"I just don't get it. I don't get it! She was perfectly fine, where is she? The last thing I heard was her coughing, then she was just gone."
"Damian... you know where she is."
"No, she's not there!" Damian screamed, trying to crawl into a ball, making himself smaller and smaller. Maybe if he made himself small enough, it would be enough for him to disappear. Maybe he could disappear from this cold, bright, room they call a therapist's office.
"Have you been taking your medication?"
He straightened out his spine and looked his therapist straight in the eye, "Yes."
"Damian, don't lie to me, I'm here to help you."
Damian looked away, and back down at his shoes.
"How long have you not been taking them?" She tried to make her tone soft, but it came out strong and demanding to Damian's ears.
"Only a couple days…"
"I need an exact date, Damian." She pulled out a small notebook, "Come on, work with me here."
"Last Tuesday."
"That's more than a couple of days." She responded.
"I'm well aware!" Damian spat.
She got up from her chair and just stared at a small poster taped onto her wall. She seemed lonely, like something was missing. "I need you to go back on your medicine. Not taking it is only making your schizophrenia worse, and you need to be mentally stable in order to attend your own wife's funeral." She inhaled slowly, stilling looking at the poster, "That's what the judge that sent you to me said."
"Don't you dare mention that funeral! She isn't there, she is fine, just hiding from me for a little while." Damian stormed out of the office without even closing the door.
He walked through the front door of his 2 bedroom apartment, the apartment he used to share with his wife, with Raven. He walked into the kitchen and opened the first drawer. The fully filled medicine bottle stared back at him. He took it out of the drawer and placed it on the counter, just staring at it; contemplating whether or not to give into his therapist's demands and just take the medication.
10 minutes had passed and Damian was still glaring at the bottle. He slowly opened the drawer back up and dropped the bottle back inside, "Not today. Today I'm not ready," He babbled to himself.
Opening the front door to his house, he walked to the closest park he would always train with Raven at, and sat on the bench he always sat at in the middle of training. Slowly he put his headphones on and turned on the saddest song he could find.
He was only 20 years old but had already lost everyone he ever loved in his life. His family was gone after a huge fight with Darksied, and his wife was gone now, too.
A rustling of bushes sounded near him. Damian took his headphones off and looked around. Out of the corner of his eye, he could have sworn he saw Raven running into those same bushes he was staring at so intently, at the moment.
"It's not real… It's not real." He told himself, shaking. "It would be nice if it was real though… but it's not. It's not. She's not here anymore."
"Are you sure?" A female voice asked.
"Raven? Is that you?" He stood up again, ripping off his headphones. "Raven? Where are you?" He looked around.
After standing there for five minutes, just peering into the bush that seemingly had moved, and had his wife's voice, he turned around and made his way back home.
While sitting down in the one nice armchair in the living room he heard footsteps. "Who's there? Is that you Raven?" He asked again, desperate to see his wife again.
Then he saw her, his Raven, running into the hallway that led to their bedroom.
"Raven! Stop running! Where are you going?" He got up from his chair and sprinted after her. He just wanted to save her, to help her.
He grabbed her arm just before she ran into her bedroom. "Where are you going? What happened?" Then he felt a lack of the hand that he was just holding, he looked back at her, but only to see she wasn't there. She was never there.
And then he woke up with a gasp. "Damian? What's the matter?" It was Raven's voice.
"Raven?" Damian asked, not believing his eyes. "You're here! You're really here!"
"Yes, why would I not be here?"
"Oh, nothing. Just a silly little dream."
"Dami? I don't feel so good. My stomach really hurts and I keep coughing." Raven held her stomach with both hands while she coughed.
"You… you're coughing?" Damian asked, not wanting to believe his ears.
"Yes, can you please get me some medicine?"
"Yes, yes, of course. Don't worry." Damian jumped out of his bed, ran into the kitchen and opened the medicine drawer, looking past his own medicine bottle and grabbing the cough medicine. He ran back into his bedroom, but only to find Raven, unconscious right next to his bed, on the floor.
He ran up to her, screaming her name. His fingers ran to her wrists, looking for a pulse.
He got up and grabbed his phone, dialing a number, "Hello, this is 911, what's your emergency?"
"It's my wife… she's fainted and doesn't have a pulse."
"I just don't get it. I don't get it! She was perfectly fine, where is she? The last thing I heard was her coughing, then she was just gone."
"Damian... you need to be taking your medication." His therapist stared at his body language, unsure of why he was back the next day, saying the exact same thing as the past four days.
"I don't need my medication! Why won't you listen to me? I'm stuck in a time loop! She keeps dying."