Rena walked slowly up the stairs that led to the roof of Three Rivers. Two days had past and Andy still hadn't woken up. His condition hadn't changed, his superior, Dr. Jordan had told her early in the morning. Rena had swallowed her disappointment and sadness. She had never seen Andy so still, lying there in the hospital bed. Even as a child, Andy was always moving, always talking around her. Rena was the one who listened to him. She wondered now if his restless personality was a façade. She wondered if he only acted that way around her because he wanted to hide the pain and anguish from the abuse. Andy's face as a child burned in her mind. Two teeth were missing on his bottom, and he was smiling at her despite his black and yellow bruises marking his face. The dark blue eyes no longer seemed lost…they seemed alive, and that was only when he was around Rena. "I felt so alive when I was around you." Her husband's voice echoed in Rena's mind as she continued to walk up the stairs. "As I feel now, Rena. I feel so…good." The smile that he had as he told her that burned in her mind. Now as an adult, his face was strangely peaceful lying there in the hospital bed, as if what she had told him days ago had left his mind. "I don't love you anymore."
Rena tried to push Andy away when she said those words. She hoped that he would react, and had hoped that he showed by reacting that he still loved her. Dr. Luc Bovell said Andy was distressed and disoriented. He hadn't even reacted when he called Andy by his given name. He had told her this when he visited her husband shortly after Dr. Jordan left. "Knowing him, something must have shaken him so bad that he welcomed death. And I know that the only thing that would have caused him to be like that is you." Casper's voice resurfaced. He knew Rena and Andy so well, even now. He knew that the only person that could hurt Andy beyond repair was her. Miranda had been cold when she checked on Andy again this afternoon. "I know it was you," Miranda had told the detective icily. "I know it was you that broke him. You had to push him away from you, and for what? You wanted to break him, to make him feel pain. I know about Lisa," she added to Rena, her mouth clenched in anger. "I know what he did to you, Rena, and I know that pain." Miranda then looked at Andy's still form with the heart monitor beeping beside him. His face seemed pale, almost as white as the sheets, and the dark blue eyes that Rena had loved so much would not open. Andy's student had turned to her with pain and sadness in her dark gaze. Tears struggled to break free. "I know what you were trying to do, Rena. You wanted him back, and you wanted him broken." Miranda tenderly stroked Andy's face. It was something Rena would have done. Tears dripped onto his face, transparent-looking, and slid from his eyelashes as if the tears were his own. "Well, now you have both."
Both voices replayed in Rena's mind continuously. Andy had felt at home at Three Rivers. Her husband would just never admit it, because he wanted to feel at home with Rena, who couldn't give him what he desperately wanted, needed. "You save lives, Andy. What's more important than that?" Andy had wanted to cleanse himself of his crimes, she knew. Rena also knew that although that time had passed, Andy was still searching for a life worth living, a family, and a home, all of which had been deprived of him in his childhood and adolescence. Your home is here, Andy, she thought as she opened the door to the roof. It always has been. Your family is here, not with me. Rena had been the one who had suggested the separation. She thought if they were given more time away from each other, then perhaps Andy would be closer at finding himself. She was wrong. Andy was more confused about himself as a person than before, and Rena hadn't expected him to sleep with one of his colleagues. Now they were both close to losing each other and their love more than ever.
Rena stepped onto the roof. A faint smile escaped from her. This was where Andy had spent most of his time, thinking and pondering after his rounds. This was where Andy had proposed to her, years ago, and where they shared their first kiss at seventeen years old. The wind softly blew through her long hair. It was slightly calmed her, and she exhaled, allowing the stress of the last two days to escape from inside her. Andy's face, pale, and his scrubs covered in his own blood, entered unwillingly in her mind. She had seen him broken, bleeding, and dying when she found him in the snow. Had she wanted him to die? Casper had said that Andy had wanted to die. Andy had hardly struggled, the crime scene showed…but Rena hadn't wanted her husband to die.
"This is his favorite place to think," said a voice across from her. Rena recognized the soft timber, and she felt her hand resting on Rena's own. "He would be up here now if…" the voice trailed off. Rena gently pulled her hand away from Dr. Lisa Reed's, and she looked in her sad blue eyes. The ER resident was dressed in royal blue scrubs, and her blond hair was in a pony tail. Her slight frame seemed tense, and her eyes shied away from Rena's gaze. "I'm sorry," she whispered.
"What do you mean?" Rena asked. Lisa met her gaze again, and she was startled to see the depth of guilt in her eyes.
"Remember when you came to see Andy and left?" Lisa asked. Rena nodded. "After you said goodbye, he and I sat in a bar and bought a drink. He wanted to talk with me…about that night, and Andy said that what he had did was a mistake, and he told me that he was sorry, just as I told you," Lisa added to Rena. "He said that he had sex with me because out of grief from Scott's death and confusion." A long pause from Lisa led Rena to suspect that the girl didn't feel the same way.
"Did you feel differently?"
"I don't know." Confusion marred Lisa's face. "We both had feelings for each other, simply physical attraction, but…" she bit her lip before she began to speak again. "Andy comforted me. When a patient, an eight year old boy, came into the ER, I was struck with the memory of my younger sister. She died when I was twelve, and I could never forget the moment of her death. I can close my eyes and still hear her calling for me. That night, Andy was near tears at Scott's death. He was close to the boy, as close as I was to Dylan. Rena, I…comforted him as he comforted me. He was so sad, Rena." Lisa's voice ended in a whisper, and Rena held the urge to comfort her. As with Miranda, tears framed Lisa's face. "I don't know if I love him or not. All I know is that he loves you, Rena. When we were talking, he would only talk about you. I could see the pain in his eyes when you didn't allow him to explain his actions, and the raw guilt. Andy still loves you, Rena."
Rena said nothing for a moment as Lisa wiped away her tears. She saw how Andy had taken a liking to her. She was compassionate and kind…perhaps she reminded Andy of her former self, the girl that wasn't a cop, the girl who wasn't married to a former criminal. Perhaps that was why Andy liked Lisa so much.
"I know he still loves me, Lisa." Rena said. She was surprised when her voice quivered. She cleared her throat and tried to speak again. "He still does, even after all this time, and after all we've been through." Silently, she motioned Lisa to the door and the young physician followed. "I suppose he's always loved me, and he can't let me go." She smiled slightly again.
"Do you still love him, Rena?" Lisa asked. They were both to the door the led to the ICU now. Rena looked into the younger woman's gaze. She seemed sincere. Rena didn't know what to say. Andy's face, first as a malnourished five year old, and then to a content and sensitive surgeon burned in her mind. Did she still love him? Before she could reply, Rena saw Lisa tense.
"That's the code," she whispered breathlessly. Lisa opened the door with surprising strength, and ran toward the sound. Rena heard machines beeping wildly, and the shock of the defibrillator electrodes and the eerie sound of a flatline. "…Clear!"
"Lisa?" Rena asked, suddenly halting behind the resident. She suddenly felt cold, and she suppressed a shudder. "What – ?"
"We have to stay back," Lisa told her, her voice compassionate but firm. "It's Andy they're working on." Rena didn't make a sound as she heard, "Code blue to room 304, code blue to room 304." Lisa was talking to her again, but Rena vaguely heard. She continued to hear the flatline, and somehow she thought she heard Miranda's and David's voices in the fray. Lisa's question that had been unanswered before echoed her fragile mind.
"Do you still love him, Rena?"