C. Brown: Fraternizing

“How are you feeling?”

“I’ve been better,” she answered, finally curving her lips into a smile.

There was a pink bucket full of ice water so I filled a cup with water and helped her drink from it. She took small sips, easing it down her throat. I couldn’t help but smile at her as I realized that I was so close to losing her, losing the one thing that mattered most to me. I took her hand again, bringing it to my lips, and kissing the top ever so gently.

“I can’t even begin to apologize enough to you, Blondie. I can’t seem to stop fucking up.”

Her eyebrows scrunched. “What do you mean?”

“I was wallowing in my own selfish bullshit, and that’s why you were left alone. I should have sucked it up. I should have had you with me, and that fucking—“ my anger was beginning to flair again, “—that fucking animal would have never gotten to you.” I could feel my body temperature rising, but I tried hard to control it, not wanting to upset her.

“Shhhh…” she said, closing her eyes then reopening them. “I don’t want you blaming yourself for this. Allen is responsible for his own actions.”

“I know, but...fuck! If I’d had you with me—“

She stopped me again.

“Alex, there is no point in that. Allen did what he did, and none of us could have predicted it.”

She wasn’t going to let my guilt swallow me, and the sweet, yet exhausted look plastered on her face made me realize even more why I had fallen in love with her in the first place.

“Do you even realize what he did to you?”

She blew out a breath and closed her eyes. The thought was probably painful for her, but I had to know. It was killing me inside to know if she was fully aware of what that fucking rabid dog had done to her.

“Yes. I’m hurting all over. I’m well aware.”

She adjusted again in the bed, this time shifting her legs with great care. The move brought back the image of Allen, half naked on the ground—his shit hanging out as Cassie sat scrunched on the floor, half naked as well. Sharp knifes jabbed at my mind as I tried hard to erase the painful and traumatizing image from my head, but I couldn’t.

And the more I saw it, the more enraged I became.

“I need you to tell me something, Cassie.” I swallowed hard as I internally debated whether I truly wanted to know the answer to my question. The deep need to know won out, giving me the courage to continue on. “I need to know what the fuck Allen did to you down there because if that motherfucker stuck his filthy fucking dick inside of you I’m going to finish him off, and I won’t have any remorse for it.”

I sat dying a slow death as I awaited her answer, the slow swallows she took acting like nails in my fucking coffin. I was prepared to hear it, but I wasn’t exactly sure what my reaction would be when I did, and that was what scared me most.

“He didn’t stick his cock into me.”

I exhaled loudly, throwing my head back in the chair. Relief had never felt so good.

“But, he was going to, and I was terrified that he was about to, when whoever that guy was came in and pulled him off of me.” She was starting to cry again which was the last thing I wanted. I scooted the chair closer to her, taking her hand to my lips, then resting it up against my cheek. “He fucking rammed his fingers inside of me. It hurt so badly, Alex. It hurt.”

Her fucking tears were streaming down her face, like water from a faucet. My stomach twisted again as she recalled what had happened, and I all of a sudden felt vomit-inducing sick again. I wanted to beat Riley’s ass for pulling me away from him because this recent news gutted me, ripped me from the core and poked holes through my psyche, making rational thought unrecognizable. She couldn’t stop crying, and I couldn’t find the right thing to do to make her feel any better. I felt helpless, powerless, and defeated. Her tears were there because I wasn’t around to protect her.

No ifs, ands, or buts about it.

I climbed into the bed, wrapping my arm around her while gently massaging her head. She rested her head on my shoulder, allowing her tears to flow, then gradually subside as I hummed our song, Fall For You, over and over again until she fell back asleep.

Cassie

Sunlight beamed into the room early the next morning, waking me from what felt like a lifetime worth of sleep. I remembered falling asleep in Alex’s arms, but when I woke up he was gone, and I was more than a little sad about it. I looked around, realizing that I was still in the hospital. The night before felt like a horrendous dream, but moving around in the bed, my sore body, and my aching bones, reminded me that it was real.

It was so real.

Flashes of the night, Allen attacking me, the firewatch throwing himself into the mix, Alex coming in and damn near killing Allen...all of it replayed in my mind, making me wince. I wanted to forget about it, but I couldn’t. It was embedded in my head, now and forever a part of me.

The aftermath of it all...Alex holding me, the exit from the hospital...all of that came back as well. My breath caught as I realized that Alex had acted like a protective boyfriend and not like the concerned instructor that he should have. I lay stoic in the bed, thinking about what would become of that if anything at all.

“Good morning, Pfc. Bennett,” my nurse said, cheerfully strolling into the room with a cup in her hands. “Here are you meds. Have you had a chance to order breakfast?”

I took the meds and swallowed them down.

“No, I haven’t. I just woke up.”

“No problem. Here is your breakfast menu. Go ahead and call in whatever you want.”

She began changing out machines all around me, then took my vitals before jotting everything down on the chart.

“Um—there was a guy here with me last night. Do you know where he went?”

She smirked at me, moving her eyebrows up and down.

“That handsome specimen that was here with you this morning? He stepped out with another guy, but said he’d be back.”

I nodded my head, relieved that nothing horrible had happened and that he was okay.

“Go ahead and order your breakfast. I’ll be back periodically to check on you.”

The room was quiet. Much too quiet for comfort, so I leaned over and pressed the button to raise the back of the bed up, putting me in an upright position to call in my food order and turn on the TV. Leaning over to grab the phone, my head throbbed with intense pain as I grew dizzy. I sat back, hoping the feeling would subside, when a knock sounded on the door, and the nurse walked in.

“You have good looking men all over the place.” She winked and led Dalton in.

I smiled, so glad to see him as he strolled in, looking fresh and rejuvenated in the early mornings like he always did.

“Well, if you wanted people to come wait on you hand and foot, you could have chosen a less dramatic way of doing it,” he joked, placing a vase of flowers down near me, then leaning over to hug me, kissing the top of my head.

“Yeah, I like getting destroyed by the living Hulk. It was an amazing experience.”

His smiled faded as he looked at me. I could tell sadness and regret were running through him. I had seen the same look the night before flash through Alex’s eyes. “I’m fine though. What’s going on?”

“Not much. I just had to see you. I felt so bad when I found out. I should have walked you to your room.”

“Stop. You sound like Alex. Neither of you could have known.”

He sat quiet for a minute, looking around the room.

“He was pretty broken when they were taking you out. I didn’t recognize him.”