Dangerous Light

Jordan tosses a fifty dollar bill and jumps out of the cab before it has even stopped completely under the emergency room’s overpass. Nothing is going fast enough for him, including the sets of automatic doors he must pass through to get to the emergency room’s waiting area.

The entire area is exceptionally empty, with only one woman behind the desk and a triage nurse in the process of taking someone’s insurance information at the desk in front of the examination room. Overlooking the strange look the woman behind the desk is giving him, Jordan moves toward the sitting area where there is one person.

One woman is sitting in the very corner of the waiting area with her head in her hands. Her long, tangled blonde hair is acting as a curtain and hanging down with the ends grazing her lap.

“Athena,” Jordan feels like there is a brick on his chest.

Visibly shaken, the woman picks her head up quickly. Her shaking hands push her curtains of hair back and fall onto her denim covered thighs. Her face is pink and blotchy, almost like she has a rash of some kind. Pursing her trembling lips together, Athena’s bloodshot eyes fill to the brim with tears and turn a shade of blue that is unnatural.

“Athena,” Jordan feels his own eyes watering and slowly sinks down in the chair right next to her with his arm around her, “what’s the matter?”

Just hearing the question makes Athena sob into her hands. Gasping for breath between her sobs, she just buries her head into Jordan’s shoulder.

Gently rubbing Athena’s back, Jordan squeezes his eyes shut as he buries his face into her hair. The pain creeping into his chest, while familiar, is something he is feeling again for the first time in years. His voice breaks gently when he speaks quietly into Athena’s hair, “please don’t cry, Athena.”

His words only make Athena cry more, slowly soaking the shoulder of Jordan’s shirt. Clenching his eyes shut again, Jordan knows that he will not be getting an answer out of Athena anytime soon.



“They don’t think they can do anything to save her,” Athena sits with her back pressed up against the headboard, running her fingers through her wet hair.

Jordan lets out a deep breath, closing his eyes. Hours later, and Athena is finally able to put her crisis into words. Opening his eyes, he looks over at Athena and does not bother to look away.

“Why are you staring at me?” Athena questions her friend, looking over at him hesitantly.

Jordan inhales deeply, not looking away. “I’m just…”

Athena allows the man sitting beside her to trail off and look down at his big, fumbling hands, before pulling him back to his thoughts. “What? You’re just what?”

“Nothing,” Jordan shakes his head. “We should try and get some sleep, though.”

Too tired to argue, Athena stifles a yawn as she turns her bedside lamp off and sinks down into her pillows, closing her swollen eyes.

When he sees Athena’s breathing steady, Jordan slowly relaxes. His nerves slow down, although his mind continues to scold him. You are being such a pussy right now. She’s your best friend and you couldn’t just tell her how you feel? You couldn’t just tell the one person that wouldn’t judge you for it? You need to tell her –

“I’m sorry, Athena,” Jordan quickly turns his head toward the small blonde, whose swollen face looks almost too peaceful in comparison to her behavior over the past handful of hours, “I’m sorry that this isn’t some simple fix. That I can’t just go rough somebody up and everything will be better.”

Athena’s chest continues to rise and fall slowly, her features remain blank.

Jordan slowly reaches over and brushes some damp hair out of her face, continuing to whisper to the sleeping young woman, his voice growing thicker, “I’m sorry that this is something that I won’t be able to fix, or even make better… I’m sorry I can’t protect you from this.”

Not responding, Athena shifts her arm slightly and takes a deep breath.

Feeling an amount of comfort from the lack of response, Jordan gently touches Athena’s soft cheek. A small smirk pulls at his lips as she slowly leans her cheek into his hand. I’m gonna miss this.



“Maybe you can fix this,” Jordan’s text message to Sidney had said.

In spite of knowing that he could not fix an elderly woman’s illness, Sidney agreed to meet Jordan and Athena at the hospital, to support Athena.

Now, he and Max are in the gift shop. Max is searching for the perfect gift for his new friend – whom he still insists on referring to as “ma belle” – and taking his merry time in doing so.

“Do I really need to be here with you while you pick it out?” Sidney asks, crossing his arms.

Not bothering to look away from the flowers, Max speaks in a much more calm tone than Sidney. “I really think you should get ma belle a gift, too.”

“I don’t think a gift’s going to help, Max.” Sidney looks at his watch.

Max just shrugs, “it’s the thought that counts. Plus, you’d be surprised.”

Sidney waits, as Max decides on a bouquet of roses and makes his purchase.

“It took you twenty minutes to decide that you’re getting her flowers,” Sidney mutters as they exit the hospital’s gift shop, shaking his head.

Max holds the vase of flowers in his hand, with no shame. “The best bouquet of roses that place had.”

If Sidney did not feel like he was overstepping his boundaries as Athena's friend before, he sure does as he and Max enter the waiting room.

At the same time, Athena stands up. She is facing the other direction, though, where a doctor is coming out of the hallway. Jordan stands up as well, seeing the doctor walk toward Athena. The man, in green scrubs and a white overcoat, speaks, although it appears that no words leave his lips.

Everything about his body language makes Sidney’s stomach drop to his knees. And if the doctor’s body language fails to do the trick, what happens next certain does.

Athena’s legs fail her. Jordan barely catches her from behind, successfully wrapping his large frame around hers to protect her from everything.

“Should we leave?” Max whispers, looking over at Sidney.

Rubbing the back of his neck, Sidney shrugs. The scene playing out before him is physically paining him, and he has no explanation as to why. All he knows is that he cannot stop it.