It was the next morning when Dr. Nguyen reduced the sedative in Mali's IV so she would wake up. Leilani, her work colleague slash best friend, was sitting beside her bed, waiting in anticipation.
Finally, Mali's eyelids fluttered open and Lei's heart leapt into her throat.
"Mali..." Lei whispered.
Mali groaned and shifted slightly on the bed.
"Hmm... what is it?" she croaked, her voice weak and sore-sounding. She took a good look around, at Dr. Nguyen, then at Lei - her face was taut, and her eyes were red and swollen. She'd been crying.
"Are you- are you okay?" Lei asked, swallowing the lump in her throat.
She struggled to sit up. "I don't think I'd be here if I was."
A ghost of a smile touched Lei's lips as she helped Mali sit up. "You're okay."
"Maliah, do you know why you're here? Do you remember what happened?" enquired Dr. Nguyen.
How could she forget? Everything came back to her like a tidal wave, almost swallowing her whole. But Mali chose to stay afloat, above her surging emotions. She swallowed tightly and shut her eyes.
Lei shifted in her seat. She was honestly a bit shaken by the whole thing, by Mali on a hospital bed. There were a few tremors in her fingers as she reached out to hold Mali's hand.
"Are you sure you're alright?" she asked again.
Mali opened her eyes and shot her a glance. "If you ask me that question again, I'm going to slap your teeth down your throat."
"You have no idea how worried I was," she whispered, clasping onto Mali's hand harder. "Don't ever do that to me again. When I heard you were in, I almost- God, I just about died."
Mali sighed heavily. She knew Lei wasn't lying. The two had been friends since, well, since before they'd been born. Their parents had been best friends too, and had gotten pregnant three months apart. So it's safe to say the two are basically sisters, and Mali knew Lei wouldn't survive if anything happened to her. Mali could count on one hand the number of days they'd been apart in all their three decades together.
"You had a miscarriage, Maliah, you're aware of that, right?" Dr. Nguyen asked gently. When Mali didn't respond, she went on, "And we had to eviscerate your womb."
Mali just looked at the woman like she was speaking in Urdu. Thirty seconds passed, and she still didn't say anything. Forty. Fifty. A minute. And then, "I know."
The doctor gave her a long, pensive look and then scribbled something in her notepad. "I'm going to book you an appointment with our psychiatrist so you can start-"
"I'm fine," she cut her off.
"As your doctor, I strongly suggest-"
"I said I'm fine!" Mali interjected again, more firmly.
Lei exchanged twin expressions of worry with their colleague before looking back at Mali and sighing deeply.
"Mali, I really think you should-"
Mali's head whipped to Lei. "Should I rip out your tongue, Lei? Is that the only way to stop you from talking?"
"If you don't go for a psych assessment, I'm going to call your brothers," Lei told Mali stubbornly.
Mali's eyes narrowed. "I dare you."
Lei dug her phone from her coat.
Mali grabbed her wrist.
"Lei, please," she sighed again, exasperated. "Like I said, I'm fine. I don't need to go for any assessment. I'm really, really fine. Things happen, and we have to accept that they do. Right? It's life."
"Mali, your child is dead," Lei emphasised on each word, trying to drill that information into Mali's thick skull.
"I know that, Lei," said Mali, "I heard what she said."
Lei sighed, rubbing her forehead. She looked up at Dr. Nguyen. "So what do you think caused the miscarriage?"
"If I had to guess, I'd say excessive stress."
"It wasn't stress," said Mali, and the two doctors turned to look at her. She had a fierce look on her face. "It was Peter."
She went on to tell Lei everything that had happened.
"The bastard," Lei muttered. "Are you really okay though?"
The look Mali sent Lei's way could freeze the Sahara.
"Oh, excuse me for being worried about you, miss," Lei spat. "But it's my job to worry. I need to know if you're really okay."
A few moments of silence passed before Mali laid back down on the bed and turned away from the two of them. She didn't want to talk anymore.
"Uhm, Leilani..." Dr. Nguyen whispered, placing a hand on Lei's shoulder. "Can we talk outside for a minute?"
Lei nodded and then rose to her feet. She planted a small kiss on Mali's head and begrudgingly followed Dr. Nguyen outside. At the eve of her departure, Lei looked back at Mali and her eyes welled with tears. She hated seeing her best friend so... vulnerable. So torn. She sighed, and swiped her hand across her face, then straightened.
"What's wrong with her?" Lei asked as soon as she stepped outside the hospital room. "Is that a normal response for women who'd just miscarried?"
Although they were both doctors, Lei knew less about miscarriages and all that. She, herself, was a trauma surgeon.
"You need to make her cry," said the doctor softly.
"What?"
"I can't exactly say she's in denial. Because she knows what happened and as you heard, she accepted it. This reaction... I don't quite understand it myself, I'm no psychiatrist, but I've had a few patients like her. She's... in a state of shock, I think. So you need to make her cry. She needs to feel pain and cry it out, or it will fester."
"But how-"
"You're her best friend, Leilani, only you can do it," said Dr. Nguyen. "I trust you to do it."
"Okay..." She took a deep breath and let it out. "I'll try."
She patted Lei on the shoulder. "Thank you."
Lei saw a man leaning against the wall in her peripheral. So she turned to take a good look at him. "And what's this hot silver fox doing here?"
"Oh, that's the man who brought Maliah in," replied the doctor. "He spent the night here, insisting that we let him know about Maliah's condition, but he's not family, so..." Dr. Nguyen let her sentence linger and shrugged before leaving.
Lei took a few steps towards Ed and stopped in front of him. She looked at him from head to toe as if assessing him.
Ed straightened and looked back at Lei quizzically.
"You are?"
"Ed."
"Edwin? Edward? Edric? Edmond? Give me something."
"It's-"
Lei raised her hand to stop him from talking. "Actually, never mind, I'll just call you Eddie. It's a stupid name, and it doesn't suit you, but you make up for it with your looks."
Ed raised his brow questioningly.
She didn't give him enough time to respond as she barreled on, "Anyway, thank you so much for helping my best friend get here. Even though she still lost her baby- God I'm not supposed to be telling you this. It's against the rules. But anyway, I remain eternally grateful for your help. You can leave now. She's fine."
"I'd still like to see her, please," Ed requested as politely as he could.
"Hoekom?" Lei instinctively asked in afrikaans, her mother tongue. And then immediately corrected herself, "I mean, why?"
"Don't I have the right to see her? I'm the one who brought her in."
"You young people and your rights! Is that all you know? What about the responsibilities that come with those rights? Who will account for them?"
Ed raised a brow because, first of all, he was clearly older than her. And secondly, what?
Ed just had to ask, "Are you a doctor here?"
"No, I'm the pilot," Lei replied sarcastically. "Obviously, I'm a doctor." She added a good amount of 'duh' in her tone.
"Will I be able to see her or not?" Ed asked, getting agitated.
Lei sighed, looking at him quizzically, wondering why he was so concerned about a woman he'd just met. He'd done his part, helped a very beautiful damsel in distress, he should leave, shouldn't he?
"I don't think she's in a state to see anyone right now," she told Ed truthfully. "But if you're so worried, maybe you can come back later."
"Okay, I'll be back later," he spoke, digging a phone in his pocket. He pressed on it as he turned and left without so much as a 'see you later'.
Lei scoffed, staring at him as he walked away. She dug her own from her coat, and dialled Peter's number.
"What is it, Leilani?" Was Peter's form of greeting.
"Mali is in the hospital."
"Yeah, that's where she works," replied Peter, making Lei roll her eyes.
"Yes, but I mean, she's been hospitalised. She suffered a miscarriage."
"What?" Peter screamed through the line, and Lei pulled the phone away from her ear, wincing, and then brought it back to her ear again. "... was pregnant?"
"She didn't tell you?" Lei pretended to sound surprised.
"No, I- I'll be there in half an hour."
Lei could hear shuffling sounds before Peter ended the call. She smiled evilly and scrolled through her contact list, then paused at Mali's twin brother's number. She was setting a trap for Peter; she was going to give the bastard what he deserved - pain.