Chapter 123: (Hundred) Twenty Two: Paralyzed

Time crawled. Seconds felt like hours. Hours felt like an eternity, driving Becca crazy. The whole thing drove her nuts.

She sat next to Leo on the bed, staring at his beautiful face while he slept. She had lost count of the number of times she had traced her finger through his face— his jaw. The sensation she got whenever his soft breaths kissed her skin was one of the things that anchored her sanity. He was breathing. After almost having Leo snatched away from her by the clutches of death, his warm breaths seemingly became more precious. He was out of the coma but was still under the influence of medications.

The longer she kept him company, the more she reminisced about the doctor's words. It had been two whole days since Leo's strange outburst and Becca had been left quite… disturbed. First, he comes bleeding, his blood sopping the floor of their home, and now… Now she finds out that he might have been traumatized as a child.

Becca wiped her eyes with the back of her hand, a weird combination of fatigue and restlessness engulfing her. Aside from her, some of Leo's bodyguards did come to visit, Martino came almost every day, and it led her to wonder if Leo had any family at all since none ever visited. Though Martino did say he made sure to keep the news of Leo's hospitalization on the low, for safety and security purposes but it has been a week already. Shouldn't his family— if he even had any— know about his condition by now? 

Johnny didn't visit as well— probably wasn't informed intentionally. It was a good thing though, if he had come and seen Becca next to Leo like that, then things would have gotten really weird. An awkward situation was the last thing Becca wanted at that moment.

Becca's rioting thoughts were pulverized by the sight of Leo's lashes flickering violently again as he grimaced. He had done it a couple of times in the past week but the doctor said that it wasn't a big deal because Leo was most likely just dreaming. Coma dreams were what he called them.

According to him, patients in a coma appear unconscious. They do not respond to touch, sound or pain, and cannot be awakened. Their brains often show no signs of the normal sleep-wakefulness cycle, which means they are unlikely to be dreaming. Yet many people who have recovered from comas report dreams into which something of the outside world penetrated. Others recall nightmares that seemed to go on and on. 

And with what happened after Leo woke up the first time, Becca feared what his subconscious was conjuring up this time. His face soon relaxed and slowly, he opened his eyes, squinting at the room.

Becca watched him as he stared blankly at the wall and fear churned her insides. He did the same thing the last time.

" Leo?" She called out softly. " It's me. Becca. The woman you love torturing in bed." 

She did some research on comas to educate herself more on what Leo was going through so she could be of help but the things she saw in the article she read, quickened the rate of her pulse. It scared the shit out of her. 

Apparently, people who have been in a coma for a long period of time stand the risk of waking up with damage to their brains and would most likely develop disabilities. But then again, Leo had been in a coma for barely a week, he can't possibly have brain damage. A week isn't a long time, right? 

Leo will recover well, right?

Becca's mind spun in circles." Leo, what do you see?"

It was more like who than what. 

Leo didn't respond. He just kept staring and Becca blew out a sigh. 

" Babe, there's nothing there." Becca gave him a reassuring rub to the shoulder.

" There is. You just can't see it."

" I wish I could though."

Just then, Leo slowly turned his head to look at Becca as she remained beside him, his face still devoid of any form of emotion.

" No, you don't. No one would want to see what I see."

" Share them with me." She kissed his forehead. " I'm sure that half of the dreams are just ways of your subconscious playing tricks on you." 

" They weren't tricks." He paused for a while. " More like memories."

Becca's heart squeezed with worry but she tried her best to stay calm. Leo was slowly opening up and showing how shaken his words made her would only make him hesitate.

" Memories?"

Leo's eyes flickered with something. Sadness, the only emotion he had managed to show since he woke up.

" My worst ones. All my dreams did was take all the horrible things I want to forget— my fears— and slumped them on a large tray for me to feast on. I felt so… trapped."

" That must have been scary." 

" It was," Leo said and looked at his body. He knew he was most likely in a hospital, the irritating beeping sound next to him made that clear. It mocked him. Then his gaze landed on the tubes connected to his body. The IV drip tube, the oxygen tube, everything. They reminded him of the chains of bondage from his nightmares. The chains the monster used to bind him in the past. That was what he saw the tubes as.

His eyes hardened as he stared at the one on the back of his hand before tugging at it. To break free. The action alone took Becca by surprise, terrified her. She immediately held his hands to stop him but not before pushing the button next to Leo's bed that alerts the doctor in emergencies.

" Leo, please stop. They are for your own good." 

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" That monster never gave me anything good." He argued. " They are chains."

Becca didn't even have the time to be dumbfounded by his words. He was surely going to hurt himself if she didn't stop him from tugging at the tubes.

" Babe, listen to me. Relax. They are not chains. They are hospital tubes." 

Leo veered to her, his gaze holding skepticism. " They bind me."

The pain in his voice squeezed Becca's heart even more. 

" They kept you alive." She wrapped her hands around his shoulders, embracing him. " They sustained you. I wouldn't know what to do if they hadn't."

Taken aback by the sudden hug, Leo slacked his grip on the tube he was tugging at.

Still holding him, Becca made sure to keep her arms loose around him and also put her weight on the bed and not on him so she wouldn't put pressure on his wound since it wasn't healed yet.

The door to the room opened and Becca gently eased away from him on seeing the nurse and doctor. They ran some more tests on him. Luckily, the bullet didn't rupture any vital organ so he would only have to stay in the intensive care for a couple more days before being transferred to the recovery room. They said he could even be taken home if he could be provided with sufficient care over there. In the end, Leo voted to be taken home after a few days.

The only glaring problem here occurred after the doctor examined Leo's legs. He wouldn't be able to use them for the time being. Due to the position the bullet penetrated his abdomen— just right above the pelvis— he was temporarily paralyzed from his hip downwards and would have to be confined to a wheelchair till he fully recovers. He was lucky though. If he had been shot anywhere closer to his pelvis, he would have kissed his ability to sit goodbye as well. He was also prescribed therapy for his ICU psychosis.

Leo squinted harder at every word that left the doctor's mouth.

Therapy. Paralyzed. Wheelchair. The only things he managed to piece together from all this. He got hit at the wrong place, half his body was now paralyzed and he would have to be stuck on a wheelchair— another form of bondage. 

Then there was the therapy. Long aggravating talks and exercises that always left him itching to kill even more. All to help his problem. His Psychosis; His mental illness. His stigma. Becca knew about it now and it wouldn't be long before she found out about everything else.

Once the doctors left, Leo turned to look at Becca and his eyes softened when he saw the worried— confused— look in hers.

" You look worried."

" I'm worried."

" Why? Is it about my legs?"

Tears glistened in Becca's eyes but she quickly wiped them away so he wouldn't see. It didn't work though, he still saw them.

" Yes and many other reasons that you don't seem to be worried about."

" Me being worried would only make you worry even more and we both know you worry too much." 

" You know how worried I get about things but you still go ahead and get yourself shot. Why?" 

Long story actually, Leo just didn't know how to start. He couldn't keep things from her any longer like this. Not when her family could just come and tell her so she would turn against him. 

" The question shouldn't be why but how, my love." 

Her forehand crumpled with confusion. " What do you mean?"

Leo paused, hesitant to go on and Becca's hand wrapped around his, giving him a gentle squeeze.

" Talk to me."

Leo stared straight into her eyes, his lips parted to speak. To confess but then there was a knock on the door, dispelling the dense fog of anticipation in the room.

The knock on the door sounded once more and the person on the other side let himself in.

Martino stepped into the room. He greeted Becca with a smile and she responded with a nod, unable to smile back. The pain in her chest made smiling almost impossible. Martino didn't mind it though, with all that happened in the past week, Becca had the right to be in a bad mood. He then turned his attention to his boss— the person he was here for— and walked towards the bed to whisper something to him.

" Boss, we have a problem."

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