I do not own Inuyasha or any of the characters.
A/N: MissTeak’s response fic to round one of TangerineDream’s Second Annual Fanfiction Tournament!
Title: To Ward 315, with love.
Prompt: Letters
Paired with: Skyisthelimit
Rating: T
Words: 6545
Genre: Angst, Romance, Friendship
AU/CU: AU
Please be sure to read the entry by my partner for round one, Skyisthelimit and send your vote in to TangerineDreams in a PM!
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“Dear Kagome,
What are you doing now? It is raining over at where you are?”
It was.
She could not help the heartfelt smile which grew on her face as she read the letter in her hands. He was always so smart, even when it came to itty bitty details such as the weather.
Outside, fat raindrops continued beating monotonously against the window panes.
It almost drowned out the sounds of her heart rate monitor.
“It’s a glorious sunny morning here in Redang in Malaysia. The sun rays make the spotless beaches look as if they are bathed in a golden glow, and the sea is a deep, refreshing blue. Coconut trees line the stretch of gold, and the water is so clear you could practically see the coral reefs below.
I am sure if you were here you would enjoy snorkelling. They have all sorts of exotic marine creatures over here, such as the endangered hawksbill turtle. There are also baby sharks swimming among the reefs, tiny fish of all colors surrounding you as you visit their underwater home…”
She practically devoured the words with her eyes, allowing her imagination to run wild as his words brought her to a place to which she had never been.
It was a dreary and depressing rainy day in reality, but his words brought rays of sunshine in.
In her mind, the balmy sea breeze would caress her flushed cheeks as she sprinted down the stretch of sandy beach, feeling the warm sand between her toes.
Then he would appear. He would chase her on the beach, running and playing tag like they were children, before finally catching her and holding her in his arms. They would dance as the soothing glow of the tropical sunset enveloped them…
“Kagome, it is time for your medication.”
The dreamy smile on her face was replaced by a wistful one as the familiar voice drew her back to reality. She replaced the letter and its envelope by the bedside.
“Thank you, Sango.” She said breathily, reaching out for the tiny plastic cup on the tray in which her anticoagulant and pulmonary pressure pills were placed. Tipping them obediently into her mouth, Kagome nodded her thanks again as her nurse friend helped her with washing the pills down with water.
“That’s a good girl.” Sango ruffled her hair affectionately, earning a light laugh from Kagome. “Come, let’s take a look at the Flolan pump. How are you feeling today?”
“Just the usual…a little nauseous, jaw pain…and I actually stopped being a little girl many years ago. The little girl is the one resting in the opposite bed.” She smiled, giving a mock expression of annoyance as Sango helped her with unbuttoning her hospital gown to reveal the walkman-sized pump slung over her shoulder, attached to a catheter in her neck.
The older nurse simply shrugged and smirked playfully, before checking on the younger girl’s battery-operated infusion pump and ice packs with practised ease. “It’s looking good. I’ll come by later to change it after I’ve mixed the medicine; it would be twenty four hours by five in the afternoon.”
“Thank you, Sango.” Kagome replied dutifully, appreciative of the nurse’s care.
As Sango busied herself with doing a few more routine checks, she casually asked her favorite patient. “So where did Sesshoumaru go this time?”
Talking about her favorite topic brought a bright smile to the patient’s ashen face. “He’s in Redang, a tropical paradise in Malaysia. It sounds so beautiful…I wish I could go too.”
To that statement, the usually chatty nurse found herself unable to come up with a fitting response. It was depressing, really, when the lovely lady she had been taking care of for six years had no chance of recovery from the illness that ravaged her body.
Kagome could go out if she really wanted to, but every journey outdoors and away from immediate medical attention would constitute risks so great that no doctor or nurse would allow.
“Show me the pictures later,” was all she could manage in response before excusing herself to tend to another patient. It was never easy interacting with Kagome, for it was painful to watch an angel suffer.
Sango’s departure only made reality sink in further as Kagome sat alone on her bed in the two-bed ward.
Yes, reality.
‘Reality’ was not the sunny golden beaches of Redang.
Instead, ‘reality’ to Higurashi Kagome could be summarized into two words.
Pulmonary Hypertension. Or PH, when abbreviated.
To put it very simply, it was a chronic condition whereby the blood pressure in her lungs was so high to the extent whereby the blood vessels are severely narrowed or even blocked. For blood to go through these narrowed vessels, her heart had to work extra hard, causing it to enlarge and pump less efficiently eventually, reducing her body’s oxygen intake.
Unfortunately, it also happened to be an incurable disease.
For Kagome, reality and life revolved around Flolan, her vasodilator medication, the perpetually iced pump carried over her shoulder, anticoagulant pills, echocardiograms, cardiac catheterization and the faraway dream of a lung transplant.
Why me? She had asked the gods again and again. It was said on the Internet that two in every million people were affected with PH. Why couldn’t she fall into the wide range of the nine hundred, ninety-nine thousand and nine hundred ninety-eight people?
It was so unfair. Why did she have to be chosen by the gods above to go through this pain?
Kagome had been leading a normal life until she had been diagnosed with the disease at the age of sixteen.
Since then, she had forgotten how it felt like to be normal. The rest of it was, as people always said, history.
“Kagome?” An angelic voice interrupted her thoughts, and her head snapped up to acknowledge the little girl lying in the bed across hers in the twin ward.
“Yes, Rin-chan?”
“Who sent you the letter?” The adorable little girl asked. Warded for long-term congenital heart issues, Rin was no stranger to hospitals. Yet innocent little souls were never meant to be chained down to such terrible places, and she was lonely and bored for most of the time. “Is it the same big brother who sends you letters all the time?”
Kagome nodded with a gentle smile. “Yes, it is from him.”
“Rin wishes someone would write letters to her.” The child’s face was downcast as she took a sideward glance at the empty doorway of their shared ward.
That little action did not go unnoticed by the older girl – it was obvious that the child was hoping her parents would visit her. But the hospital was far from where they lived, and they had to work hard to make ends meet, so visits were limited to the weekends.
“Let me tell you a story then, Rin-chan. Would you like to hear it?” Kagome offered softly, smiling when the little girl nodded eagerly with elation.
She cleared her throat, before looking out into the distance beyond the pouring rain outside. Memory lane was always a nice path to walk. Given that her condition would progressively worsen, ‘yesterday’ would always be more pleasant than ‘today’ for Higurashi Kagome.
“Six years ago, a girl met a boy in this ward.”
“Ward 315?” The child interrupted curiously.
“Yes, Ward 315.” Kagome patiently repeated. “They were both eighteen. She was here first, and he was the new boy. The nurses said he was warded for something called hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which caused his heart muscle to thicken. Sesshoumaru was his name…”
When she had first met him at the age of eighteen, he had been cold, unfeeling and resigned to potential death.
Sitting in his bed by the window, he had kept his cloudy gold eyes on the skies beyond the glass, refusing to interact or talk to anyone else. From what she had heard, he had been an outstanding youth triathlon runner, until an ECG during a routine health check revealed abnormalities in his heart activities.
Kagome had initially been thrilled to know that there was a new boy in the ward of her age – it was not everyday that she got a new friend in the long-term care program. She had been looking forward to meeting him, and had asked nurses about his condition so she could be sure not to do anything which might aggravate his illness.
However, Taisho Sesshoumaru turned out to be nothing like what she had imagined.
His first day at the ward had not been started with friendly handshakes or welcoming smiles. Instead, he had been indifferent to anything anyone tried to say or do to him, giving the caring nurses the cold shoulder and smirking when people attempted to humor him.
“Wasn’t it scary having someone so mean in the same ward?” Rin asked, her eyebrows knitted together in a worried frown.
Kagome shook her head, knowing that the little girl meant well. “No. The girl knew that the boy was not really as bad as he appeared to be. He appeared to be very angry, but in reality, he was very sad and scared of what was happening to him. He had been so healthy and active before his heart started giving him problems, so he had difficulties accepting the truth.”
The six year-old nodded knowingly with a maturity that went beyond her age. “Did the girl become friends with him?”
That question elicited a firm nod from the older girl. “She did. Their friendship began from a strange question. He had refused to talk to anyone who tried to be nice to him, so the girl walked up to him and asked…”
Kagome could still remember the incredulous expression on his face when she had asked him the question so many years ago in the very same ward…
“Who do you think would die first – you or me?”
That was the first thing she had said to him.
No handshakes, no customary greetings – their relationship had been destined to be special from day one.
Strange? Yes.
Rude? Yes.
But it worked. It got him talking, even though he had been offensive with his response.
“What’s your problem?” He had narrowed his golden eyes threateningly at her.
But Kagome was not intimidated, for she knew how he was feeling. She had been through the same emotions.
Lifting her chin up by a fraction of an inch, she told him straight in the face what her problem was.
“Pulmonary arterial hypertension.”
It was probably not the ‘problem’ he had in mind when he responded so impolitely, but to her, that was genuinely her biggest problem.
To her surprise, he stared at her for a good three seconds before smirking. She could see how he was trying to fight a smile at her answer, which probably came across as dry, deadpan humor.
“What’s yours?” Kagome had asked, noting how his eyes had softened.
“Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.” Sesshoumaru replied with a raise of his eyebrows challengingly as the thrill of competition revisited him momentarily. “In case you don’t know, it is the leading cause of cardiac death in young athletes.”
She had smiled wistfully back then, before pulling the sleeve of her hospital gown down to reveal the vasodilator pump slung over her shoulder.
“If this thing goes off, I’d die right here within a minute. Any interruption might prove fatal.”
For a few seconds she saw his wide-eyed expression again, before she smiled wistfully and added, “I do know about hypertrophic cardiomyopathy. You can go for surgery; you have a chance of recovery. The same doesn’t apply to PH.”
He had merely grunted in response, though his solemn facial expression told her that her words had gotten to him.
“Since you have a chance, you should be positive, and a miracle would come to you. Don’t give up.”
“Did the boy believe the girl?” Rin asked again, and that got Kagome’s head shaking in amusement.
“No. He was awfully stubborn, and he didn’t buy that. However, he became a friend from that day.” Kagome recounted fondly while mental images of Sesshoumaru sitting in the bed opposite hers revisited.
Slowly but surely, a friendship had started developing between the two young patients. It was a friendship which went beyond the sort they used to have with their peers – no ordinary friend from school could understand the sort of pain and emotional torture they had to endure.
One wouldn’t get to see any other friend practically turning blue in the face, coughing violently and wheezing away, fainting randomly on a daily basis, or coughing up blood occasionally. She had seen the worst of him, and vice versa.
But it was probably this painful process which brought the two young people together. It wasn’t long before the doctors and nurses started to notice that Kagome and Sesshoumaru shared a relationship which transcended regular friendship to become something platonic and perhaps a little more.
They were clearly happier than before. Kagome cried less, and Sesshoumaru became more outspoken with everyone around him.
“The boy would tell the girl about the things he knew, from random facts, sports, movies and his overseas experiences. Unlike her, he came from a well-to-do family, and had been to many countries for holidays, study programs and triathlons. She hasn’t been out of Japan before, and has always longed to do so. Yet before she could, she was diagnosed with the illness.”
“Could she get well again?” Rin asked innocently, sincerely hoping that the girl whose story she was listening to could have a chance at freedom.
Shaking her head with a ghost of a sad smile tugging at her lips, Kagome replied, “No. She never thought she would. It is an incurable disease, and her condition got progressively worse as days went by. Problems such as catheter site infection, ankle pain all came to haunt her.”
“As the girl’s health deteriorated to the extent where she could not even go outdoors, the boy was slowly recovering. The doctors said he was responding well to his treatment program, and had arranged for him to undergo surgery…”
Kagome paused then, recalling the time when she had suddenly started suffocating when she tried to bend down to reach for a pencil which had fallen to the ground.
She had felt excruciating pain in her chest, as if someone was stabbing her heart and lungs with a knife and wrenching it from side to side. Her head had started spinning, and everything looked like a blur before she realized that her open-mouth gasps were not drawing the much-needed oxygen into her lungs. The strange but familiar sensation of fainting soon set in, and through the hazy fear, she could hear Sesshoumaru’s voice over and over again.
He was shouting her name, while calling out for doctors and nurses frantically while pressing the bell by his bedside. She tried to call for help, but not a sound went by her parted lips. Then she had keeled over and practically tumbled off the hospital bed.
She couldn’t breathe, try as she might. The severe chest pain was almost numbing by the time she thought she heard urgent footsteps from the doorway.
Gasping harder, she fought to stay conscious though her eyes were seeing nothing but multicolored dots. There was no such thing as the flashbacks of her life like what people often said in stories and movies. All she remembered was thinking how she was going to die.
Then everything turned black.
Just like that, without warning or any sign.
“So…this is how it feels like to die…”
The pitch darkness in front of her eyes faded gradually into millions of dancing black dots, lightening until they became almost glaringly white. She wanted to move her body, but it felt like a deadweight pinning her down to the bed.
Then she heard his voice. It was somewhere around her, but she could not orientate herself yet. It was oddly disturbing how she had heard him only seconds ago before the inky blackness engulfed her, and now, she was back.
“Kagome…can you hear me?”
She wanted to smile; she wanted to laugh. Even in the face of her close brush with death, his voice was still so composed. Amidst the frantic footsteps, commanding shouts and erratic beeping of machines, his voice reminded her of a life buoy in a choppy ocean.
“Yes…” Her lips parted ever so slightly to utter that single word.
It hurt to speak.
So she was still alive.
The doctors and nurses had brought her back from the gates of hell.
But when she finally regained the strength to move and breathe without feeling as if she had iron shackles around her windpipe, Kagome noticed that the boy by her bedside had tears welled-up in his golden eyes.
Then she realized, for all the strength and determination he seemed to possess, Taisho Sesshoumaru was actually terrified of losing the girl whom he had gotten to know and grown to adore.
“I think the boy must have been very worried for the girl.” Rin commented, clutching her teddy bear tightly.
That was exactly how he had looked back then when I had almost died, Kagome recalled the mental image fondly as she tried hard to blink back acrid tears from her eyes. They had been through so much together.
“Then one day, a piece of good news came. The boy underwent surgery.” She recounted to the little girl who was listening intently. “It was a success. The surgeons managed to rectify the problem with his heart...”
Rin clapped happily when she heard how the boy in the story got well again, but clapped her tiny hand over her mouth when she realized what that fact implied.
“Did he leave the hospital? What about the girl? She would be all alone!”
The tears were getting harder and harder to hold back by now. Kagome closed her eyes and nodded. “Yes, you are right, Rin-chan. He got well after the surgery and left the hospital after spending three years with her. Ward 315 became so very, very quiet after he left.”
“You are leaving? When?”
Her fingers, which ended in bluish purple fingernails, had gripped the edges of the hospital bed blanket tightly as she tried to come to terms with the fact that she was going to lose her dearest friend. The heart rate monitor beeped loudly as the emotional agony in her chest grew to suffocating levels, before sharp pangs of constricting pain gripped her.
How humiliating it was to be so sick; she could not even have the luxury of concealing her emotions in front of the boy she fancied. How many girls had to suffocate and practically battle death before the boys they liked?
“You are not supposed to be agitated!” The young man of twenty-one chided, before leaning over to pat the girl on her back and hold her as she coughed hard and wheezed for air. She drew a few shuddering breaths, leaning against his larger frame for support until the heart rate monitor finally went back to its silent, intrusive presence by her bedside.
The pounding of her virtually useless heart had slowed down, but her tears had not.
It was the first time in her young life when she knew real emotional hurt.
He was leaving. He was leaving her behind.
Helplessly she recalled and retold the story of their young love in her mind, while heart wrenching pain and loneliness made her want to weep her sorrow out loud in his arms and sob to him how unwilling she was to see him go.
Yet at the juncture for separation, all she could manage was the silent flow of her tears.
She did not know which fact she hated more – the fact that Sesshoumaru had miraculously recovered enough from his illness to be discharged from long-term hospitalization, or that she was left alone to fight the pulmonary arterial hypertension which could take her life any moment.
Kagome knew she should be genuinely happy for Sesshoumaru for having recovered from his illness. She was, but it was strange that this happiness came along with an immense amount of unhappiness, loneliness and even a tinge of jealousy.
Life was ironical, and Fate was a fool.
“Did he come back to the hospital?” The little girl asked then, eliciting an amused sniffle from the older girl.
“Of course not, Rin-chan.” Kagome sniffled and replied with a smile. “He had recovered from his illness…why would he come back to this place? But he didn’t forget about the girl. Shortly after he had left, she received a letter. On the letter were the words ‘To Ward 315, with love’”
Sesshoumaru’s letters were her lifeline – they kept her going when she grew tired of the interminable suffering she was doomed to go through. Kagome could not recall the total number of times when she lapsed into a depression which no one could talk her out of, only to cheer up and smile when Sango brought her a new letter with her name in his elegant handwriting on it.
Ever since the first letter he had sent from Hokkaido, Sesshoumaru had made it a point to show her every place that he had gone to.
Every envelope was precious – Kagome reminded herself that his hands had touched these envelopes, placed them in a post box and sent them across the oceans and lands to her. Inside them were tiny surprises such as photographs, souvenirs and long handwritten letters which never failed to raise her spirits.
He had sent her blessings and love from the sacred Buddhist province of Ayutthaya in Thailand, from the breathtaking Niagara Falls in North America, from Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and so many, many more places.
There were also the breathtaking natural sights of Jeju island in Korea, where she had always dreamed of visiting after watching one too many romantic Korean dramas in that setting. The stunning autumnal foliage contrasted sharply with grayish sea by the cliff edge, and she could almost hear the hypnotizing crashes of the waves against the rocky walls.
“I can’t bring you the ocean, and neither can I bring you the forest. But I can bring you my most heartfelt wishes, imprinted onto a leaf from the forests of Jeju.”
Reaching into the envelope, she gingerly took a dried leaf out with her fingertips. Careful not to crush it into brittle fragments, Kagome lifted it to her nose and inhaled deeply.
The scent of autumn lingered heavily on the crisp leaf, accentuated by notes of salty sea breeze. Looking at the lovely photographs of Jeju which Srsshoumaru had sent, Kagome felt as if she was right there in Korea. She might never be able to go there in person in this lifetime, despite it being a mere two-hour flight away, but this was as close as she might ever get to see the picturesque island for herself.
That was good enough for her.
Flipping the leaf over, a heartfelt smile of bliss grew on her pale lips. For written on the flipside were the words, ‘never give up’.
It was a tiny message which most normal people would never think much of, but to her, it was better than any drug the doctors could prescribe. Knowing that Sesshoumaru was somewhere out there in the world, living a life free of suffering on her behalf made her happy.
What made her even happier was how he constantly kept a terminally ill woman like herself on his mind, allowing her to see the beautiful world through his eyes. She was so tired out from the long battle with the demons invading her body, and there had been countless of times when she wanted to give up and let everything go. It wouldn’t be difficult; all she had to do was to reach up to her shoulder and yank the vasodilator pump out and wait for death to claim her.
When living was so tough, dying might be a better option.
After all, what was the point of leading a life without dignity? Was there meaning in living if something as simple as breathing had to be taken care of by a machine? The doctors had never hid the fact that her illness was incurable, so she knew from day one that she would eventually die because of her condition. So why fight a losing battle? Why was she wasting so much of her parents’ money and the funds from the charity organization which subsidized her hospital bills?
Somewhere along the fight for survival, she had pondered over these questions long and hard, not knowing what her own answers would be.
That was until she had him in her life.
Sesshoumaru’s presence through his letters gave her the courage to embrace life and cling on to it as tightly as she could. She realized, to her own astonishment, that she did not want to die. She did not want to leave this world, not when he was also in it.
She wanted to remain a part of his world.
Kagome decided she would live to meet him again. If the gods above were feeling extremely merciful, she might be able to get well enough to see the world and its beautiful sights together with him by her side. She would promise to be extremely careful with her Flolan pump and ensure that it worked every breathing minute.
Every time without fail, he would ask what she was doing in his letters. She made it a point to reply, “I’m living right now.”
It sounded simple, or even stupid in the minds of healthy individuals.
But living was a luxury for her, and it was something she was constantly working hard to do.
“Kagome, the girl doesn’t have to feel sad that he is not by her side.” Rin interrupted in a small but determined voice. “Sometimes, the people we love are nearer than we think they are. Mommy said that. She told me distance was not a problem if our hearts were all together.”
She nodded and smiled her appreciation for the child’s kind words. Perhaps he was really nearer than she thought him to be. On lonely nights, she could feel as if he was just beside her, supporting her like he had done so many years ago.
Just then, a polite knock was heard, and Sango came into the ward again, carrying a tray with Rin’s medication.
“Here, sweetie, it’s time for your medication. No, no…slowly does it, slowly does it…” She announced with the practised enthusiasm reserved for children, smiling endearingly as Rin made a move to prop herself up in bed.
It was then when Kagome heard shouting from the corridors, before another nurse by the name of Misaki pushed their door open urgently.
“Sango, ward 317. Now.”
Hearing the call for assistance from her colleague, the nurse had immediately placed the tray down onto the table at the end of Rin’s bed.
“I’ll be back, sweetie. Just wait for me. Everything is alright.” She reassured the child, who was looking at the door with widened eyes filled with fright. Just as Sango made a move to rush to help out in ward 316, Kagome noticed how the former’s footsteps had stopped momentarily such that she had a split second to look in her direction.
There was something strange about Sango’s facial expression, but before she could try to decipher further, the nurse had already broken their eye contact. The only answer Kagome received was the squeaking of Sango’s shoe soles against the linoleum outside.
Being the sweet child she was, Rin was clearly worried. “What happened, Kagome?”
“I don’t know,” She admitted, though she noticed the clipboard lying on the tray at Rin’s bed.
Something about Sango’s facial expression, coupled with her gut feeling, told Kagome to go over to where the clipboard was. Slowly, she maneuvered her body such that her feet were gradually lowered to the ground, before placing her weight onto them such that she could help herself into a standing position.
Her Flolan pump would help her with her breathing; she could do this, she could walk the small distance with no issue.
Step by step she made her way over to where the tray was, mindful to note signs of breathing difficulties.
Then she saw it, the medication schedule for the name ‘Aoyama Rin, Ward 315.”
Flipping the sheet of paper over, she saw “Higurashi Kagome, Ward 315.”
This was not what she was looking for. The overwhelming feeling in her gut was growing stronger and stronger, despite how unexplainable it was.
Another page read “Kawase Soushi, Ward 316.”
She flipped the page again.
“Taisho Sesshoumaru, Ward 317.”
She blinked. She did a double take.
Then she felt her knees grow weak as a strangled gasp escaped her lips. That name was too unique for it to be a coincidence, and Kagome felt like someone had hit her really hard in the abdomen with a sledgehammer.
Why was his name on the medication schedule?
Instinct took over in the absence of her rationality, compelling her to take step by agonizing step in the direction of Ward 317. She had never been to that part of the hospital despite it being so near, for the elevator was right outside Ward 316, and being bedridden had rendered her unable to walk around most of the time.
Kagome drew deep, shaky breaths, pressing a palm to her chest as she closed in the distance between herself and Ward 317. Every step made her feel as if she was swimming against tidal waves; it was so difficult to command her weakened leg muscles to move in compliance with her mind. Beads of perspiration were beginning to form at her temples, leading her to curse inwardly at her uselessness. It was merely walking from one ward to another, but it was so agonizing for someone like her.
There was a powerful urge to stop and lean against the wall for a few moments, but her mind screamed for her to continue moving.
She had to get to Ward 317 no matter what it took. Biting her lower lip, she lifted her right foot up to move it forward, before dragging her left leg along.
She could not give up at this point.
Kagome took another step forward, and then another, until she eventually came to the empty doorway. Leaning heavily against the door frame for support, she caught flashes of familiar silver from the gaps between the three nurses crowding around the hospital bed.
She could practically feel her insides wrench with every passing second.
She could hear one of the nurses say, “You have to be careful, Sesshoumaru. I don’t want to nag unnecessarily and treat you like a child, but you shouldn’t be trying to climb out of bed in your current state. You’re lucky you’re not hurt from the fall-”
It really was him.
“Sesshoumaru.”
His name left her lips so naturally, and she had almost forgotten how much she missed saying it. Pushing herself up from her leaning position, Kagome continued to make her way towards the young man whom she had been thinking about day and night. Sango rushed forward to help her, and as the nurses stepped aside to make room for her, Kagome saw his face.
He was as handsome as ever as he looked at her with eyes widened by a fraction, but unlike the last time she had laid eyes on him; his skin and lips sported a bluish hue. It mirrored hers, and it broke her heart to know that he was suffering as well. Up till five minutes ago, Kagome had still been under the impression that he was out there somewhere leading a new life, and was hoping to get well enough to see him again.
“Kagome…”
She had to pause and breathe. It felt so good to hear his voice again, especially when he was saying her name.
“For how long were you planning to keep this from me?” Kagome asked, her eyes glistening with unshed tears. “What have you been doing all this time, Sesshoumaru?”
The nurses left the room one by one to leave the two young people to themselves.
He was lying down on the bed, so she eased herself onto her knees such that her arms were propped on the mattress with her face level to his.
His golden eyes were muted with pain and shame – she could see them, for he didn’t even bother trying to hide them from her.
Kagome saw the stack of travel guides placed on the drawer by his hospital bed, noting the names of the places on the books’ spines – North America, South Korea, Thailand, Malaysia…
“I’ve been living too.” He answered in a quiet voice, making him appear even more vulnerable in that moment.
He was using her own line on her, and the nonchalance housed within those simple words brought her frustration. Yet why was her hand instinctively gripping his so tightly as if afraid he might disappear again?
She would soon find out; out of all the letters which he had sent to her, only the first few letters had been genuinely mailed out by him from abroad. That was when he fell severely ill again due to pericardial effusion, a complication which had arisen from an infection from his surgery.
All those photographs with him in them…they were all doctored and created using Adobe Photoshop as he sat up in his hospital bed…
All the sights and sounds he had shared with her through his words…they were recounts which he had read from travel blogs and websites.
All the souvenirs…they had been placed inside the envelope and mailed out from the country by his brother Inuyasha when the latter travelled for business purposes. This was why she had always believed him to be overseas…
All these while when she had been under the impression that he was out there exploring the world with his healthy, strong heart, Sesshoumaru had been lying in the personal ward just a ward away from hers in the very same building, battling the same illness which he had been hospitalized for six years ago. That was why he always knew how the weather was like at her side.
“Why…?” Kagome knew better than to ask, but she could not help the anguished word from escaping. Sesshoumaru was the last person on this earth whom she would expect to tell a lie.
His facial expression was almost as unreadable as ever, betraying only the barest of emotions.
Silence reigned in the frozen atmosphere, and all that was heard were the voyeuristic beeping of the machines he was hooked up to. She continued looking up at his face from her kneeling position by his hospital bed, searching for answers. But there was nothing to be interpreted, and just as she was about to give up, she heard his voice.
“Because you’ve always believed in me.” His voice broke the silence. “You’d be crushed if you knew I am back to square one again. I wanted to fulfil your dreams, but I can't, for the will is there but the heart is useless-”
She surprised him in mid-sentence with her finger on his lips, shushing him into silence.
"Who said your heart is useless?" Kagome whispered, feeling a strange mixture of elation and agony assault her. She was elated because she knew she had a special place in his heart all this while, but she was also sad because she knew that he was being harsh on himself precisely because of her. "In what way is it useless? Yes - it is weak, it is diseased...but it is also capable of love."
She regarded his wide-eyed expression silently, reaching up with a hand to cup his pale, clammy cheek endearingly. Yes, his heart might be abnormal with its multiple physical complications, but it also housed something as noble as selfless love.
He had done everything for her just so she could continue to have faith in survival.
"I'm sorry..." Kagome didn't know what else to say. To be brutally honest, she had been nothing but an emotional liability to him.
“No…” He started, before squeezing her hand gently with his own. Another hand, with fingertips void of healthy color, reached out to trace the curve of her cheek. His fingers trailed down the length of her neck, finally reaching the vasodilator on which her life depended. Stroking it gently, his eyes were filled with an unreadable expression as he took in the physical reminders of her ill health. “I am sorry.”
She wondered, how many times had Sesshoumaru longed for someone to confide in like she did in him? It was precisely because she knew how he felt, that Kagome felt worse.
Battling a long-term disease was a lonesome, arduous journey with setbacks one could never anticipate. She understood the feeling; she knew it only too well. Yet on top of fighting the demons haunting him, Sesshoumaru had bravely and selflessly took her burdens one by one to heap them upon his own shoulders.
When she had written to him, crying bitter tears over the indignity of it all, hating the catheter stuck uncomfortably and permanently in her neck, he had been suffering the pain of pericardiocentesis. The excess pericardial fluid would be drained from his pericardial cavity via a catheter pushed into his chest by a needle.
When she had cried about having her vasodilator attached permanently and uncomfortably to her shoulder, he too, had an implantable cardioverter defibrillator embedded within his dysfunctional heart. Unfortunately, the ICD which was supposed to save him had also caused the infection which led to the build-up of fluid within his pericardium cavity. That took his hard-earned freedom away, bringing him back to square one.
Where she had shed tears over losing hope for leading a normal lifestyle, he had been given endless hopes, only to have them crushed cruelly by reality.
It was probably meaningless to compare in this manner, but no matter what she had suffered, he had it equally bad if not worse.
Yet he had remained steadfast in keeping his promise to her.
“I wanted to give you hope, so you can get well again.”
Kagome laughed somewhat mockingly and resignedly, gently smacking him on his arm. “Get well? I’ve been living on borrowed time since the day I got diagnosed with PH. We’ve wasted enough time, Sesshoumaru.”
This had never been how she imagined their reunion to be. Kagome wanted to see him smiling with a healthy glow in his face as he walked into her ward. There would be no tubes or catheters attached to his person, no bluish fingernails, no constant chest pain or shortness of breath.
For now, that would be too much to ask for. The present moment was already a miracle.
They didn’t need to say anything else.
Closing her eyes, she leaned in slowly to close the distance between them with a chaste kiss.
Bluish lips against bluish lips, sealing a promise for the future neither could see.
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A/N: I hope you've enjoyed the read. Please don't forget to read my partner, Skyisthelimit's entry and vote by PM-ing Tangerine Dream!