Ghosts 19/37

Chapter  19

An ER Fanfic set following the "Bishop Stewart" arc

"Luka?"  Angelique Forquet approached the young man cautiously, having watched his silent vigil for almost half an hour.  When he didn't immediately turn or seem to react to her call she frowned.  He was shutting himself down...she'd seen it often enough to know the signs and unless she found a way to bring him out of it she knew he would likely will himself to die.  She was not going to let that happen...locking a look of determined resolve onto her face she made her way back across the compound to the medical tent.

He hadn't wanted to leave the tent...he'd been laying on the cot lost in his own thoughts when the nurse had come over.  "Luka...Dr. Forquet wants you to go outside and get some fresh air."  He hadn't said anything at first, how could he tell her that he didn't need fresh air....that he didn't want fresh air?  How could he make her understand that the breeze that blew his hair and the sun warming his skin signified life, and he didn't want to be part of that?  He'd given in finally, if only to get them to leave him alone...he dropped his gaze to the small black and white photograph, these were the ones that had made him cherish life, and they were gone.  Why did they keep pushing him to stay when it was so obvious that he wanted nothing more then to be with his family?  He leaned back against the canvas of the tent's wall, then closed his eyes, allowing the sun  to warm his face.  Without conscious thought his mind began to draw him back into his past...back to the times he would never know again.

<Croatian> They stood together framed in the window watching the sun rise...this was their time alone, and he refused to relinquish it to anything.  No matter how brutal the night's shift, no matter how tired he might be he cherished these moments with his wife.  Danijela stood in front of him, her hands resting on his as his arms circled her.  He leaned his head against hers, inhaling the scent of her hair with a contented sigh.  "Luka?"  Danijela brushed her fingers over his as he held her, he was the only man she had ever known, the only man she had ever wanted.  She smiled to herself at the thought, they had a beautiful daughter between them, her smile deepened as the unspoken secret she held surfaced.  "Hmm?"  He nuzzled her neck, planting light kisses as he listened.  He had loved her from the first moment he had seen her and once they were together he had ceased to think of a time he might be without her.  She was his world, the eternal love that he had not believed existed until that moment she had entered his life.  

"Luka, are you listening to me?"  Danijela inwardly smiled as she tilted her neck to his advances and felt his hold on her tighten as his body moved against her in an unspoken invitation.  "The baby."  A blush flooded her cheeks as her nipples stirred in response to her own desire at his attentions.  "Is sleeping...and if we are very quiet..."  He punctuated his words with gentle kisses even as he rubbed himself against her.  "She will stay that way."  His voice had grown quieter as he spoke, deepening with the sensuality of the moment.  "I don't suppose it entered your mind that I might want to talk to you?"  At her question she turned to face him, her dark eyes finding his.  "We could talk after..."  He lowered his lips to hers, savoring the taste of her before he lifted his head and met her gaze again. For a moment she did nothing, then raising up on her toes she returned his kiss before drawing back, her own face reflecting the mixture of emotions passing through her.  

"Luka..."  She hesitated a moment, the smile at her still unspoken news overriding everything else.  "Danijela?"  His face took on a momentary look of confusion before his own smile matched hers.  "What is it?"  His eyes settled on hers as if he thought he could somehow find the answer within them for what she was trying to say.  A beat later he tightened his arms around her, drawing her fully against him.  "Luka," She bit her lip, hesitating for a moment before releasing it to the smile again.  I'm pregnant..."  Her smile broadened, "We're pregnant."  When his jaw dropped open her smile faded, but in that next instant he laughed, then swept her up into his arms, raining kisses on her as he whispered his elation.

"Luka?"  As she reached him Angelique lay a hand on his shoulder, holding the hope that the physical contact would be enough to draw him back from wherever he had retreated to.  He felt the hand and his eyes jerked open, the memory lost so quickly that he gasped in surprise.  "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to startle you."  She watched his face, the unshed tears still visible in his eyes.  "Luka, will you walk with me for a bit, I want to talk to you about something. "  He swallowed, then sniffed before dragging his hand across his face and finally looking back up to her with a silent nod, the loss as painful now as it was when it had happened.

Angelique Forquet did not base her judgments on people from emotions, and the longer she was around the young Croat, the more complex he seemed to become.  As his strength and mobility had increased she had seen him surrendering to the melancholy and she also knew she had to find a way to stop it.  It was easy for her to cure his physical ailes....bones healed...scrapes faded...the emotional wounds went far deeper then any of those.  She had seen the signs so many times, the patients she had lost when they should have lived.  He was showing those signs now, the listlessness, his lack of appetite, his lack of interest in anything around him.  She'd read his file...he had been a husband...a father...a doctor, and she had read what was on his face and knew well enough that in his eyes he believed he was no longer any of those things, it was time to change that if he would let her.... 


to be continued...