So I really wanted to update once more before I return to the nitty gritty of school for the last time ever. Technically my first day was today, but we spent the entire day doing an orientation at the Uni so I really only start tomorrow. Today the scary thing is that we got told that we only have 205 days left of high school. Ever! Insert heart attack here.

How flipping good was the return of Packed to the Rafters tonight too people (who watch it)?! How much raw emotion could you squeeze in there?! I've loved the return of that and Home & Away - so proud of how far my two H2o boys have come!

Anyway, can I just say also how crazy the weather has been?! I was wearing my JACKET today in the middle of summer! On my last updates I've been grumbling about the heat and mentioned the bushfires in Aus, but now it's flooding in Queensland?! Crazy!

Enjoy the chapter everyone! Thanks for all of your reviews on the last chapter. They all meant oh-so much to me :)

Chapter 18 – The Things We Do For Love

Cleo's POV

Guillain-Barré Syndrome?

"W-what does that mean? What is that?" I asked feeling a mixture of relief that they had found an answer about what was wrong with Lewis, before I was flooded with uncertainty at not knowing whether it was good news or bad news, much less what it actually was. Maybe no news had been better.

Before the nurse could reply, something that I couldn't miss considering that I was watching her intently for the answers that I was dying to know in the hope of good news; I was wrapped up in my dad's arms being gently forced into him as a comfort.

"Guillain-Barré Syndrome is an autoimmune disorder that incorrectly attacks the nervous system" she began to explain in the medical babble as I felt the secondary sensation of dad rubbing circles on my back with the palm of his hand.

"It is an infection that develops and passes on within four weeks. A segment of the infection includes a gradual, but usually temporary paralysis that builds up over the four weeks. At this stage for Lewis, we believe that the physical paralysis has reached its peak and we have taken precautionary action to ensure that all of his vital organs are functioning normally which is good news, considering that that is one of the primary dangers of Guillain-Barré."

Although I could see that the nurse's mouth was moving, I was only taking in certain words as the remainder passed straight through me with no recognition. Right in this moment, I didn't care what he had, what was causing it, why he had it, there was a time for all of that, but I only wanted to know was one thing.

"Is he going to be okay?" I abruptly questioned, not even feeling any substantial care about the fact that I had cut the nurse off mid-explanation.

She took a breath, looked down at her clipped board that was clutched in her arms and rested on her hip. "The odds are definitely in his favour. Despite the paralysis, we expect that he will be able to make a full recovery in due time."

Odds. Once again, my brain didn't even register the answer despite my desperation and essential want to know it. The words echoed and felt as though they floated through a tunnel that led to the scene that was helplessly playing on my mind, all from the trigger of one word…

~ Fifteen Years Ago ~

"I just can't get it, Lewis!" seven year old me announced with a huff as I slipped back in my seat with crossed arms.

Ever so patient Lewis immediately put down his triangle tipped pencil and shuffled the sheet of paper that my seven year old brain was completely lost on to the edge of my table. His next movement was taking a handful of coloured pencils out of his blue pencil case, a move that instantly triggered the worst for me.

"No Lewis! Not the pencils again!"

Before now, he had spent the last five minutes or so trying to educate me to differentiate my odd and even numbers through my pencils by separating one, three and five pencils that were 'the odd ones out' and the other two and four pencils that were 'even'. That visual concept hadn't helped at all.

He let out a small sigh as he put the pencils back and his face saddened, before his eyes lit up again, an expression that I knew ever so well when he would get any smart ideas of his.

"Okay Cleo! One of your Barbie's is odd because she's lonely, okay?" he started to say, looking over to me to ensure that I understood what he meant before he continued. "Then Barbie marries Ken, so they're even! If Ken and Barbie had one baby, then there would be three, so that's odd again. But if Barbie's friend Midge stopped being odd and married Alan to be even and they had two babies, twins, there would four and they'd still be even!"

I nodded slowly, trying to picture the family scenarios that Lewis was explaining with the goal of more importantly trying to wrap my head around the concept of odds and evens.

… He spent so much time helping me and going through the odds and evens with rhetorical generations of Barbie families so that I could understand the worksheet that he actually fell behind with his own worksheet…

But when it came to the next 'Odds and Evens' worksheet, I got full marks. Admittedly, this was a rarity for me. It was all thanks to Lewis' loving patience and care.

~ Continuation of Present Day ~

"Cleo. Cleo?" I suddenly heard as I returned back to reality and felt my dad nudging me gently, looking over to the nurse before placing his hand on my shoulder comfortingly. "I'm not sure if she might be in shock…" he muttered to the nurse who was now focused on me too, before he turned to speak to me once again. "Are you okay, Cleo? You looked like you were out of it for a few minutes there. The nurse was talking to you."

My focus was momentarily caught by my dad as I heard him out, and I apologized to the nurse. I repeated my question that I had asked a few minutes earlier and once again asked whether he would be okay or not. The nurse patiently started explaining it to me and I listened somewhat-attentively before I helplessly zoned out for the second time.

"Well as I said before, his chances of making it through are very high, but it may be six months to two years before he returns to normal again and starts restoring himself to as he was physically before the infection struck -"

I had lost focus once again by the word normal; even though the rest of what she had said in an attempt to explain herself a second time had not really registered in my mind either…

~ One Year Ago ~

We were a few months into our short engagement and more importantly, a few months off of reaching our wedding day when Lewis and I were sitting at the dining table of my house with wedding and bridal magazines sprawled out for what seemed to appear to be for as far as you could see.

Some weddings were planned and were ruled by the bride exclusively right down to the last detail with everything except saying the second 'I do', but from early on in our then-engagement Lewis and myself had decided that we wanted our big day to be a joint affair and event, to represent the joint union from that day forward. So, long story short, we had planned our wedding almost completely together.

The current task that we had been working towards was deciding the destination of our honeymoon.

"Swiss Alps?" Lewis had suggested, flicking through the pages of one of the glossy magazines as his thumb stopped on the page that had inspired his suggestion.

"Way too expensive. It would be cheaper to live there for six months than go over for a few weeks" I replied, picking up another magazine to mirror his magazine searching.

After a while, Lewis added to his last suggestion as he opened to another page. "Hey, it's not such a glamorous option, but if we wanted a snow-theme honeymoon, we could stay around Bright in Victoria and do daytrips up to Mount Buffalo or Mount Beauty and all that. Or even the Snowy Mountains? I've never seen snow."

I nodded, considering his suggestion before the blatantly obvious fact hit me like a ton of bricks. "Lewis! That could've been a recipe for disaster! Think about what snow comes from…"

"Oh damn!" he cried aloud as he slapped his hand on his forehead. "I can't believe that that flew right over my head! They warn women about 'baby-brain' but I'm thinking cases of 'bride-groom-brain' are just as bad!"

I giggled at my fiancé, grasping out for his hand affectionately before letting out a pent up sigh. "If only I were normal and then snowy honeymoons would be possible…"

"Hey, don't worry about it, Cleo. Sure, I would love to see snow, but anyone can see snow. If we wanted, we could do extensive tropical dives that animal lovers could only dream of. Normal is completely overrated, Cleo… Why would you want to be normal when you can be like you?"

My partial lack of normality meant that Lewis sacrificed his dream honeymoon for me and my safety…

~ Present Day ~

Now Lewis was the one that was helplessly lacking his normality for the time being. That was the sole piece of information that actually registered within my currently short-sighted brain. This was something that my dad evidently noted as he looked between me and the nurse, telling her that she might need to repeat what she had said since I had been mentally-removed from the present once again…

It had taken three attempts for the nurse to explain everything that she had needed to and by her third time, my brain was able to register almost all of the information about my sick husband.

Now, now I was just trying to wrap my head around the condition of Guillain Barré Syndrome that had been set in front of our lives as an extremely testing obstacle. Not only was the condition and the diagnosis difficult enough to attempt to understand, but the thought of the recovery period completely numbed my mind. Lewis would likely need to learn how to walk again from scratch and require extensive rehabilitation to assist with the functioning of his muscles again.

That could last two years. Two years.

I didn't care how much money or time had to be spent, I would spent our last cents if it meant helping Lewis to recover, but the problem was where this money would even originate from in the first place. At an estimate, we might have enough just to cover the ambulance and hospital bills, but I had no idea how I would fund other necessary health care for him.

I considered the options of bank loans that seemed unlikely given only my part-time income now and the fact that I wasn't even sure if Lewis would want me to do that and whether he would prefer to recover naturally, instead of landing ourselves so much deeper in debt.

Admittedly, the time factor scared me too. I am not Lewis. I have patience yes, but the perseverance and the strength needed to tackle this Guillain Barré Syndrome together? I didn't know if I could be or would be strong enough to do this.

The thought of that, along with the financial stress of health care contributed to increasing the speed of my heart rate before it got too much to bear.

I muttered that I needed air to my family, before running out of the corridor, away from the Intensive Care Ward, down the flights of stairs to the ground floor and out of the hospital entrance. There was a bus depot directly outside the hospital and I stopped, pressing my back against the wall as I tried to control the lethal combination of my raspy breathing and rough tears that represented my internal grief.

Not long after I had settled against the brick wall, but after receiving negative and confused looks from about three passer-bys, dad had reached and found me after I hadn't even noticed him following me from behind out of the hospital. I hadn't even noticed that he'd found me and was outside with me until he wordlessly pulled me into a hug and placed his hand on the back of my head that collapsed into the crook of his shoulder and neck just from the slight pressure.

For a long time, neither of us said a word. I cried my heart out and dad held me. I think it was that paternal instinct that knew that there was nothing that he could say in that very moment that would help me feel any better. And that was how we stayed for a long, long time until I'd finally recovered from the waterworks stage of my grief.

"I-I love Lewis, dad" I started to say, sniffling and trying to stop my tears from taking over once again before continuing to explain myself. "But I'm not going to be able to help him! I'm not strong enough to get through this, dad! I can't do it, not without him!"

He comforted me, continuing his soothing embraces as he tried to console me. "I wish that I could fix this for you, sweetheart, I really would do anything to make this better for you and to make this go away, but I just can't. Despite all of that, Cleo, what I do know is that you can do this. You're strong enough to get through this. I know it. "

"No I can't dad!" I sobbed relentlessly and not giving into his comforting reason. "Lewis did everything for me in the past… He was the reason that I could get through all of the hard things and the challenges in my life in the past, but I'm scared that I won't be able to do the same for him now."

"You're underestimating yourself, Cleo... Why do you think that Lewis was able to help you so many times before? It's because he loves you. And now you have the chance to show him that you love him and that you appreciate all the times that he has helped you and been there for you."

I sighed, my voice trembling as I inhaled the fresh air into my lungs.

The reminders from my dad about our love triggered the reminder of earlier today when I had awoken to find my husband in the condition that he was. We hadn't even resolved our argument from the night before when I'd accidentally ruined his romantic dinner plans.

~ Earlier That Day ~

When I woke up, I could sense the warm presence of the male next to me in bed. My first thought was how I must have woken up a little earlier than what I needed to considering that Lewis was always well and truly out of bed and nearly ready for work by the time that I would wake up.

Turning onto my side, I looked at the yellow digits on my alarm clock. 6:45 AM.

I quickly turned around again, sitting up as I nudged Lewis to try and wake him. Considering his head was facing out of bed and he was on his side, I could kiss his exposed cheek and neck in my attempt to wake him, trying to notify him that he was 'running late' and 'must have overslept' in the hopes of waking him up prompter.

No response. I kept nudging and shaking him, tapping on his cheek for a few minutes longer until the slight inkling of fear was beginning to surface within me.

With the idea of nudging him in his chest and more sensitive stomach, I pulled him over from how he was laying on his side so that he was laying flat on his back. That was when my stomach dropped and I sprung away from his unconscious body in shock, letting out a blood-curdling scream.

It was the sort of scene that you would see in a horror movie or in a graphically gory scene of a drama. The sort of thing you would expect on Sea Patrol during a body recovery. Overturning a body and being presented with something that you were not expecting or wanting to see.

Lewis' eyes were wide open, still moving slightly, despite the rest of his body being frozen.

There was this one moment that made my stomach plunge even more in grief. His eyes were soft and pleading, opened up and looking straight at me. I could see the desperation in eyes that he was trying to convey hopelessly as a message about the rest of his body. His eyes and a slight twitch on his face were the only parts of him that moved even despite the fact that I continued shaking and rocking his body desperately with my hands, hoping that passing movement onto someone else was like sharing oxygen with someone. It wasn't.

It was my continued screaming and squealing of Lewis' name that must have rung throughout the house which lead my dad, Sam and Kim to come pelting full speed into my room to see for themselves what was wrong.

Sam was the first by my side, clutching my shaking body as I focused solely on Lewis.

"What's wrong Cleo?!" she asked quickly and I assumed she obviously didn't have the same view of Lewis that I had from next to him.

"C-CALL TRIPLE ZERO! LEWIS ISN'T M-MOVING!"

~ Present Day ~

A shiver quickly worked its way up my spine as the memory ended, reminding me of one of the worst moments of my life. Reminding me even more so, that was the moment that my life changed forever.

Being thousands of kilometers away from each other, hiding and living with a mythical secret and the ploys of his malicious girlfriend to keep us apart hadn't been able to pull us apart in the past. I wondered whether I had worked up a bit of a invincible attitude towards our relationship, figuring that nothing and no-one had been able to split us up before, so why would there be any reason to in the future?

My problem was that I was blind sighted with negativity, the thought that Lewis may not ever fully recover and the assumption that I wasn't strong enough to do this without him that I didn't focus on what had gotten us through everything else that life, inevitable and of human-cause, had thrown at us in the past.

Our love.

But would that be enough to help us this time though?

Thoughts on that chap? Considering GBS would be such a gut-wrenching thing, I tried to lighten it from such a strongly depressive mood with the flashbacks. I hope that you could keep track of the time between everything and that you didn't get lost in past and present day!

What does everyone think about Cleo & Lewis anyway? Will he ever recover completely and will she be strong enough to help him and stay by his side? It's going to be a long journey for them and quite a character-building experience for Cleo.

Next chapter - Events and guilt cause Bella to come clean about everything. Upon explaining everything about herself, Daniel and Allie, what secrets will be discovered that are being hidden between the three of them, what will the response be and what does her confession mean for the future?

Make sure you review! It'll make my first official day back at school a whole heap better! ;)