Good Enough (Scomiche)

Ch 13. Freedom

The man pulled Mitch aside to talk as if I wasn’t even there. I didn’t even care to try & listen. 

I was too busy watching Mitch’s face. His features were pulled tight again, his body tense and alert. He listened intently to whatever the man was saying and I could see him asking questions, but couldn’t read his lips to figure out what they were. I watched him nod, the worry evident on his face. He took a deep breath and ran both of his hands over his face before giving a final nod. They both turned back to me.

“You need rest.” The man didn’t even look at my face before injecting something into the iv needle already in my arm.

I kind of huffed a bit. I’d been laying down for weeks. The last thing I wanted to do was keep laying there. I was again brought back to a memory of Avi. ‘You’re weak, Scott. You need to rest.’

Mitch held my hand again once the doctor moved away from me. I wanted to kiss him, to hold him, but I could already feel my eyelids beginning to droop. 

“You’re gonna be fine. Just sleep, ok?” He sat down in the chair again, intermittently kissing my hand. He wasn’t even looking at me. He kept saying it, "you're gonna be fine," almost like he was convincing himself instead of comforting me.

I tried to tell him I loved him, but my whisper was too quiet for anyone to hear as sleep claimed me again.

~ 

I swear his blood was like some sort of cure all. I don’t know what he had inside of him, what they did to his genes or whatever scientific mumbo jumbo, but it was certainly effective.  I must have had enough of it still in me to matter, because I was up on my feet in less than 5 days. I have a feeling it saved my life. 

Just one more thing I owed to Avi, and I guess also to Mitch.

Things were strained between us for those first few days. He stayed pretty quiet, the conversation stayed on trivial things, the weather, how I was currently feeling, tv shows… 

I finally learned I wasn’t at a regular hospital. These were friends of Arya. 

Mitch disappeared a lot. He was gone for hours at a time leaving me to my thoughts. Even when he was there things were distant. 

I began to feel stifled. I’d been locked up for way too long and I needed out. There were a lot of things that needed out. 

The morning of the 5th day is when I lost it. 

Funny how I seem to always react in the most inappropriate ways. He risked his life to save mine and there I was screaming at him, arms flailing about, pacing the floor like a caged animal on weak, shaky legs. I was getting angrier and angrier. 

You’d think it would be a happy reunion, that I would be grateful to be free. 

You’d think I’d be concerned about his health, or that I’d even think twice to ask him if he was ok, if his headaches were gone. 

He kept trying to hold me, to calm me. He kept telling me I needed to sit down.

But, no.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

“YOU DIDN’T EVEN HESITATE!” 

“I didn’t have a choice ” he didn’t raise his voice or his eyes. 

“IT WAS RECKLESS AND HEARTLESS! YOU JUST SHOT HIM!”

“I know.” 

“HE DIDN’T EVEN HAVE A WEAPON!” 

“I didn’t know that ” 

“YOU MURDERED HIM! ”

His eyes raised to mine for the first time since I’d left sanity behind.