Chapter 47

Ruthanne's Point of View <3

I wake up in excruciating pain, and feel Kris's leg move when I kick him as I writhe around. "Kris?" I groan, trying to wake him up. I can't think past the pain to wonder what's wrong with me. "Kris.." I groan again, summoning all of my energy to utter his name.
His head turns and he rolls over. Why? "Kris." I say again. He rolls back towards me. I reach my hand out and pat the arm he's not laying on. "Kris, help." I say as another  intense wave of pain washes over me. "Ahhhh," my hands fly to my stomach.
I'm watching Kris's face and willing him to wake up in my mind. "wake up Kris," I whisper, feeling more helpless than ever. "Help me."
Kris's eyes flutter open and my hand goes to his cheek to keep him awake. "Help," I say.
Kris's eyes go from lethargic, to terrified in an instant. "Ruthanne," he says my name, getting up out of his side of the bed and running around to my side. "What's wrong?"
"My stomach.." I trail off, pointing to my stomach, right around my belly button area. "Pain," I groan, and then I black out.

Kris's Point of View =/

Ruthanne woke me up with her groaning and kicking. And she blacked out before she could tell me what was wrong. There must be a complication somewhere. I'm freaking out, but I'm trying to portray the calm cool and collected attitude that I would love to have right now.
I scoop Ruthanne up into my arms and carry her down the hall and then down the stairs where I set her on the couch. I run back upstairs to get her parents, and pull out my cell phone. I'll drive her to the hospital tonight, but I have to tell her parents. It's extremely awkward to knock on their door and wait for them to answer, even despite the situation.
Ruthanne's dad grumbles, "What d'ya want?"
"It's Ruthanne," I say, not sure where to go next. "She's not doing good. I'm going to drive her to the hospital!" I run back down the hall and to the stairs.
Ruthanne's eyelids flutter a little bit when I pick her up again, but her body is like dead weight in my arms. She's limp and lifeless, all except that little flutter of her eyelids.
When the chilly night air hits her, her eyes are wide open and rolling back in her head. "Ruthanne?" I ask, trying to keep her with me. "Ruthanne?" She's still got her eyes open, but she's not looking anywhere. I find it difficult getting her into the car and wonder if I should have called an ambulance.
It's too late now I tell myself, buckling her in and closing the door.
I speed to the hospital, not worrying about anything but getting her there. I can't lose her, I can't lose her, is the one thing repeating in my mind.
The receptionist in the ER looks mildly concerned when she sees me walk in with Ruthanne in my arms.
"She needs help now," I say urgently. The room is mostly empty.
The receptionist, rolling her eyes at me says, "she'll have to wait."
"come on," I say. A loom of recognition flashes across her face. She picks up a phone and calls someone. Then someone comes from down the hall and I carry Ruthanne to the room they lead me to.
"we'll take care of it from here," the male nurse says to me. "you'll have to stay out until we get her stabilized. It might take a while to figure out what went wrong."
I sigh and lean back against the wall, letting gravity slowly Pull me down to the floor. The worry that's building in my chest, the longer she's unconscious and helpless, is causime physical pain. It's intense, and I try not to think about it too much, because being the pessimist I am, I can't imagine anything but the worst. It doesn't help. All I can see when I close my eyes is her face, eyes rolled to the back of her head because of the pain. I wish I could take it away from her and be the one suffering. My mind continues going a mile a minute like this for what seems like forever.
"Sir," someone is poking me in the shoulder. I jump up to my feet, already in a fighter's stance.
The man takes a few cautious steps back. When I realize its the nurse I feel stupid. But I search his face for answers instead of dwelling on it. "you can see her now. Shes asleep, but she'll be alright. Her parents came." the nurse walks off down the hallway after relaying the information to me. I burst into the door.
Ruthanne looks paler than ever. I  barely realize her mom and dad are sitting off to the side in chairs, while I run up and take her hand. I kiss it gently and look at her face, and down the rest of her body.
Ruthanne's dad speaks up, "she started bleeding internally last night," he says,  prompting me to look down at my watch, it's 3 PM, no wonder I fell asleep. "And, she was in shock when you brought her to the hospital," he says.
I groan, both of those things are awful. "Is she going to be ok?" I ask, looking back at her.
"Yes," he says, "they had to go in and fix some things in her abdomen, but she'll be out of here in a few days, maybe a week."
I groan again, feeling sorry for her, but relieved that she'll be alright. The whole process from the time she woke me up at 2 AM last night, was so scary.
"We can give you guys a moment alone," Ruthanne's mom says, standing up. "We're going to go get some coffee." Ruthanne's father follows her out the door without saying a word.
I sit in silence for a few minutes, watching her perfect delicate face as she's sleeping. "Stop staring," she mumbles, squeezing my hand.
"But you're beautiful," I say, remembering every conversation I've had with her as she sleep talks.
"Stop it," she says, again squeezing my hand.
"I love you," I say, getting closer to her ear.
"I love you too," she mumbles, her eyes opening slowly for only a moment before she snaps them shut again. "What time is it?" She asks, her eyes still shut tight.
"About 3 in the afternoon," I say, smiling down at her because she's making such an adorable and funny face.
"What happened?" She asks slowly. "I feel like I got run over by a bus again." Her eyes open for real this time and she tries to focus on my face, but her eyes are sort of glassy from the pain medications.
"Complications," I say. "You'll be in here for a while."
"Ugh."
"I'll stay with you," I say quietly.
She smiles. "Thank you." Her eyes wander down to the bed and then back up to my face. "For everything."
"You're welcome," I lean down and kiss her cheek, and her IV hand shoots up to guide my face to her lips. She gasps in pain as she feels the tug of the IV and I flinch back, not wanting to hurt her. But she persistently puts her hand on my face and pulls me down to kiss her.
I love this girl.

Caitlin's Point of View ;)

The weekend is over, all my clothes are packed up in my case and I'm ready to go back home. Sidney hugs his family goodbye and I shake their hands, except for Taylor, who attacks me with a hug. I awkwardly hug her back and say goodbye.
"And hopefully I'll see you next time," she smiles.

The flight home is quiet. Sidney falls asleep and I run out of games to play on my iPod. I resort to making up a story about the guy sitting in front of me. He was visibly upset when he got onto the plane and I felt bad. He spoke French to the flight attendant for a minute, but she didn't understand him, so she just led him to his seat. He's been trying to keep busy ever since, flipping through the ridiculous airplane catalogs where you can buy stupid things.
The story I make up about him is depressing, and probably not even close to being true... but it keeps me occupied for  a while, while Sidney is sleeping.  His wife divorced him and he's going to Pittsburgh to start a new life, without any of his family because he can't stand to be around all the places where he made memories with her.

The plane lands and Sidney tells me that Max will be the one picking us up. I drag my heavy suitcase across the air port as I follow him. I'm in a terrible mood and I don't know why.
We can't find Max's car in the dark "pick up port" as I call it because I can't remember the name of it. So Sidney stands and talks with him on the phone for a long time, just agreeing that we'd meet him at a certain statue thing, and walk to his car from there instead of worrying about all this junk.
"Are you alright?" Sidney looks at me.
"Fine," I grumble.
"What's wrong?" He asks, stopping and turning towards me, his face full of concern.
"I don't know," I say, leaning into his chest. He gives me a hug and kisses the top of my head and we continue on to meet Max.
I don't particularly want to see Max. I don't want there to be any feelings for him left inside of me, but everytime I'm near him, I feel them. It's horrible, to be stuck between these two amazing guys,  and have both of them adoring me. I don't know if Max still does, but the last time I talked to him, he couldn't stand to see Sidney and I doing coupley things together.
Oh well, I tell myeslf. The more I stress over it, the more likely it will be for me to give myself away in front of Sidney. I feel bad for lying to him, in this way, but it's not like I can tell him that I'm struggling with having feelings for someone else. Especially when our relationship has been going so great.
"There he is," Sidney chuckles. I see why when I look up and see Max leaning against the statue, his head down, and he has sunglasses on. He's all alone.
I laugh to myself. Max is hilarious and I feel like running up to him and giving him a hug.
We follow him to his car as he asks me how I felt about Sidney's crazy-ass parents.
"They were nice, what are you talking about?" I laugh sarcastically. I did get the eccentric vibe from them. But I'm sure they were trying to tone it down in front of me.
Max and Sidney both laugh and then Sidney says,  "you got the very sane version of them this time. They were definitely not acting quite as crazy as normal. I didn't want them to scare you away," he smiles, and reaches over to squeeze the hand that's not dragging the suitcase. I smile up at him.

On the way home Max makes a McDonalds trip, claiming to be starving. "Do you guys want anything?" He asks, looking up into the rearview mirror to smile at me.
"A flurry," I smile back. "Oreo. Please and thank you," I laugh as he makes a face at me in the mirror before ordering it.
Sidney looks uncomfortable in the passenger seat and he shakes his head, signifying that he was not wanting anything.
I get my flurry and Max just ordered some fries. I sit and eat it happily. Maybe I just needed something sweet, cause I feel a whole lot better now that I'm eating this ice cream.
Max drives us to Mario's where I'm going to spend the night with Sidney, so he can take me home tomorrow. It's already 11:30 at night.
"Can we watch a movie?" I ask Sidney when we make it up to his room.
He looks at me for a moment before saying, "Caitlin I'm exhausted."
"Ok, whatever," I say, not understanding how he could be exhausted right now. He slept the whole flight down here. I'm still standing by the door while he strips down to his boxers. "Are we going to bed, then?" I ask.
"I am. I don't really care what you do," he says insensitively. I feel hurt, and wonder why he's doing this to me. I feel like I'm going to cry.
I walk over to the bed and sit down by him as he's taking off his socks. "Sid..." I mumble.
"What?" He looks up at me.
"Is there something wrong?"
He scoffs before saying, "funny how you got so happy when you saw Max."
"I'm sorry?" I say.
"It's not a big deal," he says, still obviously very pissed at me.
"Apparently it is," I say. "I'm sorry! I didn't want to be a grouch around him, and I was honestly trying to change my mood anyways."
"Whatever," he says.
A tear rolls down my cheek and I feel like a piece of shit, even though what I told him was true. I can't handle him being mad at me. We sit in silence for a few more minutes before I apologize again and lean over to give him a kiss.
"I love you," I say. "Don't worry about Max," I whisper, even though I'm not sure whether he should worry about it or not.
He sits there coldly. I feel kind of extra special because he's jealous. I mean, I know Sidney loves me but the fact that he's jealous of my attention going to Max is cute.
"I love you too," he whispers. "I don't want to lose you to one of my best friends."
"I know." I smile, my face still resting near his neck. I'm glad that things seem to be fixed.
My phone goes off in my pocket and I pull it out, sitting up to read the text. It's from Ruthanne's iPod number. She never uses that.
hey are you up? I'm so bored!
I laugh out loud. Not being able to move so much is probably killing her.
Yeah, I'm at Sidney's. How was your weekend?
Sidney wraps his arms around my waist and is pulling me into his lap as I read her next text.
Fine til last night. Apparently there were some complications and I was bleeding internally and now I'm in the hospital for like, a week.
Sidney is hugging me and nuzzling my neck and apologizing for being angry, but I'm very wrapped up in worrying about Ruthanne.
Oh my God! Are you alright?
I hit send and Sidney is kissing me down my neck and onto my shoulder, giving me the chills. It's funny how he's gone from being pissed at me to being reassured and loving again.
I'm fine... just feeling very cooped up. Have fun at Sid's.
I don't bother to reply to her because Sidney's hands are wandering around on my waist and I'm extra ticklish.
I turn to kiss him back and the night goes on as though we never had a fight.