by Carys Jones
Leaning back she released the razor and let it sink to the bottom of the bath tub. The deed was done. Soon she would awaken back in Azriel and take her rightful place upon its throne.
*
Carol and Bill remained absorbed in the panel show they were watching. A number of comedians were making festive jokes. Bill was laughing loudly at every wise crack and Carol kept dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.
“I love that guy,” Bill pointed at a middle aged over weight comedian. “He gets me every time.
“He’s very funny,” Carol agreed, leaning fondly towards her husband.
“I love that joke he tells about the electrician and how he gets turned on!”
“Oh yes,” Carol cackled freely. “That’s a good one. He always tells good jokes.”
A fresh eruption broke out from the pair as yet another joke was relayed by the panel.
Sebastian felt removed from both their revelry and the television show. All he could think about was Marie. He checked his watch. It had now been forty minutes since she went to have a bath and he’d not heard a sound from the bathroom overhead. Surely she couldn’t have sat in the water for that long? Perhaps she was stuck and couldn’t get out? But then why hadn’t she called out for help?
Plagued by indecision he continued to pace. If he went up there too early she’d resent him and possibly refuse to return to London and they’d miss their all important appointment with Dr Colton. He needed to keep Marie happy. If forty five minutes alone in the bath was what she wanted then that’s what he’d give her. Only five minutes remained and then he could run upstairs, help her dress and finally depart for London before the snow had chance to grab hold and block them in.
As he moved across the carpeted floor he dwelled on what Marie had said prior to her bath. How she had thanked him, how she had said that she loved him. She had been so sweet then, so sincere. It was a glimmer of the Marie he was trying so desperately to save.
“I love you.”
He savoured how it had felt to hear her say those words to him. It had been so long since she’d said it and truly meant it but in that moment he saw the sincerity reflected in her eyes and he knew that she felt as deeply for him as he did for her.
But there was more to it than that. Sebastian replayed the words, her actions, in his mind, scrutinizing every detail. Something was off.
He abruptly stopped pacing as he realised what was happening and his eyes widened in terror. Marie hadn’t just been declaring her love to him, she had been saying goodbye.
In one swift flurry of movement Sebastian fled from the lounge and ascended the green carpeted staircase in a matter of seconds. His heart hammered wildly in his chest like a caged hummingbird.
As he ran towards the closed bathroom door he just hoped and prayed that he wasn’t too late.
Parting
Sebastian pushed against the bathroom door but it was locked from the inside.
“Marie,” he called her name so loudly that it made his lungs hurt. No one replied.
“Marie! Open the door!”
When she still failed to answer the door he became incensed. Adrenalin electrified his senses, making him desperately fearless.
He kicked against the door, instantly denting the flimsy wood it was made of. He kicked again and this time the white bathroom door fell open and the sight which greeted Sebastian made his heart turn to stone inside his chest.
Marie lay wilted in the bath tub, her head upon her chest, her face hidden by her dark tangle of wet hair. But it wasn’t her posture which alarmed Sebastian. It was the dark ruby red shade of the water which glistened menacingly around her.
Shock held him for a second, rooting him to the spot. Then his senses reignited and he flew in to action, delving in to the now cold bath water and pulling Marie out from within the tub. She was bitterly cold in his arms.
As he sat on the faded blue bath mat with Marie in his arms he heard Carol and Bill frantically diving up the staircase.
“No,” Sebastian cried as loud as he could. “Don’t let her see!”
But it was too late. Carol glanced in to the bathroom and let out a long, mournful howl.
“Call an ambulance,” Sebastian called to Bill over her wailing as he continued to clutch Marie to him. He parted some of her hair so that he could glimpse her beautiful face. Her eyes were closed and her lips were settled in a contented smile.
Sebastian leaned towards Marie, desperate to hear her breathing but she was stoic in his arms as though she were made of marble.
Recalling training he’d received back during his prep school days he placed Marie on her back on the bathmat and began to place pressure upon her bare, wet chest. After pressing down for several seconds he moved and parted her mouth and tried to fill her lungs with air.
“Come on baby,” he urged her as he thumped down on her chest with the palms of his hands.
“Just hold on.”
Behind him Carol wept and shook, unable to conceive what she was witnessing. Her bathroom looked like a crime scene. There was blood everywhere. The bath tub was full of blood and the area around it, where Sebastian had lifted Marie’s body out was now also stained red.
Downstairs she numbly heard Bill on the phone to the emergency services, grimly relaying events.
“No, we’ve just found her,” he said.
“There’s a lot of blood.”
Sebastian continued to give Marie CPR as tears flowed freely down his cheeks and landed upon her naked body.
“Marie, please, come on,” he kept urging her.
“Oh, Marie,” Carol whimpered from the doorway which she clung to desperately as though she could no longer support her own weight.
Strong arms suddenly held her from behind and turned her away from the grisly scene in the bathroom.
“Don’t look,” Bill told her softly. “It’s best you don’t look.”
*
The serenity of the snowfall was harshly broken by the onslaught of screeching sirens and garish blue lights. A paramedic first response team pulled up outside the Schneider’s home and Bill swiftly let them in. The paramedics were quickly followed by an ambulance.
“Sir, let us help her,” a female paramedic with bright blonde hair and a kind face instructed Sebastian as she entered the bathroom.
“I can’t,” Sebastian admitted helplessly as he continued to press down on Marie’s chest, desperate for her to show some signs of life.
The female paramedic shot a look at her male colleague who entered the fray of the bathroom and gently grabbed Sebastian by the shoulders and guided him out of the small room.
The blonde immediately sprung in to action, checking Marie’s vital signs and putting an oxygen mask on her.
“We’ve got this,” the male paramedic told Sebastian sympathetically. “Let us help her.”
Numbly Sebastian watched feeling helpless as the paramedics frantically tried to revive his fiancée.
*
“It’s okay, honey, the doctors are here now,” Bill said soothingly to his wife who he’d taken downstairs and in to the lounge.
Carol had ceased screaming but now she was silent, unable to speak.
Bill titled his head to listen to what was happening upstairs as an ambulance drew up outside and more uniformed professionals flooded his home and hammered up the stairs in heavy work shoes.
“They’ll help her,” he reassured both himself and his wife. “They’ll know what to do.”
*
Ten minutes after the paramedics had first arrived on the scene they were preparing to leave. Marie’s cold, damp body was placed on a gurney and connected to an IV drip. They draped a blanket over her and carefully manoeuvred her downstairs towards the waiting ambulance.
“Is she alright?” Sebastian asked anxiously, following after them.
“She’s CTD,” the blonde said quietly to her colleague at the door who nodded and helped take Marie out in to the snow.
Sebastian knew w
hat CTD meant. Enough of his friends at school had gone on to become surgeons. Marie was circling the drain. It meant that she didn’t have long left.
“Is she alright?” he asked again, more insistent this time.
The blonde paramedic turned to face him, her eyes sad but her face still kind.
“She’s lost a lot of blood,” she told him. “I suggest you and her…parents,” she assessed “follow us as we head to the hospital.”
“Can’t I ride in the ambulance with you?”
“No,” she shook her head sorrowfully. “She needs too much help right now, we can’t have too many people in the van else it will obstruct us.”
Sebastian nodded and watched the paramedics follow Marie in to the ambulance. The snow swirled manically in the air as if whipping itself in to a frenzy.
*
“We should follow Marie to the hospital,” Sebastian said when he entered the living room though his voice didn’t feel like his own. He felt like he was watching a movie of his own life and was helpless to enact any change.
“Yes, of course,” Bill stood up and helped Carol rise to her feet. She was still shaking.
“They said she’s lost a lot of blood,” Sebastian added, trying to hold back the wave of despair which wanted to crash through the walls and drown him.
“Well, she’s in good hands now. Don’t worry, love,” Bill gave his wife a squeeze as they entered the hallway.
In a trance they pulled on their coats before stepping out in to the snowy afternoon.
*
The emergency department within St. Jude’s Hospital was bursting with the afflicted suffering a myriad of issues from a drunken fall and possible broken bone to severe burns following a cooking related fire.
Sebastian assertively approached the desk when they entered, his long coat flowing behind him like a cloak.
“Marie Schneider has just been brought in,” he told one of the nurses. “Where is she?”
The nurse typed something in to a computer and read the result, her expression stern and unchanging.
“She was just brought in via ambulance?” she asked in a clipped voice.
“Yes.”
“She’s been taken to the ICU.”
Sebastian knew exactly where the ICU was located. He could find that part of the hospital with his eyes closed.
“The ICU,” he reiterated the snippet of information to Carol and Bill who were tentatively following in his tracks.
Carol was as pale and lifeless as a zombie and Bill guided her in the right direction.
When they reached the ICU it was painfully familiar. The four surrounded by an assortment of monitors looked out at them from beyond the glass pane. Sebastian placed a hand upon the cool glass, for hours he had looked through at Marie as she lay in her coma. He had waited and prayed for her recovery and now they were back there, less than three months later, about to repeat the same brutal cycle of waiting for a loved one to pull through and live.
Carol buried her head in Bill’s vast chest as they approached the familiar department. She didn’t cry, she just shook as he held her in his strong arms.
Sebastian pressed up against the glass and scoured the beds for Marie. Two had male occupants and the other bed that was occupied had an elderly woman in it. Where was Marie? Surely they needed to be hooking her up to blood transfusions and heart monitors? Why wasn’t she there?
A nurse came out through the ICU electric doors and he immediately set upon her.
“I’m looking for my fiancée, Marie Schneider, at A and E they said she’d been sent here,” he paused when he realised that he recognised the nurse he was currently addressing.
Angela smiled slightly in recognition but her eyes watered slightly.
“They’ve sent for someone to talk to you,” she admitted, her voice small and at risk of breaking.
“Someone to talk to us? We want to see Marie,” he insisted. “Where is she?”
Angela glanced around desperately for some support. Luckily Dr Simmons was the doctor on call that day and he swiftly intervened.
“Just come and wait in the family room please,” Dr Simmons advised. Carol and Bill dutifully placed themselves in the room which was located down a corridor away from the ICU. It contained plastic blue chairs, artificial flowers and an out of use drinks dispenser.
“Tell me what is going on,” Sebastian refused to wait quietly in some room. He wanted answers.
Dr Simmons glanced in on Carol and Bill who had sat down on a pair of blue chairs. Carol was leaning against her husband as she continued to shake.
Satisfied the couple were beyond ear shot he closed the door to the family room and turned to face Sebastian.
“What has happened to Marie?” the younger man demanded. “I have a right to know.”
Dr Simmons sighed. He remembered that young Sebastian Fenwick had access to an eye watering amount of money and experience had taught him not to displease the excessively wealthy. The last thing the hospital needed was for someone like him to press charges against them.
“She’s not in the ICU.”
“I can see that,” Sebastian declared sarcastically.
“The team did everything that they could during the drive over.”
Sebastian’s anger suddenly drained out of him, pooling at his feet leaving him weak and helpless. From the doctor’s tone he instinctively knew what he was about to say although he refused to believe it.
“I’m afraid that Marie was announced dead on arrival. She’d lost too much blood to recover.”
Sebastian closed his eyes and bit back his tears, catching his grief in his throat and forcing it back down. The doctor was wrong. He had to be wrong.
“Just tell me where she is.” He could barely speak as his throat tied itself up in knots.
“She’s in the morgue, Mr Fenwick. I’m so sorry.”
The doctor then opened the door to the family room to relay the devastating news to Marie’s parents.
Sebastian leant against the wall and slowly slid down it until he connected with the floor, placing his head in his hands. He felt like the world was crumbling around him.
“No, no,” he shook his head, unable to take the news in, unable to accept it. “No, no,” he made the sound over and over until it lost all meaning.
Within the family room Carol broke her silence. As Dr Simmons declared her daughter to be dead she let out a scream which echoed out along the corridor and crept in to the ICU. She didn’t stop screaming until after they’d sedated her.
“No, no,” Sebastian kept repeating his mantra. It all had to be some cruel joke and really Marie was fine. She’d be back home waiting for him and this would all just be some horrific prank she was playing on them, perhaps to teach them a lesson for not believing in Azriel.
“No, no, no,” Sebastian pulled himself in to ball and clung to his denial.
*
Two Weeks Later
Dr Simmons eyed the trio sat on the other side of his desk with caution. He knew that they wouldn’t welcome all of the news he had to give them.
“As you know, it was decided that I’d share the results of Marie’s post mortem with you. Since I’m familiar to both yourselves and the case history it seemed pertinent.”
Carol Schneider sniffed and pushed a tissue up against her sore red eyes even though no tears came. She’d already cried herself dry over the loss of her beloved daughter.
Both Carol and Bill were dressed in black whilst Sebastian wore a dark grey suit having returned from London specifically for this meeting. He’d considered staying up in Manchester but it was too difficult. Everywhere he looked he saw Marie. For the past fortnight he’d retreated back to his luxurious apartment in London where he’d attempted to find a resolution for his sorrow at the bottom of a bottle.
His suit was the only smart thing about him. The rest of him was a shambles. His cheeks were shadowed with stubble and his hair was knotted and in desperate need of wash.
Whilst Carol and Bill looked presentable their pale skin and dark, sunken eyes told the world of the weight of sorrow that they were being crushed beneath.
When no one spoke Dr Simmons proceeded.
“The cause of death was identified as extreme blood loss which resulted in multiple organ failure.”
Carol held Bill’s hand in a vice like grip, tightening it until his fingers began to tingle as blood could no longer reach them. He didn’t mind. The discomfort was a pleasant distraction from the dire information they were being forced to take in.
