Within The Bonds

34: Fallon

"I need you to listen to me carefully first and not jump to any conclusions, alright?" Liam says his tone gentle and cautious.

"When you put it like that, of course, I'm going jump to conclusions!" I express softly yet truthfully, staring straight into his identical orbits.

A light chuckle rings throughout the room lighting the mood and calming my nerves a bit.

"I promise you'll be fine," he says taking a seat next to me. Now I have Noah sitting on one said and Liam on the other.

"Can you stop with the riddles?" Snaps an irritated Jack who seems to be as confused as me.

"Okay..." Liam says taking a deep breath in, as he searches for the right words to phrase his next sentence. "I need to do a blood draw," he says ripping the band-aid off.

Panic immediately starts growing inside me at his words, a thousand questions running through my head. 'Hadn't they already done a blood draw when I was asleep yesterday?'

Doing a blood draw when I'm asleep is one thing and when I'm awake is a whole different thing. At least when I was asleep, I didn't know it was coming!

"Why?" I ask the main question running through my head.

"They couldn't find anything in your previous blood draw so, Seb just wants to run a different one to eliminate any other possibilities," Liam explains carefully as he studies my response minutely.

"Who's going to do it?" The most troubling question of all.

"Me of course," he replies swiftly and reassuringly.

His words cause relief to wash over me and calm me down to a certain extent. But that isn't enough, I still feared needles tremendously, and just the thought of it has me panicking from within.

But astonishingly I don't feel my chest tighten or my heart speed up like it usually does at the mention of needles or anything medical related.

'That's a good start, right?'

Sure, I'm panicking from within, but not to the extent that I have a panic attack which is a first. All through my childhood taking shots was a nightmare, guilt always clenches my heart when I think of all the trouble, I put mum through because of it.

"I know it's scary for you, but I need you to try and be as calm as you can. Don't stress and try not to overthink the situation alright?" Liam's words snap me out of my self-debate. But the task is easier said than done.

"Do I have to do this?" I ask in a feeble attempt to escape the situation.

"I'm afraid so, we need to know what caused your fever," he replies firmly.

I reluctantly agree moments later having seeing no other way out. "You'll be fine, we all are right here," Noah whispers into my ears giving my hand a gentle reassuring squeeze.

I look up at him and nod with a small smile trying my best to hide my true emotions and inner turmoil. Liam leaves the room to go get some supplies giving me even more time to overthink the situation.

I keep telling myself that I'm going to be fine and everything is going to be okay, but lying to yourself isn't the easiest thing in the world.

I jump out of my seat in fright when Noah's phone goes off all of a sudden breaking the tense silence of the room. Heat rises to my face at this and I wordlessly resume my position on the sofa.

Noah sends me an apologetic smile and shifts his attention to his phone now with an irritated look on his face. Excusing himself he walks out of the room yelling at the person on the other end in a low tone.