WARNING: Graphic scenes.
"Zoe...Zoe?"
He knelt in front of her, cupping her face in his hands as she sat, breathless, pain numbing her body, making her head light and her lips buzz.
"What's happening?"
He whispered, glancing down again at the blood that was gradually pooling beneath her. Her legs shook against the cold tiles of the floor, her hands trembling against his thighs as she leant on him.
"Zoe, I've got to ring an ambulance."
He lowered a hand to feel for his phone in the back pocket of his trousers. She bit her bottom lip and shook her head, frowning against the throbbing pain between her legs.
"Just get me home."
She whispered, closing her eyes again.
"Zoe?"
He shook her until she opened her eyes.
"You're bleeding..."
He stood up, helping her to stand as she began to struggle to her feet.
"It's just a bad period."
She swallowed hard, acid rising within her throat, her stomach churning as she rose to full height.
"Zoe this is a bit more than a period."
He hissed, watching as another ribbon of blood slipped from her thigh down the inside of her calf and into her shoe leaving a scarlet trail behind it.
"Please just get me home."
She whispered, placing a hand over her eyes, everything was too much. The alcohol was making her dizzy, the lights were too bright, the music too loud, the pain too much.
He glanced at the screen of his phone, contemplating phoning an ambulance but knowing if he did he risked her leaving without him before it even arrived.
He positioned himself next to her, slipping an arm around her waist, the other he placed on her upper arm, steadying her.
"Can you walk?"
He asked, feeling her body seeming to vibrate beneath his touch. She nodded, swallowing again against the rise of nausea.
"He flicked the lock on the door, opening it quickly so that he could steady her again, leading her out onto the landing.
"Hanna's pissed!"
Shouted someone behind them as he braced himself against the wall to hold himself up as she leaned heavily on him at the top of the stairs.
He found himself holding his breath as they descended slowly, blotting out the laughter and heckles shouted after them by drunk nursing staff.
As they reached the bottom of the stairs he scanned the room briefly before hauling her against him, holding her tightly with one arm, feeling her tense with pain again as he opened the front door, almost tripping over the step as he guided her over it.
"Nearly there."
He whispered. He felt cold, his throat ached and he his tongue seemed to stick to the roof of his mouth.
"Keys?"
He asked as they reached her car.
She made a half noise, touching her bag. He positioned her with her back against the car, leaning over her and unzipping her bag, rifling through the cigarettes, purse, tampons and tissues to find her keys.
"In you get."
He struggled to get her into the passenger seat, lifting her legs up and placing them in the foot well while she winced in pain, both hands pressed into her stomach.
He shut the door, looking at his hands. Fresh blood glittered in the moonlight. He could feel himself beginning to panic. This wasn't part of the plan, this wasn't something he felt able to deal with. He took a deep breath in and released it slowly before moving around and climbing into the drivers side.
He started the car, his hands shaking uncontrollably as he steered them out of the road and up onto the main road. She gagged next to him, rolling her head, hitting it hard on the glass of the window.
"Zoe..."
He glanced at her, placing a hand on her thigh ,feeling it wet with blood through the skirt of her dress. He watched the road ahead, concentrating on his breathing.
She started to cry. But not the cry he had heard before, where he had held her against his chest and comforted her. A cry that shook her body, haunting and guttural. She struggled to undo the seat belt.
"I can't sit...I can't..."
She released the seat belt and somehow rolled over in the seat, slipping down so that she knelt in the foot well, her face in the seat cushion, her body convulsing with sobs.
He flicked the indicator, realising it would take too long to get back to hers, turning the car across the lanes and into the side road towards his own house.
She gagged again while he parked, her face pale and beaded with sweat as she lay, eyes closed against the seat.
He climbed out of the car and ran to the passenger side, opening the door cautiously in case she was leaning against it.
"Zoe, I need you to put your arm around me."
He spoke slowly, somewhere in his mind he recalled how Jeff spoke to patients when he bought them in from the ambulance.
His voice thin and cracked. She reached out to him, letting him pull her out of the car, clinging onto the fabric of his t-shirt as they made it to the front door. Only then did she seem to realise this was not her house.
"Max, I can't..."
She looked up at the house, the sky spinning above her.
"You can't make it all the way back to yours. Don't fight me...not now."
He unlocked the door, bending down and lifting her off her feet, cradling her and carrying her up the two flights of stairs to his room, teeth gritted, his stomach tight with fear.
He lay her down on the bed and stepped back, feeling her blood on his arms, his chest, sticky and hot.
She lay on the duvet, brow creased, panting, her chest rising and falling hurriedly.
"Zoe?"
He tentatively sat on the edge of the bed next to her, folding his hands in his lap.
"What's happening?"
He asked, watching as she opened her eyes, she seemed to focus better on him now, in the dim light, away from the people and noise of the party.
She placed the side of her hand in her mouth, biting down on it and turning to the side.
"Fuck..."
She hissed, suddenly opening her eyes, reaching out to him and struggling to sit up. She looked at him, wide eyes suddenly focusing on his.
"What?"
He asked, glancing down as she placed a hand against her stomach.
"I need to go to the bathroom."
She seemed to try to pull away from her own body as she spoke, gulping in air as though she were dying.
"Something is coming out of me."
She spoke through gritted teeth, trying to pull herself up.
"What?!"
He wanted to run. Instead he found himself helping her to her feet, holding her as they moved to the bathroom. Before he could turn the light on, she stopped, letting herself slip down his body slightly, he felt her forehead against his ribcage and heard a jelly like flop of something hitting the floor, spattering against his leg. She seemed to freeze despite the violent shaking of her body.
Without a word he turned the light on.
"Don't look."
He said quietly. Holding her head against him so tightly it hurt.
He moved back, guiding her back against him and glanced down at the floor. A bloody mess of clots and tissue lay splattered across the white tiles, blood speckled against the radiator and up the back of the door.
She felt his hand slacken against her face, moving her head slowly, the paralysingly pain in her back easing. Without him noticing she turned her head, following his gaze.
Her breath caught in her throat, almost wheezing as she struggled to breath. He looked at her, expressionless, her lip quivered, the look of shear horror on her face turning his stomach.
She let go of him abruptly, stepping backward, feeling another clot slither down her leg. She slipped on the blood, catching herself against the radiator and staggering from the room back into his bedroom, the door slamming behind her.
He stood for a moment, just staring at the closed door of his room, nothing seeming to register yet.
He lowered himself down to sit on the edge of the bath, realising his legs seemed to be numb, his whole body trembling inside his clothes.
The blood on the floor sparkled in the light, wherever he looked it was there, in his peripheral vision. He drew in a steadying breath, slipping down from the edge of the bath, taking a toilet roll from the toilet cistern and unravelling most of it onto his hand, placing it over the largest of the clots, his mind drawing a blank as he lifted it, folded in tissue but still hot, dropping it soundlessly into the toilet. He unravelled the rest of the role and piled it in his lap, methodically wrapping it around his hands and using it to soak up the blood before dropping it into the toilet. He moved another clot, cooler than the last. As he drew it closer to him to drop it down the toilet bowl something caught his eye, the pale outline of a curled foetus, no bigger than his thumb.
His breathing quickened, his stomach turned, a suffocating wave of sickness gave way to the catch of a breath, he closed his eyes, tears stinging the whites of his eyes. He leant back against the bath, still holding the balled up tissue in the palm of his right hand, he curled the other arm around his face, resting on his knees that he pulled tightly into his chest. Crying helplessly into his sleeve.
He ignored the light tap on the bathroom door, the creak of it opening.
"Fucking hell..."
He heard Robyn take a step back, but still he refused to look up.
"Max?!"
She stepped over the mess on the floor, crouching down to him and placing a warm hand on his shoulder.
He squeezed his eyes shut briefly, regaining something of a composure before letting his head fall back against the edge of the bath.
"What the hell?!"
She glanced at the blood stained tissue in his hand. She looked nothing but terrified.
"Zoe's had a miscarriage."
He whispered, his voice weak and gentle.
"Zoe?"
She asked, looking again at the mess on the floor.
"Dr Hanna."
He looked away as he spoke, feeling that somehow, this was all happening to someone else instead.
"What?"
She asked, struggling to understand what was going on.
"Zoe..."
His breath caught.
"And me."
He whispered, the muscles about his eyes seeming to tighten, his jaw trembling.
"Everything ok?"
Lofty appeared in the doorway, stepping backwards as he noticed the blood, his eyes wide as he looked from Max to Robyn.
"Where is she now?"
Robyn asked, squeezing her brothers shoulder.
"In there."
He looked toward the closed door of his bedroom. She stood, noticing as she did what he held in the tissue.
"Lofty..."
She made her way over to him, whispering something to him before disappearing into his room.
More to come x