Borgata - Book II #wattys2016

Chapter 19: Broken

 Ahoy, Pirates! Mommy has been under SO MUCH stress lately, but I wanted to get something up!

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"Fico can choke me with his IV tube," my sister @chrisrocks247 said, when asked what I should say at the beginning of this chapter.

         

The moment Fico's fingers wrapped around mine, a massive wave of relief washed over me. I looked over my shoulder at him, and sure enough, his undamaged eye was cracked open and he was watching me.

"Robert, can you get Dr. Bianchi?" I asked urgently, without looking away from Fico. Hulk, who I imagined had already accepted Fico wasn't going to wake up, hesitated for a moment and then quickly shuffled out of the room.

Unlike me when I'd woken up, Fico wasn't freaking out about the breathing tube in his mouth. He was visibly relaxed and yet continued to both stare at me and clutch my hand; as if he was terrified I would leave him. The more I took in his sickly pale and damaged body; the more I was terrified that he would leave me.

"I'm not going anywhere," I said and caught the tremble in my voice. I had no idea what else to say. What could I even say? It was as if the moment he'd woken up had been the moment all the trauma we'd been through come at me at full force. Everything had just been a bad dream until now. I looked away from him and my breathing tightened as I tried to pathetically keep myself together.

Fico's grip got tighter. That small gesture reassured me that he was going to be okay. That I was going to be okay. I looked back at him and managed a smile, leaning onto his bed to kiss him on top of his head. Moments later Dr. Bianchi had rushed into the room.

Fico was off the breathing tube. I'd refused to go back to my room at the estate and practically lived in that clinic room, sleeping on the couch outside his room. Once everyone knew Fico was going to make it, more and more mafia men came to the clinic to visit him. I didn't trust any of his visitors. How could I? I would temporarily leave the room when visitors and nurses came into the room then slip back in the moment they were gone.

Fico was sleeping a lot and it worried me. Dr. Bianchi assured me that he was getting stronger and stronger every day. I was so anxious about his health that my own sleep schedule became muddled. I found myself taking short, unsatisfying naps that were flooded with nightmares. And then I would wake up and immediately check Fico's pulse, just make sure the steady, healthy resting beeps on his heart monitor weren't just a twisted illusion.

I continued this unhealthy schedule for weeks until one morning; my schedule turned a one-eighty on me. I'd taken a sleeping pill that Dr. Bianchi had offered me and went out like a rock. The next morning, I'd woken up with an awful headache in an awkward position on the leather couch outside of Fico's clinic room. I sat up and rubbed my eyes. My vision honed in on the room in front of me. Fico's door was open and the clinic room was black. Why were the lights off? I rushed inside and flipped the lights on. He was gone. His bed was made and everything. Where was he? What had happened to him? Was he okay? Why hadn't anyone woken me up? A thousand thoughts flew through my head, and I couldn't breathe–

"Samantha?" a soft, feminine voice asked behind me. It was Maria, Dr. Bianchi's daughter. Her purple hair was pulled back in a bun and she had glasses on. "Are you okay?"

"Where is he?" I gasped, stepping closer to her. "Where's Fico? Is he okay?"

"Samantha, he's fine," Maria assured me with a smile. "He checked himself out early this morning."