You can come in,” Dinah prompted her in understanding having been in Lauren’s shoes herself only a few short months ago.Lauren entered further in to the room, coming to a stop alongside the left hand side of Camila’s bed, her eyes looking anywhere but at her girlfriends’ face, afraid of what she’d see if her gaze did happen to fall there. Lauren looked up at the monitors above Camila’s bed, watched the red line trace across the screen which recorded her girlfriend’s heart rate, the yellow line which kept a record of her oxygen saturations. Lauren looked at the syringe drivers set up by Camila’s head, pumping infusions of ‘Lorazepam’ and ‘Phenytoin’ into the lines protruding from Camila’s arms. She glanced down at Camila’s small hands, which seemed dwarfed more than normal against the white of the sheets.“Lauren,” Dinah said sadly. “Look at her,” she encouraged and Lauren held her breath as she obeyed, dropping her eyes down to look at Camila who lay before her on the bed, a serene look on her face which seemed out of place considering the circumstances.Lauren let a small sob escape her lips as she studied her girlfriend’s face closely, noting the familiar scar above her left eyebrow and the newly sutured laceration on her right temple where her head had collided with the desk. Her right eye was swollen profusely, the skin taut and a deep shade of purple, the bruise standing out in contrast to the pale tone of her skin.“You can touch her,” Dinah said holding up the hand which she held in her own for emphasis. “Don’t worry, you won’t hurt her.”“Are you sure?” Lauren asked doubtfully, feeling as though even the slightest touch would be enough to break the fragile form of her girlfriend.“I’m sure,” Dinah reassured her.Laure took a step so that her thighs were resting against the edge of the bed and stood for a minute, listening to the sound of Camila’s heart beat on the monitor above her bed, the exaggerated resonance of the artificial breath sounds from the ventilator. Slowly, Lauren leant over Camila’s unconscious form and kissed her lightly on the forehead, one hand brushing Camila’s hair just above her brow line. Lauren’s lips lingered there for a moment, tears forming in her eyes as she kissed her again gently through her sobs.Lauren trailed a hand down the side of Camila’s face, cupping her cheek for an instant, her thumb caressing Camila’s cheek, her girlfriend’s skin feeling cold in comparison to its normal warmth. Lauren lowered her hand further to run it down the side of Camila’s left arm until it reached her hand, which she picked up cautiously as she lowered herself in to the seat that was already waiting beside her. She started to play with Camila’s fingers in her hand, old habits dying hard as she sat there watching the trace of Camila’s life dart across the monitor, uncertain what to do next other than sit in silence and wait.“I used to talk to her,” Dinah shared sadly as if reading Lauren’s thoughts. “I wasn’t sure if she could hear me but, it’d make me feel better, to know that maybe she wouldn’t feel so alone if she could hear a familiar voice.”She paused for a moment to look upon Camila’s face which remained unmoving, every muscle relaxed as a result of the sedation.“I asked her afterwards if she could,” Dinah continued thoughtfully. “She told me that couldn’t, that she didn’t really remember much, just a few things towards the end when she was waking up, but, I remembered and sometimes I think that matters more because I took comfort from it and I needed that more than anything.”Lauren glanced between Camila and Dinah, a sad expression on her face, realisation that the taller girl had lived through all this before, had thought she’d put this place behind her, that they’d finally moved on, only to be right back here again, holding her best friend’s hand whilst she remained oblivious to everything else around her, suffering, whilst she slept.“She looks better this time around though,” Dinah mused, studying Camila closely. “Like, a hundred times better than she did before.”“She still looks pretty bad,” Lauren commented, wiping at her eyes for a moment with her free hand and Dinah looked over at her, a smile on her lips.“She does,” Dinah agreed, “but I’ll take pretty bad over dying any day.”Lauren returned her smile, understanding that Dinah was trying to comfort her with her words and the knowledge that there was truth in them helped ease her fears greatly. She sighed for a moment, her eyes falling on Camila’s lips, the intubation tube partially obscuring them from view. Lauren wanted to kiss them more than anything, to be comforted by the feeling of Camila’s soft lips against her own, but, she couldn’t so instead, she leant forward, resting her elbows on the bed for support searching for solace in another familiar gesture. Lauren held Camila’s left hand in both her own, one of them playing with her girlfriends’ fingers, the other caressing the scar down Camila’s
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