He cradles his face in his hands, left foot tapping out rhythmical nonsense on the sterile floor. Every couple of taps his foot squeaks against the tile floor and he digs his fingers into the corner of his eyes tightly. Every nerve in his body is pulsing and pulled so far stretched he feels like he could smother the universe with his tension.
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Her voice broke long ago and she's left a pain-filled mess on a hospital bed with muscles twitching in her thighs and her eyes are starting to roll back but she blinks harshly and the twinkling lights reassure her that she's still conscious.
Nurses are flitting in and out of the room and one of them drags in a small wheel-y chair, and a creaking means she's seated and at the foot of the bed.
She's speaking from behind a surgical mask, rubbing her thumb absently on her left knee, and she realizes this is the closest she's ever had a girl come to her vagina before before another surge of pain racks up her spine and a scream twists itself out of her throat that ends with a scratch.
She faintly hears an, "I think I see the head!" before black spots spiral into view and she knows nothing more.
-----------
He hears the nurse clear her throat across the room and his insides are twisting inside him, pulling him into standing before he's aware of what he's doing. The nurse stares at him for a second, two, five, ten. Her face is taught and her furrowed eyebrows are casting his heart into pounding furiously against his chest.
She offers him a hand, and he allows himself to be led through a series of hallways a doors. A hand is constant on his back and he vaguely wonders about the silence of the trip. As they walk passing hospital staff seem to stop and stare at them, and he realizes with harsh twist of all the thrumming blood vessels in his body that they're marching the death waltz towards the pregnancy wing.
----------------
She's been awake for three hours and twenty-four minutes but all she can focus on is the pitying look on the nurses face, and the doctor who rested his hand gently on her arm as he told her the news. How it
wasn't her fault and that it
could happen to anyone, but words were spilling up inside her chest, about why this happened to her, if it could happen to anyone, why not
them?
Words and accusations are cycling through her mind, a proverbial cyclone of anger, depression, grief, denial, and self-hatred that had her turn away the ham and cheese sandwich a nurse offered her for lunch.
-------------------
He's standing outside the hospital room, incapable of bringing himself into the room. The floor is seeming to pulse beneath his feet and a quick glance at the ceiling consists of swirling lights and ceiling tiles. He swallows but it's hard as it falls down his throat and he digs his fingers into the sides of his neck as his breathing quickens and he allows the full realization of the situation to dig into him. As he loses himself in his heavy breathing he hears screams from behind closed doors, and as a nurse rushes in, he hears in between door closings sobs of '
let me see my baby'.
He almost believes he can feel tiny fingers wrapping themselves around his heart as he breaks down into silent sobs, sliding down the wall with shaking shoulders and a heavy heart.
