Can You Feel Me? : Chapter 5
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by: Danielle
copyright: 1999
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Brian sat quietly in the back of the ambulance, trying not to break down at the sight of his best friend strapped to the gurney and tubes running from him to machines and IV's. The medic tended to Nick and kept looking back at Brian every few seconds to see how he was holding up. Brian just stared down at the peaceful face of his friend, his eyes never wavering. Almost willing him to live through his look alone.

She still sat on the end of his gurney, watching everything that was going on, her hand still locked in his. She studied the man sitting on the other side of the ambulance, he looked like his whole world had come crashing down on his shoulders. The sadness in his face was almost unbearable to look at. Yet, she couldn't look away. Slowly she got up and knelt between the gurney and Brian, placing her hand on his, trying to comfort him even though she knew he had no idea she was there.

Brian felt something. It was calming, comforting. There was the faintest touch on his hand, almost not enough to make out. He closed his eyes and bowed his head, whispering. "If you are here to take him, please, don't. Take me, I have the heart condition, it makes more sense for me to go."

She looked up at him in shock, the whisper was too low for anyone but her to hear. He felt her. She knew he did. But how was that possible?

The ambulance came into the hospital entrance, screeching to a stop at the doors to the ER. Mass confusion reigned as information was shouted back and forth, the gurney was taken in and Brian was ushered into a waiting room away from everyone else.

She ran watched the chaos around her as they worked on him. His wrist was cleaned and a surgeon called in to stitch up the special case. His clothes and body were inspected for other injuries, finding none, they concentrated on his wrist, knowing they could easily stitch up what was physically wrong with him, but emotionally it was going to be a lot harder.

His vitals were starting to become thin, he had lost too much blood. He was on the thresholds of human tolerance for blood loss. A rallying cry was made out and she watched as a new line was inserted into him, a long thin tube of red snaking into his arm.

The maelstrom around him subsided as his wound was closed and the machines around him were left to do their work. Through it all, not a glimmer of a reaction had passed over his face, not to pain, not to the life blood that was now being injected into his veins, nothing.

She heard the whispers around them. Coma.

She looked at him, studying his face. He was beautiful in a boyish sort of way. Getting up, she went to closer to the head of the bed, looking at him. Her fingers reached out and traced over his still face, not feeling anything, but it was comforting to her. "I don't even know your name."

"My name is Nick."

Her head whipped up and she found the exact image of the man lying in the bed standing next to it, his blue eyes looking into hers.

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