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She’s mixing the cilantro into her famous guacamole when the phone rings from the other room. Sighing, Helen wipes her hands on the towel hanging from the oven door and heads to answer the call. She hopes it’s not the DA’s office; it’s girls’ night and she doesn’t want to have to cancel on Lindsay and Ellenor. 

“Hello,” she says into the receiver. 

From the other side, she hears noises, heavy breathing, maybe a sniffle? God, why does she always pick up these prank calls, and who keeps giving out this number? 

“Listen, creep, don’t call me again!” she says as she starts to hang up the phone. 

“Helen,” the voice on the other side breathes just in time for her to hear it. 

“Bobby?” She thinks it’s him at least. “Bobby is that you?”

“Helen,” he says again, “Helen, I’m so sorry, but it’s Lindsay.”

“Bobby, what the hell are you talking about?” she yells into the phone. “What’s wrong?” Her head is starting to spin. 

“I’m sorry, I’m so sorry Helen. Lindsay– she’s– we’re at the hospital and–”

“Bobby, tell me exactly what’s going on right now before I sue you!” She’s panicking now, her voice is fast, and her heart is beating in her throat. Something happened to her girlfriend. There’s a deep breath on the other side of the line. 

“Lindsay is at the hospital. I’m here too. Helen. I don’t know how to tell you this, but– Lindsay’s been stabbed.”

“Oh god,” Helen moans, the receiver falling to her heart as she falls to her knees, the cord stretching with both of them. “Bobby, what happened?”

“I don’t know, really,” he says, and she can hear his panic even as she’s fighting through her own. “Please, can you just get down here? We’re at St. Anne’s, they are asking me all these questions, and I just– I just need you here, she’s in surgery now, and they’re not telling me anything, they want– fuck they want her next of kin down here. That’s you, I think.” Bobby’s words trail off as he runs out of breath with emotion. 

“I’m coming now,” she says, hanging up the phone, her voice stunningly emotionless. She rips her purse from the closet, throws on the closest shoes and heads out to her car parked on the street, avocados browning and forgotten on the counter. 

Helen breaks at least 4 traffic laws on her way to the hospital, but her mind is elsewhere. She is picturing the worst, having not gotten any information from Bobby apart from her girlfriend being stabbed. It had to be bad though, Bobby doesn’t get that emotion for regular, run-of-the-mill injuries. Her breathing hasn’t slowed yet, and her racing thoughts aren’t helping her control her bodily reactions. 

The number of times Helen had pleaded with Lindsay to switch sides, to come work for the state, and here now she was, potentially a victim of one of her clients. Bobby hadn’t said of course, but Helen had to presume an angry client got to Lindsay. Or what if it was a random stranger attack? Those were rare, but she knew it happened. Was she attacked on the street? There had to be witnesses. She should have called her boss, or someone else at the office, or maybe she should be driving to the office to handle this–

Helen scolds herself. She’s letting her thoughts run wild, she needs to be at the hospital with her girlfriend. They’ll have more information, she can talk to the police and the DA when she knows that Lindsay’s safe. 

She realizes that she doesn’t even know the state of her girlfriend. Bobby hadn’t said anything besides that she’s in surgery. The lump in her throat grows, and she wants to vomit, but driving at the speeds she’s going, that would be both dangerous and impractical, so she swallows it down and stares at the mostly empty road ahead of her. 

What if Lindsay’s dead when she gets there? Helen bites her lip as tears that have not fallen at all since Bobby called spill over, wetting her cheeks. She doesn’t know what she’ll do if Lindsay’s not okay. 

She parks in visitor parking, and practically runs through the lot, definitely catching the attention of the parking attendant, but she doesn’t care. The elevator to the emergency floor is literally the slowest prison on earth, and she can feel herself shaking even as she presses her hands to her sides and tenses all the muscles in her body in an attempt to regulate her nervous system. What will she find on that floor? 

She finds Bobby, sitting with his head in his hands as she throws herself out of the elevator before the doors are open. 

“Bobby!” she exclaims and he shoots out of the chair, coming to her and wrapping her in a hug she didn’t know how desperately she needed. 

As she melts into his body, she asks, “Where?”

Bobby shakes his head against her shoulder, sighing, “Still in surgery. I don’t know anything. They wanted to talk to you, but I think now you’ll have to wait. I haven’t seen the doctor since I called you.”

Helen squeezes her eyes closed, still clinging to the man. “Please. Tell me what happened.” She pulls away, looking at a tear-stained face that more than likely matches her own. 

Bobby takes her hand and they walk to the plaid-covered hospital chairs. “I honestly don’t know that much,” Bobby starts, his voice thick with emotion, but steadier than it had been on the phone. “I was coming back to the office because I needed to pick up some files. I saw the light on when I was in the hall, and figured it had to be Lindsay. You know she’s been busy on that divorce case.” He looks at Helen for confirmation that she was still listening, as if there was anything on her mind apart from hearing what had happened to her partner. She nods at him. 

“I opened the door, it was unlocked. I called out for Lindsay, asked if she was there, and then I saw her on the ground, covered in blood.”

Tears fall freely from Helen’s eyes as she intakes a sharp breath. Bobby squeezes her hand. “I’m so sorry. I–I ran to her, she was gasping like she couldn’t breathe, and her chest, her hands, the floor, it was just so much blood. And I panicked, I tried to stop the bleeding, but it was so much, so fast, and she just looked up at me, so scared. I tried to comfort her, Helen, I tried, but she passed out.” Bobby’s words run together as his emotions pick up again, and Helen squeezes his hand back, but she’s not sure if she can hear any more. But she needs to. She desperately needs to know. 

“Then what?” she practically begs, her voice shaking. 

“I called 911, they were there in 8 minutes they told me, but it felt like years. I put pressure on the wound while I waited, I think she woke up one time, and I told her help was on the way. I told her I loved her. I told her you loved her, and to stay with us.” Helen closes her eyes and grips the chair with her free hand. 

“The ambulance arrived and took her away, I followed in my car. They didn’t let me see her in the emergency room, but they took her to surgery right away. But, fuck, they said–they said her heart stopped, and they got her back but her heart stopped.” Bobby runs his hand through his hair, then releases his grip on Helen and puts his face in his hands. A sob escapes him. 

“They said she’d been stabbed three times. They’ll know more after the surgery,” he says, his face hidden. Helen wants to hide her face too. She doesn’t want to be comforting this man, but they’re all friends, and it had to be traumatic to find her like that, so she rubs his back as she leans back herself in the chair. 

Lindsay already died once today. She’s in surgery. She’s been stabbed three times. Helen’s not really Catholic anymore, but at this point she’ll take what she can get, praying to a god she hasn’t thought of in years, begging that their luck hasn’t run out. 

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They wait together, sometimes holding hands for mutual comfort, sometimes staring into space, lost in their own thoughts. Helen wishes she had something else to do besides think about Lindsay. The clock on the wall ticks thunderously into the empty void of the hospital waiting room at past 2 a.m. 

Helen is counting the seconds in order to distract herself from the agony when a voice breaks her out of her own personal mental hell. 

“Lindsay Dole?” someone calls and Helen spins her body towards the voice as Bobby barely manages not to drop his cup of lukewarm coffee. They are both up in a flash to speak with the doctor. 

“We’re here for Lindsay,” Helen replies, hands clasped in front of her, an unwilling and unwitting gesture to plead for the best possible result with the worst possible deity. “Please, is she okay?”

The doctor takes a deep breath before replying, only furthering Helen’s anxiety. “The aorta was punctured,” she says, “but we think we’ve repaired it. The next 24 hours, we’ll know.”

“Know what?” Helen pleads. 

“She went through a lot of punishment,” the doctor says, shaking her head. “It’s a miracle she even made here.” 

Helen wants to melt into a puddle on the floor, but Bobby braces her as he sees her knees weaken, both of them holding the other up. 

“Can–can I see her?” Helen forces out, just as the doctor is turning to leave. 

“Okay,” she replies. “But I need you to be careful with her. She’s still very fragile right now, it was a major abdominal surgery and she needs her rest.”

Helen just nods, anything to get to see Lindsay, to verify with her own eyes that she was alive, to hear with her own ears the heartbeat that she listened to every morning. She needs to viscerally understand what had happened in that office. They follow the doctor down a short corridor to a small, dark room. 

They open the door on a sight that has Helen covering her mouth and Bobby leaning his entire body weight against the wall. Lindsay is pale, ghostlike. She has a tube running down her throat and Helen can see the machine it’s attached to, hear it’s anxious whirring. Her arms are covered with IVs and tape and her gown opens a little bit farther than Lindsay would like, revealing monitors and wire curling and winding their way to the big box on her right. 

Her heart. 

It beats. 

It thumps as her chest rises and falls, albeit artificially but Helen can see the tangible proof that her girlfriend is alive. The urge to take her into her arms like she would if they were sleeping at home, to cuddle up together and stroke her hair, brush her fingertips softly along the soft skin of her upper arm, whisper into her ear, is practically irresistible. 

“Can she hear me?” Helen whispers as if Linsday would be woken by the loud, serious voices of her guests. 

“It’s possible, but remember, she needs to stay calm and rest. You can tell her that you’re here,” the doctor nods. 

Helen takes two steps further into the room and gently places her hand in Lindsay’s. “Lindsay, it’s me, Helen,” she says, her lip quivering. “And Bobby’s here too. I love you so much Lindsay. I’ll be right here when you wake up.”

“When will she wake up?” Bobby asks, tearing his eyes from Lindsay’s settled form. 

“I’m hoping within a day, but it could take longer. With these kinds of injuries we just don’t know.”

“Bobby, you should go home and get some sleep,” Helen looks up briefly to meet his eyes but is quickly pulled back to Lindsay. 

“Helen,” Bobby starts before Helen interrupts.

“Listen, it’s after 3, you haven’t slept at all, and don’t you have court in the morning? Plus, have you even told the others what’s going on?” she rebuffs. “I appreciate all you’ve done, but there’s nothing else to do now. I promise I’ll call you as soon as there are any updates. Bobby. I promise.”

Helen can see the exhaustion on his face, likely mirroring her own, but she knows it’s only a matter of time before he caves. He might love Lindsay, but he doesn’t love her the way Helen does. He needs his sleep; Helen needs the lifeless touch of her girlfriend’s hand. 

“Alright,” Bobby says after a few minutes of a one-sided staring contest (because Helen never looks away from Lindsay’s face.) “But call me immediately if she even opens one eye.”

Helen nods with her back still towards him, and then hears the door open and close, softly. The doctor has been gone for several minutes, and she hopes she won’t need to call her back in. With Bobby gone, Helen’s very loosely held facade begins to crack. She still holds Lindsay’s hand, and now her head falls gently on to the bed, near her shoulder. She begins to cry, and the tears wet the gown, spreading slowly across the fabric. 

“Lindsay, baby, I love you so much,” Helen begins to speak. “I hope you can hear me, because I need you. Please, please, wake up.” Her words are muffled both by emotion and the damp fabric pressed against her mouth. 

“I’ll be here the whole time. I’ll be here when you wake up. Just–you just have to wake up though.” Helen straightens, sniffling, and pulls one of the chairs in the room towards the bed, never letting go of Lindsay’s hand. 

Sitting and turning her face toward the ceiling, Helen makes yet another desperate plea to the heavens, bargaining her soul for her love’s life.

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At some point, Helen falls asleep, her head resting on her forearms, which in turn rest on the side of the bed, touching Lindsay’s still-pale skin. Skin-to-skin contact, like an infant and its mother, essential for bonding, for healing. It’s not a relaxing sleep, and Helen has barely been out for an hour when she is startled into consciousness once again. 

The sound will haunt her for the rest of her life. 

The alarm is going off, shrill, piercing the air, alerting everyone in the hospital that something was going disastrously wrong. 

Before she can even realize what is happening, Helen is surrounded by lights, movement, blurs of shapes, shouts that can be heard even over the life alert. Someone is pulling her by the shoulder, removing her from Lindsay’s bedside, and she hears herself protesting but doesn’t have the wherewithal to do anything but be forced out of the room. 

People stream inside, rushing about with various trays, instruments, and Helen watches frozen as the door closes, cutting her off from the chaos. She can hear the alarms through the door, hear the raised voices until suddenly she hears nothing; her vision starts to go, forming a tunnel, until it’s all black, and she feels her body collapsing, starting with her knees giving out from under her. 

It’s a much more restful sleep when your body decides to pass out. 

She’s laying down, and sound slowly filters back in. She feels dizzy when she tries to open her eyes so she keeps them closed, but someone has noticed her. 

“Hey, you’re going to be okay,” a voice says from somewhere above her, and she turns her head toward the sound, trying to think of anything except her head hurt when–

“Lindsay!” she exclaims, eyes opening much too fast, body moving much too clumsily, and she swings her legs around, and if someone hadn’t been right there, she would be on the floor again, but they push her back down, guide her to the soft bed she’s been laying on and someone shushes her, trying to calm her down. 

“She’s okay,” the voice says again, and Helen manages to open her eyes enough to see a nurse standing near her, still holding her immobile on the bed. “You passed out in the hallway, but you’re okay, and we think she’ll be okay. There was a problem with her breathing, there was fluid in her lungs, but we’ve done a good job, and she’s stable. You can go back to her when I decide that you’re stable.”

“Oh my god,” Helen moans, and collapses weakly into the bed. “I can’t believe this is happening.” 

“I need to take your blood pressure, and if it’s up, I’ll take you back to her room,” the nurse says. She starts pulling some equipment from behind Helen’s line of sight and Helen closes her eyes again. 

Helen feels like vomiting again, but she can’t let the nurse know, she might not let her see Lindsay. It feels like everything that could possibly go wrong is going wrong, and she won’t feel better until she’s back in Lindsay’s room, and even then she doubts it’ll be okay at all. 

Her eyes open again and she searched for the nurse. “Is she awake at least?” she asks when the nurse comes back into view. 

“Not yet, dear,” the nurse replies. “These things are very taxing on the body. But she looks stronger, even after this problem with her lungs. She’s getting some color back. You’ll see. Now let me have your arm and we’ll try and get you back up to her room ASAP.”

Helen hands over her arm and feels the pressure cuff squeeze and release. 

“It’s looking good, are you feeling okay to walk?” the nurse asks, and Helen nods, eager to get back to Lindsay’s. She pushes herself up, and though she feels a little dizzy, truly feels steady enough to make the trip to… wherever Lindsay is. She is in a hallway, somewhere out of the way of the true patients, she presumes. 

“I’ll need to make some calls,” Helen says as they make the short walk. “Is there a phone I can use somewhere in her room?”

“Sure, I’ll have it set up for you,” the nurse responds, and then, “Here we are. Please, go on inside, the doctor will be in shortly for a checkup, and I’ll have someone bring you the phone.”

“Thank you,” says Helen and she pushes the door open, once again seeing her girlfriend lying lifeless on the bed. The nurse was right, though. As she approaches Lindsay, she sees a little more color in her cheeks. She takes Lindsay’s hand again, almost like nothing had happened. She pulls it to her mouth, placing a kiss on the back of the hand, then holds it to her face, making her girlfriend caress her cheek. 

They stay like that, Helen using her girlfriend as comfort, as the doctor comes and professes that Lindsay is looking good, as an orderly brings in a phone for Helen to use, as the nurse comes to check mostly on Helen; Helen is almost as non-responsive as Lindsay throughout the comings and goings of the hospital staff, her mind on one thing as she nods appropriately and makes appreciative sounds as needed: Lindsay and her heart beating, her chest rising and falling. 

Helen will need to call Bobby soon. She should call the others too. But right now, all her energy is focused on her girlfriend and willing her back to consciousness. She’s afraid to fall back asleep. So she stares, wide-eyed, rubbing circles into the palm of Lindsay’s hand. 

Finally, physical exhaustion overtaking her mental fortitude, her eyes gently close, even as her hands still play for the affections of her girlfriend. 

Until her eyes fly back open. 

The sound will haunt her for the rest of her life. 

“Helen…”

They both breathe together.

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Helen can’t even believe it at first, and her thoughts are racing so fast she can’t pin one down. 

“Lindsay?” she breathes, a question and a promise and plea all at once. Lindsay’s eyes flutter, not quite opening, but Helen feels her hand responding to the movements Helen’s been making. 

“Baby?” and Lindsay groans, a soft, terrible noise that makes Helen’s heart ache. “Open your eyes for me, baby.” Helen pulls Lindsay’s hand up to her face, kissing each delicate finger, then placing the open palm on her own cheek. 

Lindsay’s eyes open just long enough for Helen to see that they are still unfocused, confused and scared before the lids slide closed and Lindsay moans. 

“Lindsay, my love, please, please wake up, talk to me,” Helen pleads with her again. She needs to hear her voice, to confirm that the worst is over. It’s been over 12 hours since she first got the call from Bobby, though time has passed so slowly it could have been years. Helen can’t remember the day before. 

Finally, a minute later, after Helen begs to both Lindsay and whatever forces are out in the universe, Lindsay murmurs again, “Helen.”

It’s stronger this time, barely, and her eyes are still closed. Helen’s heart leaps. “That’s it sweetie, you’re so strong. You’re okay. I’m right here,” she tries to reassure her girlfriend as she struggles back to consciousness. 

“Helen,” Lindsay says as she rolls her head back and forth once on the pillow, then moans again. “I hurt.” 

Her voice is so quiet, so small and defeated, and it breaks Helen to hear her like this. She’s going to find whoever did this to her girlfriend, and they are going to rot for a long, long time. 

“I’m so sorry, Lindsay,” Helen says, voice soft and soothing despite her feelings of inner turmoil. “You–you had an accident, but you’re going to be okay. You just–had an accident.” 

“I was stabbed,” Lindsay replies, her voice shaking, and she squeezes her eyes closed against what Helen can only presume is pain. “Some guy stabbed me.”

“Yeah baby. That’s right. We’re going to find him. Don’t even worry about that. You just worry about resting and getting better.” Lindsay moans again, and Helen can tell she’s fading, and that the pain is getting stronger the more lucid she becomes. She hates to see her like this; she needs to find the doctor and get some pain meds. Her poor baby. 

“Please don’t leave me,” Lindsay begins to cry as she tightens her grip on Helen’s hand, using all the strength she can muster. “Helen, I’m so scared.”

Helen feels the tears start again, watching her girlfriend in so much pain and fear is destroying her again, even now that she feels they are past the worst of the physical trauma. She squeezes her hand back, and caresses her cheek, wiping the tears falling from Lindsay’s eyes with the pad of her thumb. 

“Never, Lindsay, never. I will never leave you. I’ll be here as long as it takes, and even longer than that. I’ll take you home, and you’ll be safe. You’re safe now, I promise,” Helen reassures. “Baby, I need to get the doctor in here to check on you and give you some medication. It’s killing me to see you in pain. I’m not leaving, but I just need to get up.”

Lindsay’s eyes have been closed for most of this conversation, but they fly open too fast at the mention that Helen might even step away from her side. “No!” Lindsay shouts, her voice raw with emotion and disuse and injury. “Helen, please. Please, stay with me!”

They are both sobbing, Helen holding Lindsay as close as she can, wary of her girlfriend’s many injuries and her decisive pain. She cradles Lindsay’s face in both her hands, placing a kiss on her forehead, and murmuring to her, lips never leaving the smooth skin. 

“I’m not leaving, babe. I’m right here. I won’t even leave the room. Keep your eyes open, watch me walk to the door and open it, and I’ll call for the doctor and I’ll be right back. Watch me, we’ll count together and by five I’ll be back, holding your hand.” Helen explains all this never removing herself from Lindsay’s body, waiting for assurance that Lindsay understands. 

Finally, after deep contemplation from Lindsay, and Helen thinks, a pain that is becoming unbearable, Lindsay nods. 

“Count with me,” Helen says and they say together slowly:

“One. Two. Three.”

Helen’s at the door, opening it. She looks out and calls loudly, “I need a doctor in here!”

“Four. Five.”

Helen’s hand is back in Lindsay’s and they are both shaking, recovering from their brief separation. 

“I’ll never leave you, Lindsay,” Helen promises, whispering in her ear. “I love you so much.”

The doctor comes up, followed by a team of nurses, and as they take in the scene before them, Lindsay returns the affirmation. 

“I love you too,” she moans. They are giving her medication. She is falling back into the darkness, Helen can tell. She only hopes that Lindsay will remember that Helen is out here, in the living world, and that she will come back to her.

Chapter Text

Helen calls Bobby first, making sure Lindsay’s still passed out, pain free. It’s 8am and he answers after the first ring. 

“Bobby Donnell,” and from that alone Helen can tell he’s still stressed. 

“Bobby, it’s me,” Helen says. “It’s okay. She’s okay. She woke up.”

There’s no response on the other side of the call, but Helen can hear a sigh of relief, and Bobby’s breath helps steady her own. 

“There was a problem with her lungs,” Helen continues, and she hears Bobby gasp but presses on, “and they filled up with fluid they said, but she’s doing better now. They were able to fix it, and she woke up. I think she’s in a lot of pain though, so I had the doctors give her medication, and she’s sleeping again. I think she’d like to see you when she wakes up. And anyone else who’s free.”

“My god, Helen,” Bobby breathes. “That sounds like quite the night. I’m so glad she’s doing okay. I have to be in court in an hour, but I’ll stop by as soon as I can.”

Helen hears voices in the background, presuming Bobby’s at the office. “Do you want to talk to anyone else, or should I just relay the message?” he asks, confirming her suspicion. 

“Can you pass it along?” she replies. “I need to make sure I’m back in Lindsay’s room when she wakes up. She’s really scared, Bobby.” 

“Of course,” he says. “Someone will probably be down to see you both within the hour. Helen, take care of yourself, too.”

Helen nods, not remembering she’s on the phone. “I’ll be okay as soon as I know she’s okay. I just–” a sob escapes her, and she doesn’t even remember starting to cry, but the tears flow down her face, and she feels weak in the knees again. Terror and relief swirl around her like a wind storm, and she sits on the floor hoping no one has noticed. 

“I’m so sorry, Bobby,” she says fighting through the tears, her voice raw. “I don’t know what happened, I just need to get back to her.”

Bobby murmurs a comforting sound of understanding over the phone, and says, “We’re all thinking of you and we’ll be there soon, Helen. Go take care of your girl.”

“Thank you,” she sniffles. There’s no need to say goodbye, Bobby has hung up. Helen scrubs her face with her palms and tries to take some steadying breaths. She needs to be on the top of her game for Lindsay when she wakes up, but Bobby is right; she hasn’t really slept, hasn’t eaten, has gone through emotional turmoil that before this day had been unimaginable. She needs coffee. 

Helen pushes herself up from the floor, still feeling a little weak from the sobbing, and decides to quickly find the coffee station before heading back to Lindsay’s room. At least she can solve one problem right now, pumping caffeine through her veins. She walks through the halls that are slowly becoming more busy as the morning continues on. 

After the coffee stop, Helen heads back towards Lindsay’s room and pushes the door open as gently as she can, hoping not to disturb her girlfriend. However, her worries about waking Lindsay fall to the periphery of her mind as she sees the scene in front of her in the small, colorless room. 

Lindsay is shifting side to side, still asleep but clearly in distress. Helen hears a quiet droning, a moan of something emanating from Lindsay’s form. A nightmare, maybe? Helen rushes to her side in flash, coffee discarded before she’d had more than three sips. 

“Baby?” she begs as she peers into Lindsay’s face: her eyes are screwed up tight, a grimace playing across her features as she moans a low, dark sound. Helen hears pain and fear in the sound, and she’s not sure what to do at this moment. She lays her hand gently on Lindsay’s shoulder, mindful not to touch anywhere there might be a wound. 

“Lindsay?” she pleads again. “Wake up, babe, you’re having a nightmare.” Lindsay appears not to hear her and as she moves in bed, Helen becomes concerned that she’ll injure herself more, pulling stitches or causing devastating pain. 

“You have to wake up,” Helen is crying again, though a minute ago she had thought she had no more tears left to cry. Every single thing that occurred in the last 14 hours flashes through her mind, refreshing the devastation she is feeling. “Please! Wake up!”

There are machines beeping in the background, and though Helen can hear the alerts getting faster, her active mind is pushing out stimuli, focusing only on Lindsay. The distress her girlfriend must be feeling is clawing its way through her heart. She shakes her shoulder, extremely aware that she is likely causing Lindsay pain, but the emotional trauma might override the physical at this point. 

The outside movement must shock Lindsay back into the conscious world, as her eyes fly open, and the moans turn to staggering breaths. Helen can tell it hurts as Lindsay gasps uncontrollably, because she grabs at her ribs, at the side of her chest where the wounds are. 

“Baby, you’re okay,” Helen says, getting her face in front of Lindsay, forcing her wild eyes to see that whatever nightmare she was seeing is long gone. “You’re safe now. I promise. You need to slow down your breathing. I’m right here. You’re hurting yourself.” Helen stops speaking and starts modeling slow, deep breaths for Lindsay, hoping that she is able to follow along. 

“OW!” is the first word Lindsay forces out, still gasping for air, and Helen has to force herself not to squeeze her eyes closed against the onslaught of emotion she feels from that one word. 

“I know, baby. It’ll help if you slow your breath. It’ll help. Watch me. Breathe with me.”

Helen counts up to four in her head, taking in a breath, then four to breathe out. She pulls Lindsay’s right hand up to her chest, forcing her to feel the rise and fall of her ribs, the beat of her heart. 

Repeat. 

Four. 

Exhale. 

Four.

Inhale. 

Slowly, Lindsay is able to control her respirations, and follows along with Helen. Tears are streaming down her cheeks, and Helen doesn’t know if they’re from pain, or fear, or exhaustion, or something else entirely. She uses her free hand to wipe away the wetness from under Lindsay’s eyes, her other hand still holding Lindsay’s protectively to her own chest. 

“Good, Lindsay, good. You’re so strong, sweetheart. You’re so brave.” Helen still sees something in Lindsay’s eyes, but before she can investigate further, Lindsay is speaking, voice raspy and frightened:

“Helen. It hurts. I’m so scared he’s going to come back for me.”

Helen desperately wants to comfort her, wants to quell her fears, and usually she would do that by taking her girlfriend in her arms, wrapping her in a warm cocoon, but Lindsay is still covered in wires and tubes, and her wounds are still clearly very painful. Her words haven’t been enough for Lindsay to feel safe or reassured, and Helen honestly doesn’t know what to do at this point. 

She presses her own forehead against Lindsay’s, their tears mingling across each other’s cheeks. “I’m so sorry, baby. I wish… I wish I could hold you, I love you so much. I promise you’re safe here. It was just a nightmare.”

“It wasn’t just a nightmare when he attacked me.”

Helen is stunned, knowing Lindsay is right, and knowing no matter what she says, she can’t take away that trauma. 

“Lindsay, you’re right. I can’t make that go away. But I can stay with you and keep the nightmares away. At least I can try.”

The exhaustion that had been pulling at Lindsay is growing, Helen can tell, as Lindsay’s eyelids keep closing slowly, against her will. 

“I don’t want to go back to sleep,” Lindsay whimpers, trying to pull Helen close to her, but still experiencing weakness. Helen understands her gesture, and caresses her face with both hands before kissing her hairline. Then she moves gently to Lindsay’s lips, a closed mouth kiss calming both of them. Lindsay sighs weakly against Helen’s mouth, and takes a shaky breath as Helen finally moves their lips apart. 

“You have to rest in order to heal,” Helen says, knowing it probably won’t help, but hoping that whatever pain meds need to be redistributed will help tamp down Lindsay’s subconsciousness. “I can call the doctor and ask for more drugs.”

Lindsay shakes her head then inhales sharply, the motion agitating her wounds, and Helen cringes, then immediately hopes Lindsay doesn’t notice. 

“Okay, but Jesus, Lindsay. I hate how much pain you’re in. It’s killing me to see you like this. I just want you to get better.”

“I can’t do it. What if I see him again? I can’t relive it, that nightmare, Helen. I’m–I just don’t think I can do it.”

“Love, you’re already falling asleep as we speak. The drugs will just help you feel better, and they’ll help you get better faster.” Helen pleads with her, both because she knows it will be better for Lindsay and because she thinks if she has to watch her girlfriend wincing and gasping for another minute she might leave and go kill the guy who did this herself. 

“Just stay with me,” Lindsay begs, which also hurts Helen’s heart. 

“I will, babe. I will.” Lindsay’s eyes are opening less and less frequently, and Helen can see her breathing start to even out more as she loses the battle with her exhausted brain and body. 

They will need time before Lindsay gets back to normal; maybe she won’t ever. But Helen knows one thing for certain: nothing in the world could ever make her leave.

Finally Lindsay is asleep for real, and Helen gently places both Lindsay’s hands back on the bed, having held them as she soothed her girlfriend to sleep. She gently kisses Lindsay’s forehead, and then once again places her head in her hands. 

“Lindsay,” she whispers, “Forever and always. You’ll never get rid of me.” She hopes her words muddle through the wild tangle of Lindsay’s subconscious, and lodge in her heart.