Complicated Love

by Harper Phoenix

  The ambulance arrives, and we head out to their hospital. Maiya is given meds to help her sleep while they discover what’s going on. They want her undressed and fitted into a gown. I kick everyone out of the room, and I do the job myself. I know she isn’t mine, but I don’t want anyone else near her, not even the nurse. I’m as gentle as possible. Then the nurse comes back with a machine to scan Maiya’s stomach. I don’t know what I’m looking at when the blue and black screen comes up and a whooshing noise fills the room. She makes lots of clicks and takes measurements and then turns on her swivel stool to look at me.

  ‘Would you like to wait until she is awake?’ I should really, but fuck if I can wait. I need to know what the hell is wrong with her now.

  ‘Just spit it out?’

  ‘I will just go and get a doctor so that they can explain.’

  I start to pace up and down, and the wait for them to come back is like infinity stretched. When the guy comes in, he goes to the screen and starts playing with shit, and I’m almost at breaking point when he finally speaks.

  ‘I’m afraid that this was never a viable pregnancy. It is what we call an ectopic pregnancy. There is nothing we can do to save a pregnancy that grows in the fallopian tube, often they come away by themselves, and you are never aware you had it. But, unfortunately, in this case, it has attached and grown until it has ruptured. We are going to have to operate to remove the tube and the remainder of the pregnancy. I’m very sorry.’

  I nod, unable to form words right now. ‘I will leave you a moment, and we will be back to prepare for surgery.’ Again, I nod, swallowing any response at the thought of surgery. Shit.

  Devon and Jared come in, and her face crumples when I tell her the news.

  ‘As if she hasn’t been through enough already. Did she want the baby? I mean, under the circumstances no one would have blamed her—’

  ‘She hadn’t decided, but I really think she was coming around to the idea. We didn’t really speak of termination.’ Devon squeezes my arm, and Jared claps me on the shoulder.

  ‘I’m sorry, man.’ He seems genuinely sorry too. I still can’t digest this shit. As I sit on the stool and take Maiya’s hand in mine, the doc comes back in. He’s ready for surgery, and two nurses follow him. They start prepping the bed to wheel it out of the room.

  ‘Where are you taking her?’ I demand with panic clear in my voice. ‘I want to go with her.’

  ‘I’m sorry, son, but it’s not possible for you to be in the theatre when we’re conducting surgery. What you can do is wait in the relatives room—down the hall and to the right—and someone will be along when she’s in recovery.’

  ‘Wait? How long will it take?’ I demand because I can’t sit there without some sort of time limit so I know if things are wrong.

  ‘We can’t say for sure—just depends on what we find when we open her up.’

  ‘Fucking humour me, doc!’

  He takes a deep breath and sighs. ‘Fine, shouldn’t be any more than a few hours.’ So three. Three fucking hours.

  I wear a path in the carpet, Devon keeps standing and patting my arm. Jared keeps coming in and out, and my nerves are fucking shot. I need someone to come and fucking tell me what the hell is going on. It’s been almost four hours, and I can’t take anymore. I storm through the doors, hearing Devon and Jared shout after me, but I’m done waiting, they need to tell me what the fuck is wrong, and I need to see she’s okay before I kill someone. I find the nearest nurse and demand to know where Maiya is. When she shrugs her shoulders and tells me she isn’t her patient. I take her by the elbow and march her down the long corridor with me. She’s practically running to keep up.

  ‘You don’t know, then you can find someone who does. I want to know now.’ Her face pales, but I’m passed caring. I want to know if Maiya is okay, and I want to know now. Just as I’m about to burst through a set of doors marked ‘theatre’, the doc appears from a room next door. He’s in a white coat and no longer wearing surgical clobber. I stop and release the nurse’s arm. He comes towards me with a stony expression on his face. ‘Where the fuck is she?’ I demand.

  ‘She is in recovery and not yet ready for visitors.’

  ‘She say that?’

  ‘No. I say that.’

  ‘Fuck you, doc. I’m seeing her right now,’ I tell him, pushing past him, knocking into his shoulder. Fucker has balls because he comes after me and tugs on my arm. I stop and glare at the place his hand is touching. Then I look in his eyes and growl. He lets go. But still runs his mouth.

  ‘Unless you have an explanation as to what has happened to this woman then you are going nowhere near her. I will call security.’ The fuck?

  ‘What?’

  ‘I said—’

  ‘Heard what you said, doc—now explain it.’ He’s flustered and didn’t expect that from me. He obviously thinks I’ve done something to her. Well, fuck if I know what he’s talking about, but I will find out. I keep walking until I find her. I look through the small pane of glass, and I almost fall to my fucking knees. She’s a mess. Pale, her burns look fresh, and she looks like death is approaching her fast.

  ‘Get me a needle,’ I demand from the doc.

  ‘I’m sorry, but you will have to leave the premises. We cannot allow you to have illegal substances. I don’t care who you are.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake! GET.ME.A.FUCKING.NEEDLE.NOW!’ I roar out, and I watch his demeanour change, and he backs up out of the room, but Jared blocks the doorway.

  ‘Unless you want her death on your hands, doc, I’d get him the fucking needle,’ Jared tells him calmly. The doctor goes to a locked cupboard in the room, and takes out a handful of equipment and gives it to me.

  ‘How much blood has she lost?’ I ask. He thinks on it and stumbling on his answer he says, ‘Maybe a few pints.’

  ‘She needs more than I can give her like this—she needs a transfusion, and it needs to be my blood. Get whatever you need to do it now. Fast.’ He doesn’t question me and rifles through the cupboard again. Bringing out all sorts of fancy shit. Zoe never used anything like this. In no time at all, I’m hooked up and bleeding into a bag. Then another as the first is hooked up to Maiya. My heart is beating overdrive as I watch the first bag slowly drain dry. After the third, I’m feeling a bit fucking dizzy, so I stay in my seat and get a cotton blob stuck on my arm where the needle went. I lie there with my eyes closed, and I must bob off because the next thing I hear is Maiya’s voice.

  ‘Brad?’ I sit straight up before my eyes have even opened. And I blink like fuck to clear the blurry vision.

  ‘Brad, why am I in the hospital? What’s happened? How did I get here?’ And my heart sinks. How the fuck do I tell her?

  ‘You’re okay, sweetheart. Stop trying to get up,’ I tell her as she fights with the tubes attached to her arm and nose. ‘Maiya, stop.’ I say in a tone I haven’t used with her before, but it makes her stop what she’s doing and listen to me.

  ‘Sweetheart, I’m so sorry, but you’ve lost the baby.’

  There is no emotion on her face other than shock. Not even shock really, more of a disbelieving confusion. Then her head shakes back and forth. ‘No… how? I didn’t decide that… I was going to… I was okay… I was… I wanted to…’ she mumbles over and over that she wanted to keep the baby, and my heart breaks all over again. What will it take for this woman to catch a fucking break? Why her?

  I pull her head to my chest. ‘I’m so fucking sorry, sweetheart.’

  Her sobs shake through her body and mine, and it’s all I can do to keep my own at bay. Instead, I cry silent tears for her and a baby that was never meant to be. A baby conceived in hate and lost in love. It’s cruel really.

  PEOPLE COME AND go all night—or morning—I’m not sure how long I’ve been here. I’ve heard snippets of conversations, different guys coming in to see Brad and Jared. Devon never leaves, she holds my hand, and even though it hurts to think about everything that relates to her, I find comfort in
it. Brad never leaves either. I know that must be hard on him because they’ve come here to do a job and Brad wants to be out there doing it.

  I know from conversations that they have done some surveillance and Brad has been key in giving them the info they need in order to carry out their roles. He’s had a couple of laptops on the go from the corner of the room and a headset on at all times. Not sure who he’s talked to, but I’ve heard stuff like ‘clear on the right’ and ‘four to the left, a hundred yards out’ and other stuff I can’t quite recall. But he never leaves.

  ‘How long have I been here?’ I ask. It’s the first time I’ve really spoken, other than to say ‘fine’ every time I’m asked how I feel. Devon hasn’t spoken to me other than to ask me if I need anything a million times. I just wanted to leave, go home and forget about everything that hurts. But I’m stuck here—at least until I’m healed, and then I have to have rest before I can do anything normal. The doctor has explained what happened and why, but it’s a bit of a blur, and all feels a little bit surreal right now. Words like ectopic, none-viable, ruptured tube. I just want to go home. Home? Where is that now?

  ‘It’s been four days,’ Devon offers in answer. Four days. Feels like an eternity.

  ‘Brad?’ I look for him and find him in his usual spot with the laptops. He moves to me and takes my hand.

  ‘Still here, sweetheart.’ I nod because I knew that, but I want to talk to him. Not Devon.

  ‘Can you take me home? I want to go home?’ His eyes widen a little and roll towards Devon, who just looks right back at him,

  ‘I wish I could, sweetheart, but you can’t fly for a while yet.’

  I sigh. ‘Well, at least get out of here then?’

  He nods. ‘Devon, you mind going and finding out if that’s a possibility?’

  I don’t look at her, and I feel awful, but I just can’t shake the feeling of hate I have towards her right now. Even though she’s never left me and held my hand the whole time. She agrees and leaves the room.

  ‘Brad, I really don’t want to be here, and I don’t want her here.’ I look away in shame because I know it’s a shitty thing to say.

  ‘Maiya, she hasn’t left your side. You need to get over whatever this is between you.’

  ‘Don’t tell me what I need to do—you have no idea how I feel or why,’ I snap. He steps back and holds his hands in the air as he backs up from me. He looks disappointed, and I can’t blame him. I immediately want to take the words back. I don’t want to upset Brad. He’s important to me. I stop and think about that for a moment. It takes me a little by shock. He is really important to me. Not for his blood, not because I need it, need him, but because I really do want him around. And I don’t know what I would do if he weren’t. He’s been a constant throughout this shit storm. And the look on his face right now guts me.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I blurt. ‘I’m sorry… I didn’t mean to snap at you.’ He doesn’t say anything, he just turns away and starts to check his laptops. I fucking hate when we’re like this. ‘Brad?’

  He still doesn’t turn around, but with his back to me, asks, ‘What?’ He’s pissed and doesn’t want to look at me and that hurts more than it should too. I don’t reply. What’s the point? Devon comes back and announces that the doctor needs to assess me to see if I can leave.

  ***

  After the doctor announces I can leave, I practically jump out of that bed. It is just a reminder of what I’ve lost, and I don’t want to spend another minute there. I want to go home, but I’ll settle for the guesthouse in the pack compound. I go straight up to the bedroom and feel relief at being alone for the first time, since… I sit on the bed and just mull over how my life has changed since I started university back in September. Only a few months and yet it seems like an eternity. It feels like a whole different life. Everything has changed. My whole world has changed. Just finding out that other things exist, is huge. I’ve been dragged into a whole different world, kicking and screaming, and now I can never not know it. I can never go back to being the Maiya who had a shitty childhood and was determined to succeed in life. To be better. None of that seems important anymore. I was stuck in this life and would be until I died.

  I should have died. I wanted to so badly. Sometimes I still thought about it. Especially now. I run my hand over my stomach. It had held a piece of me growing inside. Something I hadn’t expected and hadn’t thought I wanted. Until it was there. I did want it. I had wanted to keep the baby. And as much as I told myself I was unsure—the thought of me terminating had never really entered my mind. I wouldn’t have done it. I know for sure I wouldn’t. It was an innocent life that no longer existed.

  I don’t realise I’m crying until Brad comes in. We haven’t spoken since I snapped at the hospital but he comes right over to me and wraps his arms around me. He doesn’t ask what’s wrong—he just knows. I hug him back. I cling on to him. Realising again how much I need him around. I hate when we’re not talking. It’s as if every time we fall out, it chips away at my heart. I need him to feel whole. A sudden need flares within me, and I don’t know what to do with it. Brad pulls back and looks at me strangely for a second, right before I see that need burn in his eyes too. His face is inches from mine.

  I CAN SMELL her arousal, but I’m in two minds about whether I should act on it. I’m not an idiot. I know she can’t have sex yet, and I know that’s the furthest thing from her mind right now. But, I’m here, and she’s aroused. What’s a man to do with that?

  Before I’ve thought it through, my lips meet hers, and her mouth opens for me, allowing my tongue to slide in and explore. I’m half expecting a hand to the chest and to be shoved away. But it doesn’t come. I taste mint and that all-consuming taste which is just Maiya. I pull her to me. I want her as close as possible. I pull her onto my thighs and fist her hair in my hands. I deepen the kiss, and without realising what I’m doing, I’m lifting her and laying her on the bed. I get a sudden jolt like a bolt of lightning hitting me, and I stop what I’m doing and stand up straight. This isn’t right. She’s vulnerable, and this isn’t what she needs. Fuck me—I’m a dumbass. As if she realises too, she sits up and pulls her knees to her chest. I press my hand to hers.

  ‘Maiya, I’m so sorry,’ I say before I leave her for the bathroom.

  ***

  I can’t face Maiya yet, so I go straight downstairs.

  ‘Brad, we’ve sat on this long enough now. It’s time to move. We go tonight.’ I nod as I walk in on the conversation in the kitchen. Jared is getting more and more pissed the longer we stay here, and he wants to be off this asshole’s turf.

  ‘I’m good to go,’ I tell him. I want this done. We’ve managed to get the recon done over the several nights Maiya was in the hospital. I have their routine down. They won’t be expecting us, and it should go pretty damn smoothly. Howard is grumbling in the corner. He’d been acting strange since we arrived. He definitely has a bee in his bonnet. And considering his face usually looks like his asshole, the fucker was surprisingly worse.

  ‘What the fuck is eating at you?’ I ask him, giving him a nudge in the ribs with my elbow.

  ‘Fuck off,’ he grunts.

  ‘Sorry I asked, dickhead.’

  He just glares at me before walking to the door.

  ‘What time?’ he shouts, making Jared look up at him. Jared has a look on his face when he sees Howard’s hand on the door handle. It’s a look I’ve seen many a time. It means ‘don’t cause any shit’. What the fuck did I miss while Maiya was in the hospital?

  ‘Four a.m. we go. Don’t be late.’ Jared dismisses everyone, but I wait for the room to clear.

  ‘What the fuck is going on with Howard?’ Jared inhales deeply before exhaling on a sigh.

  ‘Some shit with a woman,’ he tells me like he’s sick to death of talking about it already.

  ‘Howard? Pissed about a woman?’ I query because that’s not fucking normal. ‘What’s up? She wouldn’t suck his dick the way he wanted?’ I l
augh at my own humour. Jared rubs at his face with his hands. He’s worried about it. ‘What? Tell me?’

  ‘We need to deal with this shit first okay?’ I nod my agreeance. ‘Then we can discuss Howard’s issue.’

  ‘So there is a problem then?’

  ‘Mmmhmm,’ is all he says. Great. He gets up to leave. ‘Go and get some sleep, and I’ll see you here at four.’ He pushes through the door, and I mull over what could possibly be such a big problem. I don’t go back to the bedroom. I have a big enough problem there myself. So instead, I go out for a walk. I hear Howard before I see him. He’s having words with Brody. I walk over, but they stop before I get there.

  ‘Everything alright?’ I ask even though it’s obvious that it’s not. Brody is pushed up against the wall, and Howard is all up in his face. Again. I sigh.

  ‘Howard, come on, man. I thought this shit with you two was sorted?’ I say, stepping between them. ‘Leave the kid alone.’

  ‘It’s not me he needs to leave alone!’ Brody grumbles as he walks away.

  ‘Umm, you wanna tell me what that was all about?’ I ask smiling. Sounds to me like Howard and Brody could be arguing over the same chick. I almost laugh, but Howard’s face is anything but amused. He’s really pissed off. That much is clear. He cracks his neck before shaking his head and walking away.

  ‘Oh, don’t mind me, man. I’ll just answer my own damn self, huh?’

  He still doesn’t speak just casually flips me the bird over his shoulder.

  I know I’ve been at the hospital most of our stay so far, but this place is eerily quiet. It’s the alpha’s compound, and no one is ever around. It’s not normal. I do a walk around the main fence and then head back to the house. I’m going to take a nap before we head out later. I will have to face Maiya, and that’s that. I get to the bedroom, and she’s sound asleep. I thank God or whoever the fuck people thank for small mercies, and I get myself comfortable on the far side of the bed. I wake up a few hours later with Maiya screaming and fighting against someone. My eyes pop, and my vision kicks in after a few seconds of pitch black. My body goes into fight mode. But I realise quickly that she’s fighting an invisible enemy. Fuck. Another nightmare.