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He listened carefully and with care. This would be his approach, listen to everything she had to say, how she said it and without interrupting. The pauses weren't due to not having anything to say but rather, making sure all was said at that moment to be sure it was time to answer. This was, however, disturbing in a way. A young woman so distraught, keeping her natural beauty hidden. It was a mental observation but nothing made obvious.
“I don’t know if you know how it’s like when your life feels like one single nightmare. When you feel like you’re absolutely powerless and helpless. Every time you want to go to bed, you know you will just dream of nightmares again. And when you’re awake, you don’t even know why you’re even awake and don’t just fall asleep again.”
His face was straight as she spoke these words. Still, he waited, not yet answering. Yes, he knew these feelings.
“You know how that feels?” He sat totally still, still with a straight face but looking in her direction. He simply answered, "Yes, I do."
He paused a moment before continuing. "Remember, there is a reason why it is me to whom you speak and not one of my staff in a steel walled room. Know that while I use my own experiences as knowledge, it's not about me."
He put his cup down and leaned forward a bit, his hands together in front of him. "This ride through hell you speak of, tell me more about it. The who's, the whys, maybe the wheres. It is my hope that I can find some understanding."
The weather outside was turning more and more volatile as they spoke, a slight snowstorm appeared, the wind began to howl and clash against the windows and the walls of the room. The crackling fireplace that illuminated the room appeared in stark contrast to the proceedings outside to Elena. Now that they were about to touch the critical topic though, she found herself listening closer to the howling wind than to the fire, unnerving her in her already flustered state of mind. For her, the sounds of the approaching snowstorm had something eerie, and so she found her pulse being well accelerated. The pauses he willingly created too unsettled her, as that gave her the opportunity to think about what she had been saying, and to get worked up on it.
Bowed down she sat on the couch, as though she was squirming with pain. In reality however, she was just pining away slowly. The talk was slowly, but surely conjuring up memories she struggled to keep locked in the darker corners of her mind. Gulping deeply, she murmured as if she was still under the charm of the flaring up howling of the snowstorm. “I guess you should know that it’s not that easy to remember all of what happened,” she began, speaking under her breath and not raising her gaze. The lump in her throat felt stifling, and so her voice sounded.
“Sometimes, I have these moments when they all come clashing onto me at once. I mean, they are always in my head, but usually I can keep them somewhat at bay, but not always. Then, I usually find myself lying on the floor afterwards after they’ve vanished again. I don’t know why that happens, and I can’t control it either.” She paused, searching for words. It obviously took her some time to avow the following. “And it frightens me.”
By now, she held her frowned forehead with one hand, rubbing it slightly. Another moment of nothing being said endured, as the fire took over anew to fill up the room with its spitting, though it was steadily drowned out by the outside howls. And ultimately by Elena’s voice again, strained and feeble as it was. Although she had warned him about it, she would not do less than her best to not have one of these moments, despite knowing she wasn’t in control of it anyway. “It began early this year, actually,” said she. “I’ve met somebody back then. A man I instantly began to like. And before I knew what was happening, I was in love."
She cleared her throat. The less she had to think about this, the better it would have been. She realized she was anything but over this at all. There was not a single smile on her face as she went on. “It was great, it was fun, but we weren’t very careful either. We should have been, looking back. But so it happened that one day, some weeks into our relationship, I found out I suddenly was in the family way.” Doc could see that her eyes were closed as she narrated. Keeping a level head happened to be far more difficult than telling somebody about it, she found. Or she was just far too busy with keeping a level head to care about any sort of judgement from others right now. “Come to think of it, from that point everything went downhill.” It goes downhill for me my entire life, she added by herself, but didn’t voice the thought.
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He found where she was going both unexpected and interesting. While he did understand love, he didn't think it would be part of this equation. He took a momentary look at the window and the storm outside. He knew with the weather that she would be here awhile and he intended to use the time wisely. He took the last sip of his coffee and set the empty cup back on the table.
"This man," he began, "tell me more about him. Where was he from? Where did he live? Was he a man of peace or a man of war? What did he do? What is it that made you fall in love with him?"
He kept his question brief but to the point. Right now, the ball was in her court and he had more listening to do before he could offer anything.
He then looked at his cup and then hers. "Would you like a re-fill?"
Elena momentarily splayed out her fingers and beheld them to distract herself from the topic a bit. Then, her gaze wandered to the fireplace, and onto the window afterwards. She looked at everything briefly, everything except the Doc. The way the topic they spoke about made her feel horribly uncomfortable left her sitting on the sofa ashamed. She clenched her teeth together, similar to how a cat would have hissed against an opponent, and her face turned a grimace. It stirred up the self-hatred inside her again. “No, thanks,” she gave back, putting the empty cup aside. Only now she realized how damn sweaty her hands were, it almost felt as though she had bathed them in water.
It slowly dawned on her, she didn’t want to talk about it, had just persuaded and coaxed herself that she really wanted to have a talk about it. That left her even more ashamed. What was it that she found herself unable to talk about it for the life of hers? Mentally, she swore out loudly. For a moment, she contemplated to straightforwardly stand up and leave this damn house, but then a look outside reminded her of why she shouldn’t do that. In some way, she suddenly felt trapped through that snowstorm, as if it willingly tried to keep her together with this man asking these darned questions. Mixed with the memories she got confronted with again, she grew more and more distraught, and her heart drummed against her chest as a consequence.
Elena used a few seconds, although bitterly hating the awkward silence that happened because of it, to sort herself as much as she could. Breath in, breath out, all slowly. She kept her glance locked on the floor as a picture of the man she talked about appeared before her inner eye. And so she began describing, though with the utmost reluctance. The whole story had only brought her pain and had left her with rough disenchantment. She spoke haltingly, as she had to desperately search for words. To her, it felt as if words were more of a barrier than means to express her thoughts. “I, I don’t know honestly,” she hemmed and hewed. “I found him to be a nice person as a whole, I guess. He was a gentleman by all means, calm, sympathetic, and obliging. Not perfect, but who is that anyways.”
Still no smile, her face a waste of a landscape, although her mouth looked pinched, and her eyes steadily turned sadder. “He was a man of both. Keeping the peace inside, and waging a war outside. He was a Captain of the Navy in Liberty, very high tier so to say. That left him with only so much time to spend with me and…” She choked. “… and the baby. We didn’t see each other much, sometimes he even got called to the front at Leeds.” Lifting her gaze just a little bit, she glanced at Doc out of the corner of her eyes. The bitterness in her voice returned, and the self-blame became more audible. “I swear I must have been one hell of a bad girlfriend. Always either euphoric as fuck or subdepressive, depending on how things were for us. I’ve blamed him far too much, for always being away and for his paperwork.”
That confession virtually throttled her wind-pipe, and rather silently the started gasping. Shaking her head, she returned her glance to the floor. It had gotten her hackles up by now. Still she felt like merely beating around the bush with Doc. And it hadn’t helped her one bit yet.
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He had heard this story before. He had seen it often. It was why he hated war and even laughed at humanity. He knew the history of Sirius and why humanity had settled it....to escape a war of over a hundred years that neither side remembered what they were fighting for only to begin fighting again. But Elena was a victim. She wasn't the only one nor would she be the last but he was no stranger to it. For as in rough a shape as she was, it was times like these where Doc found the best in people. In his mind, the layers of the onion were peeled back enough to reveal the core of a matter. He gently nodded in understanding.
"It's cliche and you have probably heard it before but nothing is your fault. It happens often. A man takes his career to the point where his family doesn't matter."
He paused a moment but not for too long. He spoke softly and gently. Doc himself hadn't realized it but it was a first for him. It was easy to understand. He WAS that man who chose medicine and diplomacy over his wife. Now, she was gone. He had a chance to take a big negative and make it a positive.
"Sadly, so long as there is war, as there is mankind, you won't be the last person to go through this. That fact doesn't make things any better but it's an evil truth."
He then leaned forward a bit and while he became a bit direct, he was just as gentle with his questions. "Listen, I'm going to ask you a few things. You might get mad. You might cry hell you might even want to strike me.....which I wouldn't blame you for but they are questions that I must ask."
He sat back again and began asking, "So what is it that you blame yourself for? Demanding his attention? Wanting him to take time away from his busy schedule to be a boyfriend and father? Do you blame yourself........." He stopped in mid sentence. It was a touchy question but given circumstances, it was necessary. "Do you blame yourself for having his child? If you do, you shouldn't."
While he awaited her answer, he looked toward the fire and the pile of logs nearby. In a minute or two, it would need another.
“It happens often. A man takes his career to the point where his family doesn't matter."
Suddenly, Elena’s gaze darted up right into his eyes. It would come bursting out of her at once. “No, that’s not true,” she gave back stubbornly, her voice sharpening and turning a tad louder. “Work wasn’t everything for him. He didn’t only care for his position, and his duty. He cared for me, too. Deeply.” As she spoke it out loudly, the doubt almost instantly came in.
How naïve was her thinking? She had been told often enough that she was too naïve for the world. So was she just glorifying him right now, talking herself into believing that he had been forced into all his duties and his work, or was it truly the way she described it? Suddenly, with the way how Doc had expressed his thought, she wasn’t all too sure about it anymore. So she grew silent, and her features relaxed again.
It was after his last question that Elena felt like a bullet had been shot right through her body. She clenched both her fists, and convulsed the rest of her body. Indeed, she would have loved to stand up and punch this guy right in the face for asking such a silly question, but she restrained herself, though it took her quite an amount of willpower not to. The question left her speechless for a moment, pressing all the air out of her lungs, leaving her longing for air. An attack of sweating overcame her. Her fingers began to prickle weirdly. “No,” she spat through her clenched teeth in an almost disgusted way, looking down.
Another few seconds of silence, then she went on. In the meantime, memories of times gone ran past her inner eyelid. “I don’t blame myself for having it,” she stuttered. Her heartbeat rose. Memories steadily made tears spring to her eyes. “I blame myself for,” she shook her head, and held her eyes closed with her fingers. The first teardrops already made their way down the cheeks, albeit her attempt to dam them up. Somehow, she managed to spit out the last words in between the upcoming sobs before losing her temper completely. “For killing it.”
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Doc was stunned. This wasn't what he was expecting. He expected bad memories from combat or something but not that. He was speechless for what seemed like an eternity. No amount of training, no amount of consult could have prepared him for that. Doc loved children and a piece of him disliked her for it but the guilt she had upon herself was punishment enough. He wasn't about to add to it.
The caring man he was wanted to go over to her, to comfort her....but they didn't even know each other and she was here for therapy. He just hated to see someone in pain.
Looking at her now wet face, he leaned upon his elbows which were resting on his thighs, "Elena, I'm sorry....sorry for your loss." He thought a moment. "I've experienced death in many ways to include parents losing children but I can't fathom that pain myself," he said in a kind voice. He then looked at her. It was obvious he was being kind and caring when he asked simply, "Why?"
She buried her face in her hands now, in an attempt to hide the tears away from her consultant – which was insofar in vain as her sobbing was still just as hearable as before. Her fingers had grown pale, and so had her whole face. She didn’t know what wet her face more – the tears or the sweat on her hands. It was an easy for her to remember the doctor’s words on the matter. She could remember the situation. She didn’t want to, but she was forced to. Radiation, injuries, alcohol.
And so she recited those words for Doc, somewhere in between her sobs, her voice sounding low because of the hands before her mouth. “Radiation, injuries, alcohol,” she outright squeezed them out of her mouth, with surprisingly few emotions sounding by. At that point, she didn’t even realize how mistakable her way of saying it must had been for him. Her mind was far too clouded with feelings of guilt and despair to see things from his perspective for one second.
All his kind words were in vain though, as she felt the judging glances of his on her. Or so she believed. She hated herself for it, but not only for what had happened. The way she couldn’t at all control her feelings drained her of strength as well and made her disgusted by herself even more. And so she kept on sobbing her tears away, somehow trying to keep them as few as possible, though at one point she tried to blubber some words out. As if she thought she had to explain herself to somebody, though it was more herself than Doc she told. “I swear, I swear I didn’t ever want any of this to happen!” she said screamingly as she convulsed her body again.
Opening her eyes wide open, she looked around the room, then fixated her glance on Doc for a few seconds. With her heart hammering away, she breathed heavily as she clutched at the armpit with one of her hands. It was a pleading look she gave him, tear-streaked and slightly trembling as she was. The memories were getting the better of her yet again.
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It was an opportune time to put another log on the fire. He stood up and went to the fire. He stoked it with a poker and added another log. On his way back, he went around the other way and passed the sobbing Elena. He placed a kind hand on her shoulder. Something in him, the humanitarian, made him do it. He knelt before her, hand still on her shoulder and replied, "I know you didn't want this to happen........I know."
He then pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and handed it to her before standing up and taking his seat. He was, however, slightly closer. He wanted to help and was figuring out how.
"Radiation......injuries.....alcohol," he slowly stated, "I know of those. I've dealt with them before. Elena. Alone, each is terrible. Together, well, they're devastating but please, try to pull yourself together. No one here is being judgmental or issuing blame since no one here is perfect or blameless." There was a hint of a very faint smile as he was trying to be understanding to her.
She jerked slightly as he laid his hand on her shoulder, but else there was scarcely any reaction to the sudden body contact from her side. Taking gulps of air hysterically, she reached for the handkerchief he had offered to her, and dried her eyes and afterwards took her time to blow the running nose. The second she let go of her eyes with the handkerchief however, tears promptly started dropping down her cheeks again. But she didn’t even try to hide or suppress them now. It would have been of little to no use.
Following his piece of advice, she tried to get herself fairly together, as much as the circumstances could allow. She coughed a few times, in order to get rid of the pesky lump in her throat that way, but it stayed no matter. In hopes to rid herself of the memories that had come back and pestered her, she weighed her head to glance at the fire place. She felt it again: she was sick of all this, and badly wished it to finally stop, the self-hatred, self-blame and above all every single memory that reminded her of what had happened to her.
The utter despair she had had some seconds ago suddenly changed into stubborn hatred. At least the blazing flames had some sort of lulling effect on her, and so her heart tardily gave up on the frantic hammering.
With watery eyes she stared in the fire, not deigning to look at Doc. There was some silence before her answer came, during which she repeatedly used the handkerchief to dry her cheeks and eyes. “You don’t understand it, do you?” she gave back with embitterment in her voice. She tried to keep her breathing steady, in which she didn’t truly succeed. Another tear made its way down towards her chin. “Not judgemental, you say? Okay. Listen.” So she turned her frowned head towards him, blinkingly staring right into his eyes. With the index finger she pointed at herself.
“Every single bloody thing I’ve done all those months. Everything, no matter what, it led to exactly what it led. The death of the one thing I thought I was caring about. It’s all my bloody fault!” Anger possessed her, and turned her face into a grimace. Anger about herself, and about him obviously not understanding anything of it. Then however, her voice that had been shouting before cracked at an instant, and moments later she slumped down on the sofa completely, exhaling deeply, apparently bereft of any energy by the sudden blowup of her temper.
