Hope Will Find You

Blake thought Mr.T was going to be mad, but forgiving? Had it really seemed that bad? After she thought about it for a while she guessed it was. No one at work had ever seen her that way, not even her closer friends. She didn’t do things like this, that break down probably scared the shit out of Steven, no wonder he had been so worried. For the first time in four days she thought about someone other than Whimsy. That scared her.

The next day she got to work on time despite ridiculous amounts of traffic. Waking up had been hard, but manageable, and she had found herself in a better mood than usual. As she walked into the building she shouted over to Danni. “Hey, Sunday still a coffee date?”

“If your up to it!” , was the reply.

“Of course I am!” , Blake headed around the corner to the locker room, and for the first time in four days she had some bounce in her step.

Once she had changed and gone outside for a morning smoke she headed towards Christy’s desk. “Hey babe, boss said I have a new patient, what’s up?”, Blake smiled, every minute of her day was bringing her farther up.

Christy mouthed, ‘Are you okay?’, at her. Blake held up a thumb and grinned. Christy tossed her a paper.

Room 311, second floor. She headed up the stairs. She wondered what kind of patient it would be this time. Another whining old man who made crude gestures at her when he thought she couldn’t see. Maybe it would be another child, one with a cute little smile despite the eye patch or burn wounds. It could be a woman with a hard pregnancy, so sick she had to be hospitalized. She stopped pondering as she reached the door to room 311, surprisingly it wasn’t a single room. She hadn’t been given a patient, just a room. She opened the door, Mr. T was sitting in front of a curtain. “What’s this all about?”

“I’m here to fill you in on your new charge. She’s a new kind of case for you.”

“Alright, where is she?”, Blake was deadly curious now.

“She’s not here yet.”

“I don’t understand, where is she then?”, she raised a brow at Mr. T.

“She will be here at five, but I wanted to tell you about her and give you a few insights into taking care of people in her situation.” Mr. T gave her an apprehensive look.

“Why is she in the hospital? That’s possibly the best place to begin, don’t you think?”

“Sure. She just came out of a coma yesterday.” He eyed her again.

“So, what is her condition now?”

“She’s been consistently delirious for the duration of the last twenty-four hours.”

“How bad is she, is she a round the clock ward?”, Blake crinkled her brow and frowned, she was getting sick of waiting already, she needed something to focus on and a patient would have been perfect.

“We are not sure, that’s why were letting you watch her, she might need to be cared for a bit longer than your shift keeps you here and we need to keep her supervisors from changing so often, since she is in such a state of delirium and we don’t want her to become upset or confused. You understand?”

“Perfectly”, Blake nodded to ensure him that she understood.

“Alright, report back here at fifteen ‘till five then, don’t be late. As for now, you’re welcome to come and go as you like. I trust you can handle that.” Mr. T eyed her again, as if trying to decide if it was a safe bet, if she were the right horse. Then he headed out the door and left her standing there.

It was all a little strange. But then again, it was a lot better than her last few days had been. Blake realized she was opening a door behind which Whimsy would surely be. She cut herself off and headed to the locker room to grab her things. Once she managed to get her clothes changed and get out to the parking lot it was ten thirty. She jumped on her bike and headed to the café.

While Blake was riding the back streets to the café she had to stop short at a stop sign she hadn’t noticed. Her mind was distracted again. She was desperate to keep it off of said wraith. She tried to think of something else, but she couldn’t shake a foreboding feeling. She didn’t know if she should anticipate the outcome of this feeling or be afraid of it. She drove faster, dangerously so, just to be sure she had no room in her mind for anything else but the road, and she didn’t. When she parked in front of the café it was close to eleven. She walked lazily up to the door and looked inside. There were only a couple of people there, they all looked a little tired. She walked in and sat down at the counter. “What can I get for you?”, the little red head behind the counter warbled cheerfully.

“A bagel and a glass of water, please.”

“No problem lady!”, she chirped pleasantly.

Blake sat for a few minutes in the still, warm silence of the café without thinking at all, and then a magazine caught her eye. She picked it up and started flipping through it for something interesting, there wasn’t anything. The little red headed waitress came back and gave her the bagel and water. She ate slowly and when she was done she thanked the waitress, paid, and left a hefty tip. She jumped back on her bike and headed home.

Figuring she had another couple of hours at the best she decided to take a nap. This of course was decided with the chance of an all-nighter in mind. She slept from twelve thirty until three and then got up to take a shower. She walked into the bathroom and looked at her self in the mirror, she looked weary. Her eyes had faint circles, her hair was limp and stringy, and her face continued to be a little less than the proper coloration. She quickly undressed, throwing all of her clothes in a pile on the toilet. She studied herself once more, her thin waif like frame, her much less than adequate endowment, and the skeletal way all her bones seemed to poke out of her skin. She looked starved. She jumped into the shower. The hot water was soothing, it felt much better because it was the middle of the day. She hardly had time to do anything for herself in the middle of the day. Which only reminded her that she really had never had any reason to need to. She had never had a boyfriend to spend time with, or any hobbies to pursue. Which only brought her back ultimately to her phantom love. “Whimsy…”, she sighed a loud.

Her day had been so full of other things to think about that she had not noticed that Whimsy had not been on her mind. Now was not the time to put herself in a bad mood but she couldn’t help remembering. She thought of the little blonde girls smile and of her tiny frame. Her tiny frame that despite all its slight features was somehow not scrawny at all, just slight. Her beautiful legs, she was always showing off her legs. She was gorgeous. Most of all she made Blake happy, she made her so happy she thought she would burst. Her laugh, her bright smile. Blake was in love. But she was in love with a wraith. She was in love with her own imagination, with a figment of that very thing.
Blake began to cry, her sobs shook her thin body. She cried until the only hot water was the tears rolling down her cheeks. How could she love a dream? How could she love something so much when she had never loved before? And how cruel did fate have to be with her in order to make this her future? Blake wept. She didn’t stop crying until the water nearly froze her out of the shower. At that point it came as such a shock to her that she almost slipped and fell trying to get herself out of the bathroom and into a towel.

She stood shivering in front of her bed, she took up her clothes and threw them back on. Her shirt had sprinkles of water from her scramble and near tripping, she put it on anyway. It was four fifteen. Blake hurried to put her hair back into a braid so that it would stay out of her face. She brushed her teeth and managed a little last minute primping before running out of the house with keys and purse in hand.