Patience

Chapter 46

Harry pov

I was collecting the last of our clothes to pack when I heard a loud noise. We are going home today, but I don't know if it is the right thing to do. Kate keeps telling me she's okay but, she doesn't look okay. I turn around and suddenly my world stops spinning. On the blue, carpeted floor lays Kate, she looks like she's sleeping, her eyes closed and her mouth is a little open.
The clothes I'm holding fall to the floor and in two big steps I'm by my girl's side. For a second I start to panic, but I take a breath and go into doctor mode to keep my cool. I take Kate's wrist and try to find her pulse. Kate normally has a very high pulse rate, but now it's very slow. Next I put my hand on her head, her skin is covered with a thin layer of sweat and she feels like she is burning up. Kate's eyes flutter but stay closed.
"Kate, beautiful? Can you hear me," I ask while I lightly tap her cheek with my index finger.

She squeezes her eyes before they slowly open and I smile at my girl.
"Hi beautiful, welcome back!" Kate looks at me with a look of fear in her beautiful, green eyes, but she says nothing.
"Come on baby, let's get you on the bed," I tell Kate, while I put my arm under her arms and I help her to get off the floor. When Kate sits down on the white hotel sheets, I lower my eyes so I can look into hers.
"You've not been telling me everything, right?" Kate looks down, but a sharp pain makes her hiss.
"I knew you were holding things back, I had a feeling..." I'm angry at Kate and myself but, I know this isn't the time to talk about it.

"Tell me baby, what do you feel?" I take Kate's cold hands in mine to encourage her to tell me everything this time.
"My headache, it's so bad, my eyes, it hurts to look, especially to the sides and when the light is bright and my neck, it's so stiff." I notice how her speech is slower than normal. I sigh and secretly hope it isn't what I think it is.

I look around the room to situate my doctor's bag, thank god I brought it with me. When I see it at the door, I take it and while walking to the bed again I start to rummage around in it, looking for my little torch. When I find it, I switch it on and shine it into Kate's eyes, she immediately closes her eyes and complains that it hurts. Next, I take her head in my hands, one hand covering her ears at each side and I pull her head down towards her chest, but quickly stop when she screams out in pain. Lastly, I look at her arms to see she has a light red rash on it.

"How long have you had this," I ask while I walk to the other side of the bed where my black coat is laying with Kate's red one. I put mine on before I walk to Kate and help her inside hers.
"It's been going on since yesterday," she sighed. I knew she wasn't telling me everything, I knew it, but I thought it would be from the spinal needle a couple of days ago.
"Damn," I scold myself. "We're going to the hospital, here is your wheelchair," I say when I take it out of the corner of the room.
When Kate finally sits down in her wheelchair, she asks why we are going to the hospital but I'm not going to scare her without doing some tests first. We leave the room and I push her through the hallways of the hotel, soon, we are in the back seat of a taxi.

I push Kate through the revolving doors of the ER. It's crowded in here, sick people, nurses and doctors swarm around. I walk up to the desk and start to talk to the friendly receptionist who immediately calls an ER doctor and Dr. Moens once I told her who we are, what happened and what I think is going on.
While I'm filling in a bunch of forms, a female nurse whisks Kate to a room. When I enter the room five minutes later, Kate is already wearing a gown. She's attached to a heart monitor and the nurse is setting things up to take some blood. Between when she regained consciousness at the hotel and now, Kate has barely said five words. I immediately went into doctor mode but now I'm standing here at the door of this cold room and for the first time, I allow myself to feel. I feel powerless, I'm not in control of this situation and it scares the shit out of me. I look at Kate who has tears in her eyes and is looking around unsure, probably also very scared.
When the nurse has done the blood work, she says she'll be back later and the doctor is on his way too. I take a chair and pull it up next to Kate as I take her little cold hand in my big warm one.