I will rescue you

6 All the feels

Chapter 6

As soon as Maya left to talk to Amelia, Carina knew it was bad. That's the only reason she could think of as to why they wouldn't talk with her there. Scenarios of what could be wrong with her started spinning in her head. The neck pain had concerned her from the start. As a doctor, she knew neck pain was never a good sign, especially after a traumatic injury. She started to find it hard to catch her breath, causing her breathing to quicken, as well as her heart rate, alarming the monitors. She was unable to stop the copious amounts of tears as she started to think about everything she could lose, everything she might never be able to do again.

Hands appeared on either side of her face, making her open her eyes, immediately met with calming, blue oceans. Her wife didn't say anything, simply breathed her through it while wiping Carina's tears with her thumbs. The firm and gentle hold on the brunette's face grounded her enough to quiet the thoughts. When Carina had calmed down, Maya sat down on her bedside with one hand still on her cheek, taking her hand with the other.

"You really miss me that much?" Maya said smiling, causing Carina to chuckle.

"You talked about me, right?" Carina said somberly after a while.

Maya just nodded, squeezing her wife's hand, trying not to cry.

"How bad is it? Just tell me, please. I need to know" The brunette pleaded.

"We don't know. We won't know until Amelia runs some tests, but-... but it's not looking great" Maya said quietly, now looking at her wife, watching her lip quiver.

It was silent for a few minutes, neither of them knowing what to say.

"I can feel you hand in mine. That's good, right?" Carina said, a surprising amount of hope in her voice, despite it still being shaky.

Maya smiled, bringing her wife's hand to her mouth and kissing it.

"Yeah, it's good. It's really... really good" Maya said, looking down and, once again, fighting the tears.

"I- I'm so... so grateful that you're still here. I was so close to losing you and- you're my everything, Carina. Whatever happens next, whatever the tests show, we will survive. We will be okay, and you will never be alone, okay?" The blonde continued.

Carina blinked once, still not able to nod, and sniffled.

"You will never be alone either, this doesn't just affect me... I love you" The brunette half whispered, as her throat still hurt.

Maya leaned forward, placing her forehead against her wife's as they soaked each other up.

"I love you too" Maya whispered and laid a soft kiss on her wife's head.

"But we really need to clean you up, you kind of stink" Maya chuckled and Carina gasped, pretending to be offended, before smiling brightly.

"Hey! you are just as bad" Carina mused tiredly, both of them grateful they were able to make each other smile in the darkest of times.

Amelia once again interrupted them with a knock on the door.

"Wow what are you two laughing about? Not me I hope" The neurosurgeon smiled, walking into a much different scene than she had expected, but happy Carina seemed somewhat okay.

She pulled up a chair and sat by the bed, opposite to Maya.

"So, I'm sure you don't remember much so I'll just start from the beginning. When they brought you out, you were already unconscious. Maya told me about the head and neck pain. I guessed you passed out from oxygen deprivation, which is true, but when we did a CT, it revealed you also have a grade 2 concussion. It explains the headache I'm guessing you still have... The CT also revealed a displacement of the T1 vertebrae. It hadn't caused any damage, but to get it in place we had to open it up. When we got in there, the damage was worse than we thought. We fixed the vertebrae, but it injured your spinal cord. That, as you know, could cause permanent means, and likely, paralysis. Since we were nearly 100 percent sure your lower body would be affected, we also did a colostomy. It can be reversed if you don't need it later on" Amelia explained calmly.

Carina fixed her gaze on the sealing, knowing that looking at her wife's face would make her cry.

"To know the extent of the damage, we have to run some tests. Are you okay to do that now?"

"Sí" Carina answered, swallowing her tears.

Maya stood and kissed her wife on the forehead before going to stand at the foot of the bed. Somewhere Carina could still see her, but she wasn't in the way.

"Okay Carina, I'm gonna move this pen along your skin and you tell me when you feel it okay? Remember, this is not definite, you could regain some feeling and mobility with time and PT" Amelia said, lifting the blanket covering Carina's right leg.

Carina closed her eyes, and Maya intently followed the pen's movements. Starting at the toes, Amelia slowly dragged it all the way up her leg.

Nothing.

Maya bit her lip and quickly wiped away a lone tear. Amelia moved on to the next leg, doing the same thing, getting the same outcome. She then removed the blanket from Carina's upper body.

"I'm gonna take off you gown okay?"

With Carina's consent, the neurosurgeon untied the gown. Starting right above her pubic bone, she slowly moved the pen upward. Right at the top of her abdomen, below her chest, Carina felt a weird, tingling sensation.

"Wait!" A raspy voice startled both Maya and Amelia.

"I feel something, it- it's so weird, like eeh- a tingling" Carina said, a frown on her face as she tried to find the right words to describe it.

"Okay, that's good. The tingling means the nerves are working, but they're kind of confused right now. You will most likely regain function and feeling in those parts with time" Amelia explained with a smile.

She continued moving the pen up Carina's body, and about 2 inches above the previous spot, Carina said it felt like normal, meaning she had full feeling from her chest and up. Amelia then moved on to her arms and Carina could fell her hands and most of the arms. However, the inside of the forearms and wrists had nearly no feeling.

They then moved on to the mobile part of the testing. Amelia asked her to move her feet and legs, which she couldn't at all. The frustration caused her eyes to well up and breathing to intensify slightly. Something Maya noticed quickly.

"Hey Car, can you look at me?" She said, getting her wife to make eye contact with her.

"Breathe with me okay? I'm here, and we're almost done. You're doing great" Maya insisted, and after a minute of breathing together, Carina calmed down enough to continue.

Moving her shoulders and arms were no problem, however her wrists were hard to control. She couldn't completely straighten them, and although she had full feeling in her hands, had problems opening and closing them. Amelia explained that was due to the affected nerve in her forearms running all the way into her hands. It was also something she could work on in PT.

After the neurosurgeon had left, Maya could tell her wife was exhausted, mentally and physically. Carina agreed to sleep for a bit, on the condition that Maya did too, as she needed the rest just as much. Maya was reluctant as she didn't want to leave Carina alone, so they asked Julie if they could have a cot. Once it was set up, Maya scooted it as close to Carina's bed as possible, which she lowered to be the same height as the cot. She laid down on her side so she could look at her wife.

"I wish I could look at you right now" Carina whispered after a couple minutes.

Maya brought her hand to her wife's hand and stroked it gently, bringing both of them comfort.

"Me too, but I'm really happy you can feel me"

>>>

I am not a doctor so some things might be wrong, anyway hope you enjoy! :)

Also! Updated chapter 4 cause I forgot some details, nothing major tho.