Come Back To Us - 15. Chapter 15

Shift to George's POV for this chapter

He’s been gone for quite a while now….

George slapped himself out of it.

“Shut up, dummy brain. You’d rather memorise everything I have to know,” he grumbled as he was wandering through the hospital’s corridors. People were too busy to even pay attention to a madman talking to himself.

He was tired. After spending so many sleepless nights his body had been reading negatively, but this wasn’t going to prevent him from standing on his feet. As he kept walking he came across one of the doctors of the hospital. One who hadn’t died under the rubble. At least not yet.

“Is everything alright?”

He was unusually old for a doctor. He was in his early seventies. White grayish hair, brown eyes covered by glasses. Never had he seen anyone still working with such an old age. He was good to go in an old people’s home.

“Yeah. I’m fine.”

But he had to admit that he was nice for an old man. And an excellent doctor on top of that. But he still wasn’t in the mood to be nice himself. Hadn’t been for what seemed like ages by that time.

The man was examining him carefully, something that he quite didn’t like.

“You should go and get some rest. It is getting quite late.”

And you should mind your own business, was what he wanted to reply, but it wasn’t something you should tell a doctor.

“I’ve just told you I’m fine.”

“Don’t say you are fine when you look like you haven’t slept in ages. If you keep working in such a poor condition, you are going to make a mistake at some point. And one of the patients will pay for your carelessness. And that is not what I want.

He was right in a way.

“This is a war. There is no time to rest. And if they don’t die for my carelessness they’ll die with a shower of bombs, so we both know what’s worse between the two.”

His voice rose as he spoke. He was on edge. He started turning away to leave but the old man grabbed his arm and forced him to face him and stay still.

“What are you trying to avoid?”

What?

“Nothing.”

“Stop lying. You are trying to convince yourself that you are doing well when you perfectly know you are not deep down.”

“Not at all,” his tone was sharp like a knife, unwavering.

“Loneliness can be your worst enemy if you make only poor choices. But it can become your ally and help you understand important things if you listen carefully to what it has got to say.”
Bloody hell, he was supposed to be a doctor, not a philosopher.

“Instead of criticising my poor choices, you should go help those who really need it.”

What he had just said was absolute nonsense, that was all.

Loneliness doesn't make you understand things. Otherwise all the lonely people would have made their own revolution and gone down in history.

“First I’m not criticising your choices, and second I won’t leave you alone until I am sure you are going to get some rest now.”

The old man was stubborn.

“Why do you care? I’m nothing to you.”

It was true. Why should he care about him. Except working in the same hospital, they had nothing in common, nothing to do with each other.

He could remember when he had said the same thing to Carl. He bit the inside of his cheek hard so the man wouldn’t notice it.

“You are the one to say it, but because you think so does not mean you are right. And I think you are forgetting that not only am I a doctor, but a human being, just like you.”

He felt like sighing but knew he couldn’t. If he didn’t go get some rest he would never leave him alone anyway.

“Alright,” he said in defeat.

The man let go of his arm slowly.

But he didn’t want to go back to his uncle’s and aunt’s, or rather back to the house of his aunt’s parents. It was strange. Even though they were his dearest family, he felt like there wasn’t a real place he could call home. It was as if something were missing. Something which made him feel incomplete…

He made his way to one available room, which was like finding a stretch of water in an endless desert after looking for it so desperately. He closed the door once he was inside the room and went to lie on the bed. It was hard as a plank, so he really wondered how patients could get some rest with such awful equipment.

He stared at the ceiling with empty eyes. It was just as awful as the sensation of his body resting on that bed. He closed his eyes, wishing it could make him forget everything in his life, but he knew it was a dumb thought.

No matter how hard he would struggle every time, he could never stop thinking about him. It was like a tune stuck in his head which he had heard too many times to forget. He just needed more time so the memory of him would fade away, he kept repeating to himself every time. But the more the time passed the worse his absence. Everything came back to his mind before he knew it. It was like a movie he wished he could have never watched.

His blue eyes, their color bluer and purer than the sky itself or any sea and ocean. His freckles…freckles everywhere, on his face, his arms, his chest. There are so many of them that it makes it impossible to join all the dots, they’re like stars in the milky way, except that they don’t shine. The way his lips feel pressed against his skin. The way he tasted in his mouth.

He sat up as he opened his eyes. He clenched his jaw and curled his fists into a ball, his gaze hard, and if the wall across him had been a person, it would have probably flinched out of fear.

He stood up like a predator ready to bounce on its prey and made his way towards the other wall next to the bed. He couldn’t take it anymore. He didn’t care about that Danish bloke. He didn’t have feelings for him. It had only been sexual between them, so he could get over Nathan’s death. He wasn’t a poof. He wasn’t sick. He was a man, not a woman.

“Just get out of my bloody head!”

He started hitting his head hard against the wall. If he really had a brain disorder, he was going to fix it right now. But all he ended up doing was making his head hurt…tears were welling up in his eyes. He let himself slip to the floor like the vulnerable mess he was. He could feel something wet run on his nose. Tears? His fingers brushed it to wipe them. But as he removed them and looked at his hand he realized it was blood and not tears. The mere sight was making him nauseous.

He put his hand down and stood up to leave. He wiped the tears with the sleeve of his white coat before they could roll down his cheeks. He left just like that, forgetting about the world around him, and went back where he didn’t want to go back a few moments ago. It was dark outside. He didn’t care if he was hit by a sudden bomb. But just when he finally didn’t mind it anymore, it never happened. The night was eerily silent.

When he came back he discreetly made his way upstairs and locked himself in the bathroom. He took the razor blade resting on the edge of the sink. He rolled up his sleeve and then brought it to his wrist. His heart was beating like crazy. He stared both at his wrist and blade for a while. If he tried to do it again, this time he wouldn’t be there to save him….

He wanted to start with a small cut, but realised he couldn’t do it. He was trembling so much, he had never trembled so much in his life. He clenched his jaw again. He noticed the dried blood on his fingers as he glanced away.

He thought back to all the times he had helped at the hospital until that night. All the wounded people, all the violence that had been hitting the city for so long now, all this suffering…Seeing so much blood and so many lives lost…it had him realize he couldn’t stand it anymore.

He let the blade drop to the floor. It wasn’t long before he fell himself to the floor on his knees, his legs being too weak to bear his weight any longer. New tears started welling up in his eyes. Everything he had been doing, all of his efforts and perseverance, it was like a tiny drop in an endless ocean of tears and blood. He was suffocating. He needed it to stop. It was all too overwhelming.

He screamed. That was all he could do in that moment. These were desperate cries, cries for help. He needed to exteriorise all the pain, anger, frustration and all the rest that had been building up in him and which he had tried to suppress for so long.

Soon enough, there was a loud knock on the door.

“George?” He heard through the door. His cries were dying down but he couldn’t calm down. “George? Please, open the door.”

It was his uncle’s voice.

“George!”

He couldn’t bear hearing it sound so desperate. He found the strength in him to stand up and open the door to let him in. He broke down in his arms as soon as he saw him.

His uncle held him tight and comforted him.

When he had finally calmed down, they went to sit on the bed that was temporarily his.

“Remember, you can talk to me. You can say anything to me. Keeping everything locked down inside is not good for mental health, I know that for a fact.”
George stared at him with teary eyes. If only it was that simple…he would have done it long ago…

“I’ll never become a doctor…I thought I could do it. But…I can’t. I just can’t stand all the suffering, all the blood. It’s just too hard!”

He looked down as his nose scrunched up. He shook his head from side-to-side without even being aware of it. His jaw wouldn’t unclench, neither would his fist. He hated that kind of silence. Even though he could understand it.

“You know, it’s okay. We all have our own fears and weaknesses, but they don’t make us any less capable. We all get somewhat messed up after seeing so many horrors, and it’s normal. I do think no one is immune to it, not even the toughest man you will ever meet. But this does not mean that you can’t become a good doctor because of it. You don’t have to work at a hospital. You can just become a regular doctor. Or you can become a psychiatrist for example. Mental health is as important as your body’s health, and I would say even more, and this is an even greater challenge to be able to help people overcoming their traumas. This is much more interesting to me if you ask me.”

Him? Becoming a psychiatrist? This wasn’t a thing for him. Definitely not.

“I don’t see how I could help people try to solve their own problems when I’ve got mental disorders myself,” his voice was cold like stone as if it was a stranger talking about himself.

He didn’t care about what he had just said. There was no need hiding it anymore anyway.

“Don’t say that.”

Why shouldn’t he say it? It was only the truth. It was useless denying it.

His uncle couldn’t approve of it. It was impossible. Men weren’t made to approve of such deviances. Neither were women. No one was.

His father would have most likely disowned him for having such a twisted mind.

Father. It felt strange to even pronounce that word. A word that meant nothing to him.

Father.

He knew nothing about the man who was supposed to be that. He could only assume things. He just knew that he looked like his uncle. His mother had told him how they had met, and that he was just like his uncle, only a younger version of him. But he didn’t want to believe it. No, he didn’t want to. They couldn’t be exactly the same, they must have had characteristics unique to each other, slight differences in taste or whatever.

His uncle had never said a word about him as far as he could remember. And never had he dared ask about him again after that one time he had asked why he didn’t have a father like the other children he used to know. He used to say his uncle was his father when he knew it wasn’t true. Just to pretend to be like the other children. But his lie had never made him happy. But the truth wasn’t much better. No.

“George. There is nothing wrong with you. And I don’t want you to believe there is. And if someone says so, they are either fat heads or too scared to face their true selves.”

George’s heart skipped a beat and there came that creepy feeling in his stomach.

Did he know? Had his mother told him about it? Had she whined about how desperate he had made her?

The feeling became worse as his thoughts went further.

Did…did they know about him and Carl? Thinking back about it, it had been incredibly stupid and reckless and dangerous to do what they had done under the same roof.

Not only was he twisted, but if on top of that he was stupid…there was absolutely nothing that could be done about him…

He could feel tears prickling his eyes. His throat was dry. But all the water in the world couldn’t help make him feel better.

“George.”

He bit the inside of his lip as he kept looking down.

“George. Please, look at me.”

They were blurring his vision now. He thought about him. His thoughts always came back to him. He was like a poison that was slowly killing him. Such a sweet poison. He was shaking again.

Before he knew it strong arms were surrounding him. His uncle shushed him gently and rocked him with very slow and regular motions.

“Why did he have to come here…” his voice broke as he spoke. It didn’t even sound like a question. “Why…”

His uncle said nothing. And he didn’t want to know whether it was good or bad. He gladly accepted the comfort he was being offered, even though he felt the void that had been so strongly anchored in him could never be filled.

Hello everyone!!
I hope you're doing well on this new weekend!
So, even if Karl has gone now and is surrounded by new characers, I still wanted to have at least another point of view, even if this ill be restricted compared to the first part.
So what do you think about it? I know it's hard to have compassion for George, but he had his reasons for what he did.
Have a good day/evening or night and take care ❤️