I'm Nothing Without You

Cold environment, white and spacious place, machines keep on beeping once in a while, people dressed in strange outfits, different instruments being laid in two different table, a pleasant, slightly sweet odor inside the room from nitrous oxide used as anesthesia every thing seems to be normal for me but it isn’t. Today I’m inside the OR not to do my practice but to accompany my boyfriend –

‘Wait what’s going on?’ I asked loudly as I heard the most unfamiliar sound that I ever heard. One machine was producing that sound and I have a very bad feeling about it.

‘Ma’am you need to leave. The surgeons can handle it from here.’
‘What?! No! I’ m not leaving. I’m staying.’ I said to the nurse stubbornly.

‘I need a defibrillator.’ I heard one of the surgeon said.

One minute I was at his head part, the next thing I know I was at the far corner of the operating room staring ahead at my boyfriend’s motionless body. I saw everything was so surreal looking at him. I remember so well his eyes smiling at me when I threw him my tantrums, how he could make me smile and sigh at the same time with those fathom eyes of his and I remember it well when it was just yesterday that we were planning for our future our future together.

‘Oh my God!’ I said softly to my self not aware of the tears flowing from my eyes. ‘Oh my God Gareth don’t do this to me.’ I covered my mouth with my two hands trying desperately to suppress my sobs. I just stood there, not taking eyes of what was happen around my while still muttering a soft pray. ‘Please Lord don’t. Gareth I’m begging you please don’t die…’ it has been ten minutes since the doctors starts reviving him but still there haven’t had any slight changes in his vital signs.

‘Gareth… please.’ My knee starts to weaken as another minute passes. I already know what happens next but I haven’t had loss hope on him. ‘Don’t die on me Gareth please…’ I said as I totally sitting in the floor crying my heart out still hoping for any changes. ‘Gareth you promise not to leave me! You said you love me! Then prove it to me now! Please don’t die…’

‘Urgh! Aw…That again?’ I sigh and look at my wrist watch it is just one. It’s always been this way ever since that particularly scenario happens three months ago. I stood up from my bed and decided to have a drink. After drinking water I go back to my bed.

‘Gareth…’ I sigh as I noticed my pillows were soaking wet. For these past three months I’ve been crying in my sleep and even after waking up because my dreams are always the same. ‘I helpless… That was entirely my fault! It shouldn’t be him.’ I started crying after that thought. I should be the one who died that day not him. Then again I sigh hoping I could turn back time and save the one I truly love.

That thought made me more uneasy and all the sleepiness inside my system was gone. I decided to go for a walk at the sea to somehow lighten up my load. I bring with me my sketch book and some materials for drawing. It’s my way of expressing my feeling through my works.

After the tragedy, I moved in together with my mom in our bungalow house in the province which is situated near the shore. When Gareth dies I’ve left and forget everything my life in the city and live in a simple bungalow. I also left my job because after what had happen, I didn’t not like being inside the hospital anymore. Everything keeps hunting me when I’m inside.

I go out in our hut and starts walking towards the shore. The environment is clearly illuminated thanks to the moon that is shining wonderfully that midnight. I bitterly smile at my self. ‘At least I found my subject.’ I was looking for a good spot to sketch but my attention was drawn from a figure lying still at the shore and faced flat at the sand.

I run towards the figure I was. Kneeling in the sand I try with all my might to change his prone position into supine. Successful doing that I then check for any obstruction inside his mouth, satisfied I gave him two rescue breaths and watch for the rise and fall of his chest. I then put heel of one hand midway between his nipples and put other hand on top of the first and press down to a depth of 1½ to 2 inches at a rate of a little less than about 2 per second. Then given him two breath followed by thirty compression after doing so I check for his pulse.

‘Crap!’ I said. ‘Don’t die on me man. I’m doing this for you so do you thing…’