Erich - Nineteen

Erich

I only remembered bits and pieces of what happened after the bombs fell. For a long time I didn’t know what was happening. There was a cycle of sleeping and waking sleeping and waking. Whenever I woke up I would be so groggy I usually thought I was still asleep. I wanted to find Gabe. I would try to get up. But no one would let me go. There would be a cloth over my mouth and I would be out again. I tried my hardest to remember. I wanted to remember.

The memories came in flashes like dreams. I remembered throwing off my sweater vest as I reached the scorching hot square of burning buildings. I remembered screaming Gabe’s name into the fire. Searching the building desperately. I remembered the flames consuming my arm when I pushed open the door to a practice room. The deathly hot fire on my arm. The smell of burning skin. Screaming in pain on my knees. Then, Gabe’s voice, getting to my feet, falling into his arms.

There was one thing I remembered with perfect clarity. Every time I went back to sleep it came back to me. I remembered lying on my back. The cool grass on my seared skin. I remembered Gabe’s hand on my face. I could hear his voice and I could see the relief in his eyes.

“You’re all right. We’re all right.”

 I was really disoriented when I finally woke up for good. I couldn’t figure out where I was or why my arm hurt so much. My mouth was open and I couldn’t seem to close it. I wanted to get up. I thrashed hard but I couldn’t get out of bed.

“Shh, shh… calm down,” the voice sounded like it was far away and underwater. There was a hand on my good wrist. It held me down. I thrashed angrily towards the voice. As my eyes focused, I saw Gabe kneeling next to the bed. “Hey, you’re all right,” he soothed. “They won’t put you under again if you keep quiet.” I listened to him. I didn’t want to sleep again.

I didn’t know what to say to Gabe. Could I even say anything? I tried to get my foggy mind to put together a sentence. If I could have I would have said ‘how long has it been?’ or ‘what’s happening to me?’ or ‘are you all right?’ But whatever was in my mouth kept me from talking. All I managed was a muffled, “What?”

Gabe understood. He sat in the chair next to my cot. “You’ve got some bad burns on your right arm, mostly on the hand. But the doctor says the skin will grow back. You breathed in a lot of ash, and you bit halfway through your tongue, so they packed your mouth with gauze.” That explained my mouth. I wanted to touch my face to make sure it was okay. But something held my arms down. For the first time I realized why I couldn’t move. I looked at Gabe. Again he understood.

“I’m sorry,” he looked down. “I told them not to do it. I said they didn’t have to. But… but your record said you had violent tendencies, and when you woke up and tried to rip off your bandages, they had to tie you down.” I looked helplessly at the binds at my hands and across my chest. “They’ll untie you when they come by again.”

There was nothing I could do about that. I felt like an animal tied up like that. It was humiliating that Gabe had been there to see them have to tie me down and knock me out. Maybe he hadn’t, I thought. Had he even been awake? I looked back to Gabe. “You?” I asked.

Gabe shook his head. “I’m fine. A few burns on my leg, and I’ll be raspy for a while, but I’m all right. They let me out last night.” I gave him a questioning look. “It’s Friday night now. The boys are at supper, but they’ll be here to see you soon.”

“No.” I didn’t want anyone to see me like this. Gabe knew what I meant. I realized that he had understood me every time.

“Okay,” he nodded. “When you’re feeling better.”

We were both quiet for a long time. I stared up at the ceiling. I had never been in the infirmary. It was a white room which must have been in the main building. I couldn’t see much because there was a green curtain pulled around my cot. It was a tiny space for just me and Gabe. But at least no one could see me. I looked down at my right arm but the bandages kept me from seeing how bad the damage was. My fingers were red and raw. Gabe noticed me looking and he suddenly looked like he might burst into tears.

“I’m so sorry,” he sniffed. “I’m so bloody sorry, Erich. I shouldn’t have told you I was in the music building when I wasn’t. I was just scared to be around you, and I didn’t know you would go to roof. You shouldn’t have gone in there for me. It would have been my fault if you died. It’s my fault you got hurt. I’m so…”

“Shh,” that was all I could manage to say. I didn’t want him talking like that. As much as I wanted to, I didn’t blame Gabe. How could I? Of course he hadn’t wanted to be around me. Of course he had to come up with an excuse. If I could have I would have told him that it didn’t matter that he was the reason I went into the fire. What mattered was that he was the reason I came out. I couldn’t manage any of that though.

Gabe’s face flushed. He was quiet for another minute. Finally he got up and shook his head. “I’m sorry. I’ll go. You don’t �" hell �" you don’t want me around. I shouldn’t have stayed. This is…” he sighed heavily. “I should go.”

I realized something then. Gabe had said ‘I shouldn’t have stayed.’ He stayed.  I knew right then that Gabe had stayed with me the whole time. He had been there when I woke up. When they tied me down. When they wrapped my arm and jammed up my mouth. He had stayed. And now I didn’t want him to leave.

“No!” I said as loudly as I could through the gauze. Gabe turned back to me. “Stay,” I pleaded. “Stay.” I wanted to go after him. I tried to sit up but of course I couldn’t.

Gabe closed the curtain and came to kneel next to the bed again. “Okay,” he whispered. He put a hand to my forehead so I would lie back down. I relaxed once he was close to me again.  “I’m here.”

Then he did something amazing. He did what I could never do for him. What I had fought the urge to do every time he was hurt. When he was crying in his sleep. When he was dying of grief and humiliation telling me the story of Leo. He did the one thing no one had ever done for me. He took my hand.

His hand was light and small on top of mine. The palm was as soft as I remembered from the night he bandaged my cut. His hand looked even darker next to my translucently pale skin. His fingers stroked the top of my hand. I put my thumb over his and just held it there. Gabe smiled sadly and gave my hand a squeeze.

“They’re calling us heroes.” Gabe’s voice was soft and sad. “Can you believe that? After everything this bloody school put us through?” I didn’t feel like a hero. I would have died if it hadn’t been for Gabe.

It was happening before I could stop myself. One second my eyes were stinging. The next I was blinking away a tear. I couldn’t remember the last time I cried. “Men don’t cry,” my father had told me over and over. “Amerys don’t cry.” I could expect to get hit if I ever cried at home. I had learned that tears did more harm than good. No one had seen me cry since I was a little kid.

But I couldn’t help it. There was nothing I could do once the first tear fell from my eye and rolled down the side of my face. I just stared at the ceiling and tried not to let Gabe see.

To his eternal credit Gabe didn’t say a word. He just kept holding my hand.

I knew exactly why I was crying. And knowing made me cry harder. I wished I was crying because I was hurt and scared and tied to a bed. I wished I was crying because I was hundreds of miles from home. Because I had to go back. I wanted to cry for my mother. For Brigitte. For the thing inside her that she had killed. I should have cried because every imaginable part of me was broken. Because I was afraid that I might really never be able to love anyone.

I wished I was crying for any reason but the real reason.

But I cried because, no matter what else had happened or would ever happen, I had run into a burning building to save Gabe. And he had run into a burning building to save me. And I cried because I knew that soon I would have to let go of his hand.

The two of us stayed there just like that for a long time. Hand in hand. Tears falling down the side of my face towards my ears. Until I was exhausted and I fell asleep again.

Author's Note

So the story is probably seeming a little "Gabe and Erich storyline heavy." But there are six chapters left in part one (excluding two entries in Herschel's log, and by my math the division of chapters should just about even out.

Reviews

[Bexfinch]

You better not tear them apart you will have one mad fangirl!!!!

[Arianna]

i love that he knows what erich is saying in like one word. and in response to it being gabe and erich storyline heavy. THANK GUMDROPS! its about darn time! i feel like ive been waiting for them to get together for longer then they have been waiting for them to get together. goodness. LET THE ADORABLENESS ENSUE, and then the inevetable break up... and hopefuly make up. HAZAHH :)