Soft Sounds and Hard Impacts
Don't weep, not for long
Lost savants
Between this fight and a wall
- Glimpse of the Con, Chevelle
Jill stepped quietly into her apartment and slipped off her shoes as she closed the door.
"Jill, that you?"
"Yeah," the brunette replied. Payton stepped out of the kitchen. He was about the same height as her with blonde hair that reached about midway down his ears. He had a slight build. He moved and kissed her. She barely kissed back, only enough to satisfy him.
"Why'd you take so long? I was gonna ask you to make me a sandwich for lunch," he spoke. "Y'know, before I got home."
She gave him a smile that was more directed at Chris's wellbeing than her boyfriend's stomach. "Chris woke up."
Payton had almost no reaction. "He okay?" Jill could tell the blond had only asked so she didn't get angry with him.
"Yeah, I think so." Besides the fact that he had a coma dream where messed up events took place.
"Good." He paused. "Do you wanna make dinner or order out or something?"
"We always order out. And no. I'm tired, I'm going to... I'm going to go to bed," she whispered, taking a few steps into the bedroom.
"Want me to join you?" His question was fully based on his own satisfaction.
"No."
Chris sat in his hospital bed, watching some show on the tv. He wasn't paying attention at all. His mind was still racing at the confusion of his dream life and his woken life. He thought about how Jill was in a relationship with someone else. That annoyed him. He was the jealous type, and even though she wasn't his here, he was angry at this new guy for going near her.
Jill seemed sad. For the hour she had been able to talk to him, she appeared downtrodden, almost depressed. He prayed that wasn't the case. She was too beautiful and smart for that. And if Payton had caused it, there'd be hell to pay. Chris didn't care if, at the moment, he was weak from two years in a hospital bed. He still had his training.
And then there was Claire. Chris didn't know why, but he felt as though there was tension in the room when Claire and Jill were there together. That was something he didn't like. Claire was his sister, Jill his lov- partner. He'd rather they be friends. In his dream, they were best friends. Jill acted like an older sister to the redhead. They told each other everything. Chris was curious to why there was such a drastic difference.
"Guys, slow down," Chris heard a man's voice say from outside his room. "We don't want to overwhelm him. Jill, you go on in." The door opened and Jill slipped in.
"Hey," she greeted with a smile that didn't need to be faked. "About half of Alpha and half of Bravo is here."
He gave her a hopeful smile. "Can I have a hug before they come in?"
"You can have a hug anytime you want," she replied. He held his arms out towards her and she stepped close. She had to almost kneel on the bed in order to hug him properly. He pulled her close, his face turned so it was hidden in her hair. She smelled both sweet and spicy. Just as she had in his dream.
"You smell good..." he murmured in her ear. His voice sent an imperceptible shiver down her back.
The door of the room opened, letting Barry view what was happening. He waited only a moment to speak. "Jill? Can we come in?"
"Yeah," she answered slowly, pulling away from Chris. She took the only chair as they filed in.
They were all loud and rowdy. Joseph commented on how much smaller Chris was, muscle wise. Forest brought up how he missed the target practice with the marksman. The group of men (excluding Jill, of course), spent an hour cheering Chris up. It was a loud gathering that had to be asked to be quiet more than once. At the end of the hour, they gradually trickled out until, yet again, it was only Jill and Chris in the room.
As soon as the last person to leave (Barry) had stepped out of the room, Chris began to cry.
"Are you okay?" Jill asked, setting a hand on his arm.
He nodded. "They were all dead in my dream... But now they're not. I feel much better, Jill."
She took his hand. "You don't usually cry, Bearfield." He smiled at the old nickname. She had given him it on his second day at work after a training session in which he had nearly beaten her with his bearish tactics. He had kept her from flipping him by wrapping his arms around her, pinning her arms to her sides, then lifting her in the air. But then the situation quickly went from that, to her incapacitating him (which was, as he recalled, the first time she pinned him). But, she coined the nickname Bearfield as a combination of his last name and his style.
"You've seen me cry before."
She nodded. "Only once. When you told me about your parents..."
He frowned and looked down. "I have to keep reminding myself all that other stuff never happened... In the dream, you saw me cry a lot. Especially after..." he trailed off, not wanted to bring Africa up. "Nevermind."
"Chris..." Her voice was soft and full of caring.
"I'll tell you later, okay? The things that happened... I hated most of them. It's hard to even think of them and the possibility of them happening here and now."
"Well, I'm not going anywhere as long as you need me."
He raised her hand to his lips and pressed a firm kiss on the back of it. "Thank you, Jill."
That was when a man entered the room. He was about six foot tall with dark brown hair. He was in a loose suit with no tie. "Christopher Redfield?" he asked. Chris nodded. "I'm your psychiatrist, Dr. Kevin Cuilter. A nurse might've told you I was coming today?" Chris shook his head no. "Oh, well, I'm supposed to talk to you and help get you back to the RPD."
"Okay. Can Jill stay during it?" Chris asked, gesturing towards the brunette.
Cuilter frowned. "It'd be better if she didn't. But in some of our later sessions, she can."
It was Chris's turn to frown, followed by Jill. "I guess I'll go then," she stated, turning to Chris. "Want a hug before I go?"
He grinned. "Yes, please." She leaned down and put her arms around him, a hug which he returned. It would've lasted longer had Cuilter not been in the room.
"I'll try to come back later. I promise." He nodded enthusiastically. She could do no wrong in his eyes.
"Oh. Here." She dug into her back pocket and took out a cellphone, which she handed to him. "It's my old one. I reactivated it so you can have one."
"Jill, you didn't need to-"
"Just take it, Chris. My number's on it and so is Claire's."
"Thanks, Jill..."
She left.
Chris found out very quickly that he wasn't fond of Cuilter. The man had a sort of condescending tone and pried too much. The marksman understood he was a psychiatrist, but there was a limit to everything. At first, Cuilter started with typical questions like "How are you feeling?" and "What's on your mind?" But then he reached a bigger question. It wasn't so much of a big question as it was something with a big answer. "Did you have any dreams while in the coma?"
Chris bit his lip. "... Yes."
"And what were they about?"
"One. I only had one, but it was long."
"Okay. What was your one dream about?" Cuilter waited for an answer, tapping the end of his pen on the top of the clipboard he had.
Chris hesitated. How could he answer that question straight? "... Life, I guess. It never had one main plot."
"Could you tell me some events in this dream?"
"It... It started off in 1998 and ended around 2012..." The marksman ran a hand down his face. "I worked in STARS at first but after that it was the BSAA."
"And what does that stand for?"
"Bioterrorism Security Assessment Alliance. We worked to clear out Bioterrorism, obviously. Viruses, parasites. Jill was my partner. We lived and faught together."
"You were in a relationship with her?"
Chris nodded. "Yeah. And I still love her." He hadn't told her of course. But she was in a relationship with someone else and that meant he couldn't be with her. He'd live with it as long as she was happy. He ignored the fact she hadn't seemed very happy at the moment. He'd deal with that later (and kick ass if he had to).
This struck something with the shrink. "Are you currently in a relationship with her?"
"... No." The man sighed. "No, I'm not."
Cuilter wrote something down on his pad. "Please go on with your dream."
Chris huffed. "I don't wanna talk anymore..."
Cuilter nodded. "Okay. We can continue next time. I'll be back in a couple days." He packed up and left without a goodbye.
"Good riddence..." the marksman mumbled. He took out the phone Jill had given him and found her number. It only rang once before she answered. "Hey, Jill... Yeah, he's gone. Any chance you wanna come back? I think it's time I tell you the rest of my dream."