#i love those sweats sm they have pockets and i look forward to wearing them as much as i can soon | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

takivvatanga · 4 years

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what remains.

Brown paper bag. PATIENT PROPERTY. The top folded over one, two, three times, stuck down with a printed label.

VAR ANAHID-REID, Assire. Date of Birth, NHI number, Address.

Patient Deceased. NOK to collect written underneath in black pen.

These are the contents. This is what remains:

A crumpled feather, blackish brown. Damp.

8 hours remain.

“Mum, look!” Stella’s voice is insistent, serious. She’s fallen behind, easily distracted by her surroundings – she is her mother’s daughter. Assire checks her watch, turns around towards her daughter, her expression serious. Stella is crouched on the wet pavement, the hood of her coat pulled up over her head, dark curls spilling out in a stark contrast against the white faux fur lining. Sometimes Stella looks like Assire, other times she looks just like Jonathan. There’s hints of other people there, too. But most of the time, Stella just looks like Stella, and Assire loves her so fiercely that it hurts.

You’re the most impossible task I’ve ever tackled. You are the greatest thing I’ve ever done.

“What are you doing, Stella? We’re going to miss the train if you keep mucking around. Do you want to go to Emma’s house or not?!”

“Look what I found, Mum!” Stella raises a gloved hand, her breath rising in small white clouds. Assire responds with a stern look, an impatient gesture. Stella huffs a little but obeys, running towards her mother, her boots going splish splish splish on the wet ground.

“It’s for you, Mum. It’s from a bird.” She presents the feather with something bordering on reverence, and Assire accepts it without thinking, slides it through the top buttonhole of her coat.

“Why, thank you very much. I shall wear it with pride.” Stella beams at her, and Assire takes her daughter’s hand in hers.

“You have to wear it for the rest of your LIFE, Mum.”

“I will, honey. For the rest of my life.”

A raffle ticket. Number 47. Carefully folded in half.

7 hours remain.

Barbara has a round face and kind eyes. Her blonde hair is cut short and her earrings glitter in the late afternoon light. Her house is colourful and noisy, in a perpetual state of activity. Herbs grow on the windowsill of her kitchen. Dishes are piled in the sink. Children’s drawings cover the refrigerator door.

“What do you say to Barb, Stella?” Assire’s hands rest on her daughter’s shoulders.

“Where’s Emma?” Stella bursts out, already kicking off her boots.

Assire rolls her eyes, her lips forming a silent apology. Barbara chuckles, turns on the tap, hot water rushes into the sink.

“It’s all good, it’s all good. No worries, eh? EMMA! Come down, Stella’s here!” The sound of light steps racing down wooden stairs. A blonde head poking through the kitchen door.

“Hi Stella! Hi Stella’s Mum!” Stella’s best friend in the whole world forever and ever is small for her age and full of energy, a noisy, snot-nosed little kid with a big heart and an even bigger mouth. Assire is glad that her daughter has friends. She remembers what it felt like to be a lonely child.

“Stella’s Mum, do you want to buy a raffle ticket? I’m doing a fundraiser. So I can go to camp over the holidays.”

“Hello, Em”, she replies, letting go of her daughter’s shoulders. “Sure, I’ll buy a ticket. Today might just be my lucky day. Give me… number 47.” Emma squeals with excitement, produces a greasy booklet of tickets from the pocket of her jeans, flicks through, tears one out, passes it to Assire who hands over a crisp ten dollar bill in exchange.

“I don’t have change.”

“It’s fine, Emma.”

“Whaaaaa… THANK YOU! Stella your mum is cool.”

“You girls be good, okay? No staying up watching rubbish all night and Stella – you promise me to listen to Barb, please. Seriously, if I find out you made a nuisance of yourself, you know what that means, right? No more sleepovers.”

Stella looks up at her mother, nods quietly. “What time are you coming back?”

“In the morning, honey. Dad and I are going to pick you up in the morning.”

“In the car?”

“Yeah. In the car.”

“Bye, Mum.” Stella turns, opens her arms. Assire hugs her daughter goodbye. Neither of them know that this will be the last time.

A mobile phone. Shattered screen. A smear of dried blood.

One hour remains.

sms: Jonathan

[txt] I’m just about finished thank goodness. You wouldn’t believe what these absolute incompetents did to their server I am SPEECHLESS

[txt] but that being said I’m really enjoying being in this building all by myself. It’s like being a ghost. The benevolent spirit of emergency server repair. It’s so lovely and quiet and there’s people’s things just sitting around and I can’t stop wondering who the people are that those things belong to

[txt] you still on track to pick me up? I’m so very much looking forward to having some time with just US. And I feel so bad for feeling like this because you know how much I love stella but sometimes I just miss when it was just you and me

[txt] can we go for a drive over the bridge? I love the bridge at night

[txt] really? I was so looking forward to us having some time to ourselves. Nvm you do what you have to do hopefully your shift improves. I’ll catch the train and I’ll see you at home I suppose. I might text barb and see if stella can stay at hers until after lunch we can sleep in and just BE at least

[txt] yes I’m sure! It’s fine seriously! I can look after myself, remember :)

[txt] I love you too. Very very much.

[txt] see you soon x

A train ticket. Single fare. Western Line.

Forty-five minutes remain.

There’s no sense of impending doom. No oppressive atmosphere. No feeling that this is it, this is the end. Assire’s shoes echo on the subway stairs. She’s going to have to wait for a little while until her train arrives, but she doesn’t mind. Assire has always, in some strange way that she can’t quite explain, enjoyed the stations at night. Sometimes, they feel like sacred spaces, separate from the world above, existing in their own time, according to their own rules. She is disappointed when she finds that the platform is not completely deserted. A young woman wearing headphones sits with her phone in her hand, popping bubblegum against the back of her teeth.

An elderly couple, long distance travellers, judging by their suitcases, share a newspaper. Assire watches them with curiosity, wonders what it will be like to grow old, and all of a sudden there’s a dreadful thought screeching through her mind that she cannot silence.

What will I do, when I am old and he dies before me?

There is not a doubt in her mind that it is Jonathan who will die first. Everyone knows that women live longer, and his father died young, who knows what the burden of his genetic legacy will be. The thought grabs hold, cold and cruel and terrible, crushing her heart and constricting her throat. She scrambles for her phone, her fingers slick with sweat, it slips out of her hand, falls to the ground with an ominous thud. The screen shatters.

Shit.

The girl with the headphones looks up, grins, her expression pure schadenfreude.

Assire scoops up her phone, keeps walking. The lights at the other end of the platform flicker erratically, almost as if in warning. Assire does not recognise it, or else she does not heed it.

“Give me your wallet.”

“Excuse me?”

She never even saw him approach. He’s very young, almost still a kid, with big hungry eyes and a sad excuse for a beard dappling his chin. His hood is pulled right up over his head, his jeans are dirty, and he’s very thin. There’s an eruption of infected sores over his sunken cheeks, every part of his body seems to be in motion.

“You fucking heard me, bitch! Give me your fucking wallet!”

She should be scared. By all means, she should be terrified. But all she can see is a little boy, a desperate little boy. She has faced far greater fears than this. She shakes her head. She will not be intimidated.

“No.”

“You fucking bitch!” There are tears in his eyes. There’s a knife in his hand. There’s something sharp piercing her side, again and again and again and again. There’s something hot and red and viscous spilling out of her, dripping down her leg, blooming on her coat. There’s nausea, and dizziness, and a sound like a train approaching. There’s darkness closing in, clouding her vision. There’s the dirty subway platform floor, rising up to meet her. There’s a light. It’s beautiful.

A set of torn and bloodstained clothes.

Sixty seconds remain.

She recognises him. Despite the fact that his face is obscured by a surgical mask, despite the fact that everything is all messed up, despite the fact that she cannot focus her eyes. She would recognise him anywhere. She would know him in death, at the end of the world.

She is looking down on him, watching him work, his movements quick, frantic. His hands are shaking. She’s pretty sure that when a surgeon’s hands are shaking, the prognosis is unfavourable. Assire feels sorry for the person on the table, the person who is about to die. She doesn’t like this place. She remembers asking him what it is like, in theatre, remembers listening to him describe it, the way everything is deliberate, precise, orderly. This is not orderly at all. Discarded equipment litters the floor, there’s drips and machines and sharp metallic things everywhere. There’s a shoe on the ground, lying in a pool of blood. She has a pair exactly like that. They are her favourite shoes.

She can hear voices, but the words don’t make any sense. They don’t need to. This is nothing good. Assire knows nothing about medicine, but there’s blood everywhere, seeping out from underneath the sterile sheet covering the body person on the table, seeping, seeping, seeping. A river of blood that pours and pours and will not, can not stop. Someone pulls off the sheet, the sound of the machines rises to a crescendo. The person on the table is a woman. She looks familiar. Assire wants to get closer, wants to see her face properly. This is someone she knows!

“Excuse me. I need to look. Please. Let me look.” No one takes notice of her request. No one takes notice of her, full stop. Aren’t they surprised that she’s here, right in the middle of it all?

“Assire! No! Don’t you dare!”

He has noticed. He has noticed her, and he’s calling her name, and he is angry, so angry, and by all means he should be, she has no business hanging around in operating theatres!

“I’m sorry! Jonathan, I’m sorry. I just need to see, I’ll explain later. When you finish. When we’re home. I can explain. I don’t know how I got here but I can explain.”

He looks up, but he doesn’t see her. She knows he doesn’t. There are tears in his eyes and something else, a terrible, terrible grief and all she wants to do is to reach out and comfort him, to let him know that everything will be alright, she’s here

I’m here, I’m here!

and she’s both here, suspended above and there, on the table, in a pool of her own blood, not making a sound not moving not breathing not living it’s time to go but she doesn’t want to, she wants to stay!

I want to stay!

and it hurts, it hurts, oh God it hurts so bad until it doesn’t

It doesn’t hurt anymore.

It’s alright

Everything will be alright.

and darkness starts to close in on her but she’s not afraid of the dark this time, because there’s a light at the very edge of it and it keeps growing and pulling her towards it

The light is so beautiful.

and she turns around for what she knows will be the last time and she knows that this time he can hear her

I’ll wait for you. I’ll always wait for you. I love you. I’m sorry.

Goodbye.

@throatkissed why am I like this

#vignette: assire #verse: modern #tw death #tw stabbing #sorry not sorry at the dash #but legit i was just driving today #and all of a sudden i knew how her story ends in modern verse #IT'S OK THERE'S AN AU WHERE SHE SURVIVES OK

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