I Love My Wife

I woke up in the hospital.

The beeping of the EKG combined with my nightmare jolted me awake.

I sit up in a rush, the tubes connected to my arm snags a little. I wince forced to lie back down a gasp sounds in the room.

“You’re awake,” Jenny says, her voice soft.

She stands from the chair in the corner and comes to the bedside with a teary bandaged face.

“Wh- where’s Natalia,” I ask throat raspy.

Jenny wipes her cheek, “she’s in another room down the hall.”

I start to get up but Jenny throws her hands up and she tries to keep me down. She does with little effort because I’m in an enormous amount of pain.

“Wait, wait,” Jenny says. “You’ve got a gnarly cut on your arm. I’ll go get the doctor and let him know you’re awake.”

I ignore her, “I want to see Lia, I don’t give a shit about what some doctor says about me. What about her, is she awake Jenny? Please tell me she’s awake.”

Jenny falters and drops her eyes, “I’ll get the doctor.”

Without letting me get another word in she disappears behind the curtain. Her lack of an answer tears my heart to shreds.

“Why, why did I let you go?!” I grumble to myself. “Why the hell did I let you go?”

Tears roll from my eyes, her screaming voice saying my name, begging me to slow down swallows me up.

“Adeen?” It’s another voice and I’m snapped out of the trance.

A doctor with a head full of grey hair, black rimmed glasses and a lab coat walks up to the foot of the bed picking up a clipboard.

“Mr. Bektashi,” the man says. “Glad to see you’re awake, I’m Dr. Harvey.”

He walks toward me with an extended hand, I shake and try to sit up again.

“You are quite the driver, huh?”

I ignore the comment because what does he actually want me to say in response to that? ‘Yep sure am, chortle, chortle, chortle. Damn near killed everyone.’

“I want to see Natalia,” is my only response.

Harvey puts the clipboard down and adjusts his stethoscope.

“I’d like to check you out a little more if you don’t mind. You lost a good amount of blood. I want to make sure this is the last transfusion you need.”

“And then I’m seeing Natalia,” I am not asking.

Harvey nods, “I can make that happen as long as you are in good shape to be walking around.”

He looks over the paperwork, looks at the monitor. He takes down the emptyish brown and red stained bag of blood that was being pumped into me. He then removes the needle while simultaneously taping a bandage with gauze over the hole in my arm. It starts to throb.

"Thank you for keeping the damage in the same arm," I wince trying to lighten the mood.

I realize I'm being a slight asshole to the guy doing his job.

Harvey smiles at me and nods, "the puncture pain should go away by later today or tomorrow. Take the bandage off in about an hour. As for that gash in your upper arm and shoulder. I'll prescribe you a low dosage of hydrocodone. You don't smoke do you?"

He scribbles down on his pad.

"No, I don't... I might pick it up after this," I laugh once.

Harvey shakes his head as he writes more, "nasty habit. Don't pick that one up, try meditating. I can bring you a few booklets on zen practices... I came in to check on you a few times, you were jumpy in your sleep. Glad we didn't have to strap you down, it can be a mess if a needle rips out mid transfusion."

I gag at the thought of blood being sprayed everywhere.

"If your nightmares continue, maybe we can get a therapist for you to talk with."

I look at him as he continues scribbling.

He places his pen into his coat pocket and nods, “let’s go see Ms.Durand.”

He gently moves the pole with the tubes and bags of clear liquid that were connected to me out of my way to step down.

Slowly I make my way out of the bed stuffing down the grunts from the aching. Once I’m up on my two feet that are slid into fresh new hospital slippers I follow the man through the curtains.

We walk down the quiet hallway and two doors down we stop. My heart is thumping like I just ran a marathon, “she’s awake right?”

Harvey nods, “yes and we want to keep her that way. She’s suffered from a concussion. If she falls asleep it's bad news.”

I suck in a breath and nod once. Harvey opens the door and steps in first, “Ms. Durand. You have a visitor.”

I watch through the door as Harvey peeks his head past the curtain. A nurse walks by, glances at me then she walks out of view. When I hear my sweet girl’s soft voice I hurry in through the door and curtains. She looks at me with those soft sad eyes and I hurry to her side.

“Adeen,” she pushes my name out with effort.

“Oh Natallia,” I collapse next to her and hold her close to me. “I’m so sorry. I’m in idiot, I shouldn’t have let you go, I shouldn’t have put your life in danger like that.”

She weakly protests, “I made you take me. This is not your fault,” her fingers tighten in my hair.

“It is! I couldn’t slow down. I- I” I’m crying in her arms and she squeezes me tight.

“You did what you could do baby. This isn’t on you, I promise,” she starts crying. “You saved us, we could’ve died had you not thought on your feet and turned away from those trees.”

I don’t say anything but the tears keep flowing. She unburies my face from her neck, now we’re forehead to forehead staring into each other’s glistening eyes.

“This isn’t your fault Adeen. I need you to hear me,” she whispers. “We were all in the moment trying to be heroes ourselves. We were trying to stop Glenn and Frank. I wanted you to be okay and Jenny wanted Glenn to be okay. But that’s it. We got into an accident, that was no ones fault."

She puts emphasis on ‘accident’. “Accident meaning you didn’t do this on purpose. And it’s okay because we survived. And now I get to love you today, tomorrow and every day after until I can’t anymore.”

Tears roll down my cheeks, “I love you,” I croak.

She smiles through her own tears, “I love you.”