Guilt

By slow degrees, Julianne regained consciousness. She couldn’t remember anything past the feeling of her body slowly growing numb, starting from the tips of her fingers and toes and gently sweeping inward towards her more important organs. There were flashes of memory, foggy and obscured by half-consciousness and disorientation. They were just out of her reach. Finally, she grabbed one little sliver of memory: one flicker of flesh. Whose flesh, she didn’t know, but with the sight came the memory of feeling as though she was being lifted from her white, bloodied tomb.

Methodically, Julianne switched from reaching for some memory of what occurred beyond her clear range of sight to pondering whether or not she was even alive anymore. She wondered what she would find upon opening her eyes. Would she be met with blank darkness, or would her eyes merely resist her every effort to open? Would she open her eyes to see Kelly hovering over her, smiling and welcoming her to the afterlife?

Julianne inhaled deeply and then cautiously parted her eyelids. Her vision looked foggy, as though a mist hovered above her, but upon blinking her sight cleared. She found herself staring straight into a bright florescent light. She winced and turned her head, wanting to raise her hand to shield her eyes, but her limbs felt heavy.

A monotonous beeping slipped into Julianne’s consciousness. She finally noticed the machines standing next to her bed, watching over things the doctors couldn’t keep an eye on for themselves. The relentlessly clean and sterile smell met her nostrils, and Julianne realized where she was. She was in a dratted hospital. The last time she’d been in a hospital, it was to witness her husband’s death. It seemed as though no one would be forced to witness her death, however.

Julianne felt oddly relieved that someone had saved her. It took nearly dying for her to realize that she wasn’t ready for death. Feeling the darkness closing in on her was terrifying.

Julianne eventually received all of her senses back. She became aware of a hand resting inside of hers and lifted her head slightly to see who it belonged to. Of course. Matt sat in a hard hospital chair next to Julianne’s bed, looking pale under all his tattoos. He looked tired and his forehead was pinched together with a constant frown. As she watched, his eyes flickered from where they stared at her pale hand to the bandage wrapped around her elbow and halfway down her forearm and halfway up the top part of her arm. He sat on her left side, holding her left hand connected to her injured arm.

Not quite sure whether her hand would follow her bidding, Julianne felt relieved when her fingers squeezed Matt’s hand just as she commanded. The movement sent a spark of pain up her arm, but she ignored it as Matt raised his head and his hazel eyes met her chocolate brown ones. The frown disappeared, and he smiled, obviously glad to see her awake.

“How are you feeling?” Matt asked.

“Not well,” Julianne answered honestly. “So, nothing much different from the past year or so.”

“Julianne, I have to admit that you scared me real bad,” Matt sighed, raising his free hand and tracing a line back and forth across the back of her hand. His gaze did not waver from hers. “The doctors said I reached you just in time. If there had even been a minute more for you to bleed out...you’d be lying on a cold slab of metal downstairs in the morgue with a tag tied to your toe. Even so, the doctors weren’t sure whether they’d been able to get enough blood back into your system quick enough. They’ll be glad upon seeing that you’re awake and alert.”

“Does everyone else know?” Julianne asked.

“Yeah, I called them once the doctors had finished injecting you with blood,” Matt answered. “I thought they’d at least want to see you one last time just in case you...” Matt cleared his throat and quickly skipped the rest of his sentence. “They’ll be relieved to know that you’re doing...well, maybe not well, but you’re alive.”

“I’m sorry, Matt,” Julianne apologized.

“I know,” Matt answered. Julianne looked confused. “You told me. You were barely conscious, but you told me.”

“These last few weeks have been the toughest yet,” Julianne said. “You probably noticed.”

“Julianne,” Matt began, becoming suddenly very serious. He rose to his feet and perched himself on the edge of Julianne’s bed. He cupped her hand in both of his; her hand disappeared inside the shell of his joined hands. “I don’t care how much it hurts. I don’t care how much you don’t want to say it. I just don’t care. You need to tell me everything. I’m not sure what exactly everything is, but you do, and I trust you to tell me everything and leave nothing out. You need help, Julianne. Pretending otherwise is foolish—and next time, you might not wake up in a hospital bed. You might not wake up at all.”

“I know,” Julianne said. Using her free hand, she shoved herself up into a sitting position against her pillows. Then, she took a deep breath and began.