He had thought his fight to regain strength and independence had been difficult, but as the days passed he began to understand that for Sara this was not going to be such an easy ride. He remembered the days and hours of nausea and ferocious headaches as he struggled, at first just to sit for a few minutes at a time, after waking up in Jenni's care with more clarity than he cared for. The pounding behind his temples that increased by magnitudes each time he so much as twitched a muscle, and the agony in his ribs as he tried to find a comfortable way to lie in bed so that each breath didn't feel like a hot poker was jabbing through his torso.
Now though, as he watched Sara struggle, sweat and fight her way through every second of physiotherapy he wondered if his situation could even be compared with hers. She was so weak she couldn't hold her arms out in front of her for a full minute. Her grip was frail, she barely left an indentation on the stress ball clutched between her fingers, and she couldn't sit fully upright unassisted without toppling sideways or back into her pillows. She had vertigo, constant nausea and a headache that had yet to ebb; remnants from the concussion that was still not fully resolved.
She looked ill too. True she had regained much of the color she had lost to the fever, but she was still pale, bruising easily and almost gaunt with the weight loss. Her shoulder bones and ribs were starkly visible, as were the bones in her hands and arms. Her good knee was knobbly, the bad one still swollen. She had circles around her eyes so dark it looked as thought she'd never slept, yet she did most of the day and all of the night.
Her morning sponge bath routine was exhausting, and she'd learned to sleep through it, conserving her energy for physio. Gil had been steadily and smoothly applying moisturizer for her every day and the dryness of her skin was slowly dissipating with the caring attention. What wasn't leaving was the exhaustion, which Jenni had warned would likely take her weeks to get over, if not longer.
"She's been through massive trauma Grissom," she had explained gently as he stood in the hallway, frustrated with how well therapy wasn't going. "She will get better, I promise. It's just going to take time and a lot of patience."
Doctors MacAndrew and Thistle had been carefully managing her pain medication, determined not to let her suffer any more than necessary in order to hopefully speed up the recovery. Some days he wasn't sure if it was working, but then he was admittedly having a difficult time with the whole situation.
Sara herself was grimly pushing on, fighting tooth and nail to achieve whatever goals and tasks were set before her. He had been awed for years at her ability to push past adversity; now he was stunned with her steely determination and rebellious attitude to the physical restraints the accident had placed on her body. She simmered with anger at her inability to do simple things, and consequently worked herself into exhaustion daily, sleeping for hours after each session with Gwen.
Emotionally she was grumpy, irritable and angry more often than not, something both he and Greg had noticed within days of her waking up. Gil and Doctor MacAndrew had discussed this departure from her normal sunny disposition with care. It was likely, Ian had said, that the exhaustion, pain and frustration were the cause, which would resolve as Sara progressed. It was not out of the bounds of possibility however, that the head trauma had caused symptoms in line with a mental health condition of some kind, in which case they could certainly help her. The thing to do for the moment was wait and see if she improved on her own. It was certainly not rare, the doctor kindly explained, for a brain that had received the kind of traumatic shock Sara's had to need some kind of pharmacological aid to help with recovery. As he sat in his chair next to her bed, Grissom wondered how many more complications and reactions they would have to face.
…
Shortly after lunch on Tuesday afternoon Doctor Dale returned, producing a small box from his pocket containing Sara's new reading glasses. He gently put them on her and they all admired the dark brown plastic frames and sleek, stylish lenses for a moment. Then he removed them and Sara watched curiously as he used a kit of miniature tools to make a few adjustments to the frames before resettling them over her nose, standing back and smiling.
"They suit you," he complimented her. "I think you made a very good choice with them."
"Looking good Sar," grinned Greg, who lounged at the foot of the bed. "Shall we see if they work?" He held up the deck of matching cards and glanced at the doctor, who nodded in agreement. Sara agreed enthusiastically, and waited impatiently as he set up the deck in five rows of ten on her table and then slid it close enough to her that she could reach. She had enough stamina to play about three games turning the cards herself. After that her hands would tremble too much and she would need help until she'd had another nap.
Grissom scooted closer to look as she began to turn the cards, matching pairs as rapidly as her physical movement would allow. If she had seen a card once, she matched it as soon as she found the pair, never making a mistake. Turning over the last pair she grinned triumphantly at the three of them.
"Wow," observed Doctor Dale. "Your memory is absolutely remarkable Sara."
"It's getting better," she shrugged. "And now I can see; it's wonderful. I have no reason for getting any of them wrong again," she declared. She looked at Greg with a hopeful expression. He laughed and scooped up the cards, resetting the table for her. Her dexterity wasn't good enough to allow her to shuffle the cards yet, and she frequently dropped the lot when she tried to handle to whole pack at the same time.
"Thanks," she told his as he placed the last card down for her; she immediately started matching again, finishing the game even faster than she had the last time.
"That was four seconds faster," Gil told her as she turned the last two and looked up. Another game and Greg had to start helping her turn the cards, two more and she slid off to sleep as he revealed the last pair. Gil gently removed the glasses and put them back in their case, thanking Doctor Dale.
"It's my pleasure," he replied, impressed with Sara's determination and accuracy. "You certainly have your hands full helping her." Greg and Grissom glanced at each other and smirked.
"We do indeed," Gil answered him, leaning over to kiss Sara on the forehead.
"And we wouldn't have it any other way," said Greg, gathering the cards and returning them to their packet.
…
Much later, as evening drew in and the sky darkened the three of them made their way to the NICU with Victoria, the nurse who covered Jenni's days off. Shawna was there to greet them and share some good news.
"Her weight is up by just over an ounce," she announced cheerfully. "It doesn't sound like much, but it is great news. Her numbers are continuing to creep up slowly too," she added, pointing to the respiratory monitors. Seeing the difference in oxygen saturation, they all smiled.
They sat for a while, until it was obvious Sara was in a lot of discomfort and about to fall asleep again. They said their goodbyes and promised to be back the next day; as they were leaving, Shawna gave them all a reason to smile. If Rowen kept improving at the rate she was, they would be able to hold her soon.
…
Waking from the sound sleep she kept plummeting into every time her eyes closed Sara lay in bed and stared at the ceiling. It was late she knew, Gil and Greg had long since left for the evening. Her leg and hips ached fiercely, and she groped for the button to call Joan who came with a sympathetic smile and an armload of pillows. She helped Sara roll onto her side and propped pillows behind her back and around her legs; the new position meant the agony began to subside quickly. Sara sighed in relief.
"That feels much better, huh honey," soothed Joan, tugging another blanket over the bed.
"It really does, thank you," agreed Sara.
"You feel like some Jell-O?" asked Joan, checking the monitors and scribbling on the chart at the bottom of the bed.
"Ok, I'll give it a try," Sara returned, sighing again as she warmed cozily under the extra blanket. This was becoming a nightly ritual for the two of them; for three days now Sara had woken around this time in a lot of pain, Joan had resettled her and brought Jell-O in hopes of her patient keeping something down.
"You want the purple one again honey?"
"Yes please," smiled Sara.
"Sure thing, I'll be back in a few." Joan walked out of the room and Sara let her head fall to rest on the pillows, closing her eyes and concentrating on relaxing her sore muscles. She was just starting to feel better when she heard footsteps in the doorway; she peered through the gap in the bed rail, thinking Joan had made it back in record time and felt a warm smile creep across her face when she saw Candy standing there, looking hesitant.
"Hello," Sara said softly, "how are you?"
"Shouldn't I be asking you that?" replied Candy, stepping into the room and over to the bed, her hesitancy gone now she could see Sara was awake.
"You could," agreed Sara, "but it would make for gloomy conversation, and I could do with something a lot more cheerful. Tell me about university." Candy grinned and dumped her coat over the back of the chair, dragging it right up to the side of the bed before plonking herself down in it and bringing her legs up into a tailor seat.
"It's amazing, I absolutely love it. My classes are really engaging and I have a hilarious roommate. Her name is Ksenia, she's originally from Russia and she's totally hyperactive- she always has to be doing something. She runs about eight miles every day, and she's taken to taking me with her. I swear I'm going to be in the best shape of my life soon. And then she decided to bake cookies at six o'clock this morning, so I had to help her otherwise she would have burned the place down. We've had some very strange kitchen experiments thus far; blue vegetable soup, lime green muffins and we had peppermint and cranberry flavored porridge for breakfast yesterday."
Candy continued to regale Sara with tales dorm life, Ksenia's culinary disasters and the interesting people she had met both in her classes and on campus. When Joan returned, she heard her patient laughing as she approached the room and could not help but smile at the musical sound.
"Interesting visiting hours that you keep," she said to Candy, her voice without a trace of disapproval. Candy glanced at the clock, which read well after eleven pm, with a guilty grin. "Just remember others are sleeping," Joan continued, "and you can stay as long as you like. That was the first time I've ever heard Sara laugh; I would very much like to hear it again." She turned to her patient and placed a pot of purple Jell-O before her.
"Here you go," she pried off the lid and handed over a spoon. "Do you think you can keep it down tonight?" Sara grimaced.
"I'd like to," she shrugged warily, "but what I'd like and what actually happens are seemingly very different things recently." She took a tiny amount and slipped it into her mouth, savoring the taste of something that wasn't water or vomit. Joan paced a cardboard emesis basin on the bed within easy reach and checked the call button was where it should be.
"Are you comfortable enough?" Joan asked Sara.
"Yes thank you," nodded Sara.
"Ok, you two enjoy yourselves; call me if you need anything honey," said the nurse as she left.
"Why do you need that?" asked Candy, pointing to the basin. "I thought you were allowed to eat real food again?" Sara grimaced and took another slow, savory taste of Jell-O.
"I can eat," she agreed. "But it all comes back up again after about half an hour."
"Gross," said Candy bluntly. Sara nodded and ran a finger over the nasogastric tube that was taped to her left cheek.
"Yeah; I'm slowly becoming rather fond of this purple flavor." She stared into her Jell-O pot with a longing look and took another tiny bite.
"You're addicted to Jell-O?" Candy's eyebrows rose in disbelief.
"Purple Jell-O," said Sara with a resigned sigh. "It doesn't taste so bad when it comes up again."
"That's disgusting," muttered Candy.
"There's not a lot else to enjoy around here," grumbled Sara, her eyes glazing as she stared angrily into some middle distance point invisible to Candy. "I get given a sponge bath, which is exhausting and I get poked, prodded and other unmentionable things done to me on a daily basis, by people I don't really know, all of which are also exhausting. I do therapy, which is even more exhausting, and horribly painful. I sleep a lot, which is boring. I talk to Gil and Greg sometimes; mostly they talk and I listen. We practice therapy, which is exhausting and painful. Sometimes I get to go and see my baby, but I can't touch her, can't hold her, can't feed her. I feel like a prisoner, a dirty prisoner. The germs here must be out of control. I'm trying really hard not to imagine what an ALS would pick up in this room alone. I would really, really like a proper shower or a bath, but I can't sit up all the way without getting frightful headaches. So instead I just lie here and hope this nightmare ends at some point. I would really like to wake up soon. Or at least have enough energy to get through a day without needing a dozen naps to recover from the last activity endured while just lying here."
She stopped her rant abruptly when hot tears began to trickle down her cheeks. Furious at her stupid overreaction Sara swiped her spoon through the pot and took a large mouthful, swallowing it quickly. Another mouthful followed, and then another until all the Jell-O was gone. She stared into the pot, her stomach churning, eyes burning, and her heart a tangled mess of confusion and uncertainty. Her vision blurred by tears she resented, she spoke without filters.
"I've been told it's as scientifically close to a miracle as possible that I'm still alive. I shouldn't have come out of that first surgery, but Doctor Fielding refused to let me go. I definitely shouldn't have lived through the fever; Doctor Blackman said she's never had a patient survive a body temperature that high for that long. So I should be grateful to be here, but all I can manage is anger. Seething, furious rage at this stupid situation."
Candy felt a knot in her chest come loose as understanding dawned and Sara's words made sense. Abandoning her chair, she skirted the bottom of the bed and climbed up beside her friend, mindful of her healing wounds, and wrapped her into a comforting embrace. How long has it been, she wondered, since someone she loves was able to just wrap her up in a hug and hold her? Sara was warmth, happiness, tranquility, calm under pressure, passionate, loving and supremely logically ordered. As Sara leaned into her arms Candy could feel, in the tension that permeated her entire body, that the intrusion of a constant stream of other people into her friend's currently pain ridden, confused and illogical circumstances was overwhelming her past the point that she could deal with.
"It's ok," she murmured soothingly, "I know it sucks right now, but it is going to get better, I promise. And it is absolutely fine to be angry at the world; I would be too if I was in your situation. I'm angry for you, and I'm in my shoes." Against her shoulder there was a hiccupping snort that made Candy smile.
"Personally though," she continued, her fingers gently rubbing Sara's back, "I think angry is a good thing. It means you're thinking and feeling and experiencing, which is a lot better than all that time you spent in a coma when no one knew when or if you were going to wake up. And all that time, I had to wonder, what would it be like if you did wake up? You know me, like my mother always says, I have way too much imagination; well I had all these awful thoughts about what might happen when you woke up, like maybe you wouldn't remember anything, or be the same, or… or, I don't know, I just kept dreaming up horrible scenarios. So I'm quite happy with angry, because eventually anger goes away and life moves forward. So hang in there, ok? I'm here, Griss is here, Greg's here and Rowen is here too, and we've all got your back."
They were quiet for a long time, Sara leaning heavily into her friend's shoulder and Candy tracing light, relaxing and nonsensical patterns on Sara's back with idle fingers as she hummed under her breath. She was just beginning to think Sara had gone to sleep when she heard a quiet, but heartfelt
"Thank you," murmured against her shirt.
"You're so welcome," she replied honestly as Sara began to sit up. She slid off the bed and pushed a pillow into the space where she had been sitting so Sara wouldn't topple over. Looking up she saw a green tinge wash over Sara just as a bony hand made a lethargic grab for the basin. Knowing what was coming, Candy clenched her teeth and thrust the cardboard under Sara's chin as she heaved. A watery purple mess splattered into the container as Candy's stomach rolled. Sara spat and pulled a face, groping for a tissue to wipe her lips.
"It's not so bad," she reassured Candy, noting the expression on her face. "The purple one really doesn't taste that bad the second time around." Candy gagged, fumbled for the box of purple goo, missed, and vomited onto the blankets. For a moment Sara gawked at her; when Candy looked up and their eyes met, a sheepish expression sprawled across her features, Sara's mouth fell open. Without warning she burst into laughter, a deep rolling sound of true mirth worked its way up through her chest and she gasped, clutching her ribs as she mopped her eyes on her sleeve. Candy ran a hand through her turquoise and violet hair and felt her own treacherous lips twitch as a grin of part mortification, but mainly amusement, lit up her face.
…
…
To everyone still following this story, thank you for not giving up. I hope, even with all the interruptions, it is still as enjoyable to you as it is to me. If you have only just found it, the same a applies in terms of enjoyment. Please take a moment to let me know what you think; the next chapter is already underway, as is Ethereal Theory's next instalment. Many thanks, as always, Got Tea?