. Beep, beep, beep. She didn't know what it was. It was too slow to be an alarm clock. She couldn't hear anything by the beeps, and she still didn't feel anything besides a deep sense of peace. She felt good, and she didn't want to leave.
But she knew that she had to, if not for her sake than for Toby's. She remember the deep sense of dread and despair that she felt when she thought that he was dead, and that was not something that she would wish upon anyone, let alone the one person in the world that mattered most to her. Even if going back was going to be hell, she would do it for Toby. She would walk through the fire if it kept him safe and happy.
Beep, beep, beep.
Somehow the darkness started to swirl in exactly the matter that she imagined a hurricane would look like from above. Around and around the darkness spun until it gave away to a flash of light. The light didn't fade. Maybe it grew brighter, consuming everything that she knew. She winced and squinted the eyes that she had finally managed to pry open.
Beep, beep, beep.
A pair of unfamiliar green eyes peered down at her from the epicenter of the blinding light. "Miss Hastings? Are you awake?"
She hadn't realized that she was in a hospital until that exact moment. Because where else would she had been that they would ask such a stupid question. Her eyes were open, wasn't that a fairly obvious indicator. Another set of eyes looked down at her, and she didn't recognize them either. She whimpered. It was all too much. Where was everyone? Shouldn't someone be here? Where were the girls? Where was Toby? Or her mom?
"Miss Hastings I-"
She whimpered again. It was slightly muffled by the tubes running down her throat. She knew they were to help her breath, but right now they were just making her panic escalate. She wanted to see her hands, to see what else she was hooked up to, but she couldn't move. She could barely blink. The allusive beeping got louder and faster, showing her that it was a heart beat monitor.
"Hanna, can you turn the lights down?"
She shut her eyes in relief, snapping them back open as a familiar pair of blue eyes pushed into her vision. She relaxed into the pillows. Toby. And at least Hanna was there as well. They were okay, and because Toby was here she was okay as well. She could relax, because knew that he wouldn't let anything hurt her.
And leave it to Toby to know exactly what she needed without her having to ask.
His eyes were rimmed with red. "You're okay, Spencer. You're safe now, don't worry about anything."
She swallowed roughly, her lips closing over her breathing tubes. Her chest burned. It was like feeling was slowly coming back to her body. Her arms hurt. Her head hurt. Everything hurt.
Toby's gentle fingers ran down her jaw line. "Look at me," he murmured.
She shifted her eyes, unable to move anything else. His eyes were full of tears and some escaped down his chaffed cheeks. Was he crying before?
He gave her a sad smile. "You're okay. God, Spencer I love you. I love you so much. You could have-" he swallowed roughly. "I could have lost you, but you're okay."
His hand touched hers. It took everything she had to curl her fingers over the top of his. It wasn't quite holding his hand, but it was pretty close.
TPOV
She was awake. She was awake, and he was struggling to be happy about it. Because it was more than clear that she was barely even able to move. The breathing tube was still down her throat. Their tests indicated that she would struggle to breath without it. They shot off a long of medical jargon that he didn't understand, but essentially, what it summed up to was that they were afraid of her throat closing, and the difficulty they would have reinserting it if that happened.
The oxygen mask that covered her dwarfed her delicate features made her look so small. Her skin was peppered with needles and tubes, and it looked nearly translucent.
She was awake and he was still terrified. But she was awake.
"Toby?"
He ignored Aria's questions. His anger at the other girls increased tenfold with Spencer's slow and unsteady recovery, because he knew that she would be far less angry than they deserved. She risked everything for them and they didn't give her a second thought as they scurried out of the building, leaving her behind.
He kept his vigilant eyes on Spencer. She was sleeping, but if anything changed he would alert the nurses before the machines had a chance to. But even more than any of that, Wren was in the same building as her and that felt so fundamentally wrong. If anyone deserved to die in that blast it was that spineless bastard. And if anyone was going to by wryly enough to escape his round the clock guard it would be Wren Kingston. He wouldn't let her get hurt again.
He shouldn't have let her get hurt the first time.
He saw Aria nod out of the corner of his eye. "Listen, I know you're still mad at us, and I don't blame you. I'm mad at us too. But she's going to need all of us. She'll need us and she'll need you. Spencer's the most perceptive person in basically the entire world. She's going to know something's up. At least fake it for her sake."
She was right, but he wasn't going to admit that to her right now. He wasn't going to divert his eyes. He wasn't going to speak, because that was reserved for people that he cared about. And right now, the only person in the world that held that honor was Spencer. Of all of her friends, Aria was the one that had taken the least time to get to know him, and she was the one that it hurt the least to disappoint. He was glad that it wasn't Emily.
Spencer moaned in her sleep, from pain or some disturbing dream he wasn't sure. He tightened his grip on her hand. He was here and he wasn't going anywhere.
Spencer's eyes blinked open again, the beautiful brown- his favorite color. They were hazier than usual, but she was there. She was there, and it was the best feeling in the world to know that she would be okay. He didn't want to get his hopes up, because the last time she opened her eyes was the closest he ever came to losing her for good. But right now he couldn't help but allow himself to be saturated with hope.
He brought her unbandaged hand to his lips, brushing a gentle kiss over the top of all of her knuckles. She looked scared, and he didn't blame her. It had to be a difficult thing not to be able to talk, to wake up and not know what was going on, but to also not be able to inquired about it.
"You're okay," he said softly. "It looks a lot scarier than it is, or so I've been told. I don't know if the doctors were just trying to placate me, but because you're awake I'm inclined to believe them."
She didn't take her eyes off of his, but her other hand weakly brushed over the tubes that snaked down her throat. He winced. "Yeah, that can't be comfortable, can it? They said a lot that I don't understand, but the way your mom explained it was that they did some tests. Those tests showed them that you might have trouble breathing on your own still. There was some damaged to your neck in the explosion, and they're worried that if your throat closes up they won't be able to get a tube back down it. Once you get to a certain level they'll take it out."
Her fingers, almost imperceptibly, tightened over his. "What do you need?" He asked her softly. "Can you do that again? One for yes, two for no?"
It took a moment, but she squeezed again. He nodded. "Okay. Are you okay? Do you need something?"
Two soft squeezes gave him a negative. "Alright, did you have a question?"
One squeeze. He smiled, using his free hand to brush away the tears that were starting to fall again. "Okay, let's see how well I can predict the way your brain works. You want to know what happened?"
There was some noise from her as she lightly squeezed his hand one time. He grinned. He couldn't stop himself. "You're nothing if not predictable," he laughed quietly. "I got there just as the other girls were tumbling out of the building. When I saw that you weren't with them I shouldered back in. Luckily you guys hadn't gotten too far inside or I might not have gotten to you in time. I found Alison almost right away, but it took me longer to find you. It took me a few minutes to dig you out, but once I did I picked you up and we got out just as the ambulance was getting there."
She squeezed his hand three times. "Three?" He asked her. "What does that- Oh," he said softly. "Me? How am I?"
One squeeze. He could see the ghost of a smile below the mask covering her lips. "Really? You're asking about me? I guess you wouldn't be you if you didn't," he sighed. "I got a small burn on my shoulder and ruined a pair of pants in the building. Emotionally, though? That was the hardest thing I have ever experienced by a significant margin. You can't leave me, Spencer."
She nodded. He took that as her agreeing. "I love you," he whispered. "God, I love you."
