Carter slammed her fist into the heavy wooden door of Melissa's hospital room. It had been half an hour since the nurses ran inside in a hurry. Soon after they left, giving Carter and Abbie dirty looks on the way out.
She punched the door again and one last nurse came out of the room, closing the door behind her before Carter had the chance to run inside. "What's going on?" Carter demanded, eyeing the nurse like prey.
"I'm sorry but you can't go in there."
"Huh?"
The nurse blinked for an extensive amount of time and finally opened her eyes and sighed. "I have orders from her doctor to keep you out. This means you, and all of your friends can't visit."
Carter jammed the pals of her hands into her hips. "Why the hell not?! I'm your sister!"
"It appears that you and your friend," She added with a quick glare in Abbie's direction, "may have caused your sister to overwork her lungs."
"Overwork her lungs?" Carter chuckled. "Dude, never try out for a spot on E.R. cause you don't have that doctor lingo quite down."
"I was trying to say in the simplist terms possible, that your sister's other lung is very close to collapsing the same way the first one did . If it does, she's in trouble."
Carter stared for almost a full minute before shouting. "Are you telling me she's going to die? Because so help me God if you are you better let me in there to be with her or I'll have to take you down right here right now."
The nurse backed up slightly and pushed her huge brown framed glasses back up the bridge of her nose. "Your sister won't die as long as you give her peace and quiet. She needs rest."
"So if nobody is in there, how will you know if something happens to her?"
"If anything happens, the machines will let us know."
Abbie laughed at that and Carter glared. Everybody who knew Melissa knew that she didn't exactly get along with machines. "My sister hates machines and they hate her. She has a vcr at home that eats the tapes and shoots them back out at her forehead. She's had a dvd player for 2 years and hasn't figured out how to work it. And it took her 3 years to figure out how to work her digital camera and by that time it was so outdated that it didn't work with my computer." She took a deep breath. "And you expect me to trust a machine? She's probably silently wigging out in there anyway because of your freaking machines."
The nurse sighed. "The doctor's order still stays. You aren't allowed in. And if we catch you going in there, we will remove you from the hospital." She turned on her sneaker covered heel and headed back to the nurse's station.
Carter let out a loud, yet muffled, growl and turned to Abbie. "You know I'm going in there right?"
Abbie nodded.
"So if you want to leave you can. I don't want you getting in trouble with me."
Abbie shook her head. "No, if you're going down, I'm going with her. I want to be with Mel in there."
Carter grinned. "This could be fun."
"You're going to make me dress up in a janitor's outfit and crawl through the ventilation system aren't you?"
"That only works on Friends and cartoons and contrary to popular belief, I'm not a cartoon."
"So what's the plan?"
"You're going to hoist me up and throw me through the window from outside."
Abbie sighed, "Not a cartoon, eh? Wasn't it you that stepped on the rake that one time?"
Carter shushed her and led the way outside. "It should be easy. We're on the first floor."
"Don't say it's going to be easy. Mel's told me many times about how your schemes were going to be easy. It usually ends up with a dresser through a wall."
"That... was not my fault."
Abbie laughed and looked up at Melissa's window from outside. They were standing in a small garden of wildflowers. She felt bad for a minute about walking on them but that went away as soon as she remembered why they were there. "Ok, it looks a little high for being on the first floor. Are you sure this is her window?"
Carter nodded. "Yeah, I can see the massive amount of flower's Isaac sent."
"Alright then, how are we doing this?"
Carter thought for a moment and ran her hand across the small gap between a few bricks, a quarter of the way to the window. "Ok, I'm going to stand on this and then you're going to lift me up and throw me to the window. Then, I'll open it and you can shove me in."
"Then what about me?"
"I'll reach down and pull you up. I'm freakishly strong for a girl and you weigh about four pounds so that should be easy enough." She placed the tip of toes into the brick and pulled herself up. "Ok, now grab my ass and throw me up."
Abbie laughed loudly. "Damn it's been a while since anybody has said that to me." She hesitated before placing her hands gently on Carter's butt. "Ok so... this is weird. Just don't make me laugh or I'll drop you." She pushed as hard as she could and Carter jumped upward and grabbed the windowsill.
She pushed the window open and peered inside, Melissa seemed to be away but she was looking in the opposite direction. "Meli..." Carter whispered.
Melissa turned toward her and smiled. "I was right... five whole minutes before you defied the orders of the doctor. I'm proud." She laughed lightly and then coughed. After coughing, she winced and placed a hang on her chest. "Ok this sucks."
Carter pulled herself inside and within another minute, she had Abbie inside as well. Carter sat in the chair next to her sister and frowned. "Did I really almost break you?"
"No. I think I just got worried that you were going to kill Abbie and then I couldn't breathe. Are you guys ok now?"
Abbie nodded. "We're fine. Carter just needed to take anger out on something and I happened to be the first to walk into the room." She gave Carter a quick smile and sat down on the floor next to Carter's chair.
Melissa smiled again. "Hey, Car, could you by any chance get Katie in here?"
"Katie?" Carter blinked hard. "Why?"
"It's obvious that she knew ahead of time what was going to happen. Or at least, she knew it had happened, the very minute it happened. But... I want to talk to her."
"Why?" Carter repeated.
"I just," She paused, "I need to know."
"Know what?"
"Guys, what if I don't get better? What if nothing heals and ...
Carter and Abbie both interrupted her with a wave of their hands. Carter shook her head. "You're going to get better. And I know you guys think that Katie is this amazing psychic but she can't just turn those things on when she wants. And even if she could, I wouldn't want to know anyway."
"I want to know." Melissa whispered.
"No, you don't. And even if you did, Katie's been laying low ever since the accident. I think it's hard for her to face what she saw. You know?"
Melissa nodded. "I guess, yeah, I don't want to stress her out or make her feel bad or anything. I'd still like to see her though, just to see her. And Diana and Walker. And Todd. And..."
Carter stood up with tears in her eyes. "Dammit Meli! Please! Don't sit there and make a list of people you want to see. It makes me think you're getting rid of unfinished business before you..." She blinked away tears. "I'm sorry."
They all stayed silent for a while before Melissa finally spoke. "Why are you sorry? You just spoke your mind."
"I'm just scared. I didn't want you to know I was scared because I thought it might stress you out. But I'm really scared. If I lose you...I just..."
"It's ok." Melissa coughed again. "I'm scared to. But I promise you... I won't leave you. I won't."
Carter squeezed away more tears and bent down to hug her sister. "You better not."
Abbie stood up all of a sudden with a panicked look in her eyes. "Guys, I don't mean to be a pain in the ass but I think I just heard somebody page the doctor to Mel's room."
Carter jumped up and kissed her sister's forehead quickly. "Ok so we better go before they never let us in here again."
Melissa laughed. "Run!"
Carter and Abbie quickly jumped out of the window and pulled it closed behind them. Within minutes, the doctor was back. "Sooo," he glanced at the window with a confused look and then turned back to Melissa. "Feeling any better?"
Melissa beamed and gave him a genuine smile. "Much better. Thanks."
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