With shaky hands, Rainbow secured all the locks on the door.
This was it. It was time to make a move.
She tried not to think about the few good things in life she would miss. Tried not to think of her family or of Nadja. She was determined to focus on her reasons for doing what she was about to do and not let anything stop her.
She read over the note she would leave on the table one more time to make sure there were no last-minute changes she wanted to make to it. Once she was satisfied with what she’d written she got up and took a bottle of pills from her suitcase. Then she filled her wine glass. Before she could lose her nerve, she swallowed as many pills as fast as she could until they were gone. Next, she kicked off her shoes and then made herself comfortable on the bed.
Her heartbeat raced nervously. As ready as she was to die she was still afraid. She silently prayed that she would go fast and soon be reunited with her Carlos. She may have been attracted to Nadja and even liked many things about her but no one could replace Carlos.
Every minute that passed by seemed like an eternity. Eventually, an intense drowsiness began to overtake her. She felt heavy, almost as if she was being pushed down into the mattress by an unseen force. The sound of the fan in the room’s heating and cooling system seemed to fade while the sound of her heartbeat and the air moving in and out of her lungs seemed amplified.
Time had slowed to a crawl as she willed herself to hurry up and be dead. Why did it have to take so long to die? She just wanted to be dead and gone from such a cruel, unfair world of which she no longer wanted to be a part of.
Finally, she felt herself slipping… deeper… deeper… and deeper down into a blissful oblivion. Never again would she have to miss her Carlos. Gone were the money worries, the day-to-day stressors, the hopelessly lost dreams…
A fierce pounding.
She continued sinking… sinking…
Someone shouting.
Still sinking…
Pounding, hammering, shouting… and then a blur of frenzied motion and voices she couldn’t have made out even if they were in her native tongue for everything looked and sounded so garbled and distorted.
No! Don’t let them save me, she cried out in her barely conscious mind.
People were grabbing and prodding at her.
No!
For once something was on her side for she slipped deeper still into a well of black nothingness until all awareness ceased to exist.
The sound of a male voice calling her name made Nadja glance up. Her eyes were still red from crying. She rose from her seat in the waiting room and hurried to the doctor who came toward her. “Is she going to be alright?” she asked in German.
“It’s too soon to say for sure,” the doctor answered, also in German.
Nadja gave the tall, wiry man a quick once-over. Doctor William O. Brandt, said his name tag. “She’s still in a coma?”
“Yes, I’m afraid so. And we can’t yet say if she’ll wake up or recover if she does. Can you tell me more about what happened?”
Nadja nervously ran a hand through her dark locks. “She was supposed to be visiting friends and family and then was going to return home to the United States to live with a friend. She recently lost her husband and their home to an earthquake in California.”
The doctor nodded dubiously. “I heard about the earthquake in California. But she obviously had something else planned.”
“I should have known,” Nadja said, tears threatening to spill forth. “I kept having this bad feeling.”
The doctor smiled slightly. “If you had acted just five or ten minutes later than you did she would be gone for sure.”
“Really? It was that close?”
The doctor nodded. “But you acted upon instinct.”
“I guess I did. I have a friend who works at the hotel, Molly, and I urged her to talk the receptionist into looking up her room number even though it’s against policy. Then Molly and I ran up to her room and knocked on the door but we got no answer. Molly said she probably left already, but my gut feeling said she was still in the room. I then had Molly, who has a master key, try to open the door. When the inner lock prevented the door from opening, there was no doubt at that point that something was terribly wrong. That’s when we called for help.”
“Well, you did the best you could do under the circumstances. Without you, she wouldn’t have had a chance. Now all we can do is hope for the best from here on out.”
“But is there any hope?” Nadja asked, wiping an eye with her hand.
The doctor shrugged. “Time will tell.”
“How much time?”
“I wish I could tell you that, but I simply can’t. She might never wake up, or she may wake up today, in weeks, in months… we just can’t know that yet. Our hands are also somewhat tied with an uninsured person from another country.”
“If there’s anything I can do, anything at all. Just ask. My family and I will do whatever we can to help.”
“That’s good to know that she has someone like you,” the doctor said with a smile. “What about family back home?”
“All she left in the note was a number for her sister. I was going to call her after I spoke to you.”
“It may help us out quite a bit if the sister or anyone else can make us aware of any physical conditions or allergies she may have.”
“I’ll find out what I can. The only thing I suspect is that she may be hard of hearing.”
The doctor nodded. “I’ll be sure to give you a call if anything changes.”
“Thank you, I really appreciate it,” Nadja said. “No matter what time it may be.”
The doctor gave Nadja his card and then she hurried off. She glanced at her watch on the way down the hospital’s long corridor. It was early morning in the eastern part of the U.S. She would have waited a few more hours if it weren’t for the need to know if there was anything important the doctor should know about the beautiful lady who believed she had no reason to live.
Back at her apartment just minutes later, Nadja dialed the number on Rainbow’s note.
“Hello,” said a sleepy voice.
Nadja introduced herself and explained the situation to Rainbow’s sister Kelisha.
“Oh, jeez,” Kelisha said with devastation. “I am so, so sorry. And the doctors have no prognosis as of yet?”
“No, I’m afraid not. They can’t say if she’ll wake up or what her condition will be like if she does. They can’t even say if she’ll live or much of anything at all at this time.”
“Oh, my God. This is just terrible! I’m so sorry you have to be the one to deal with this, though I’m very grateful to you at the same time for doing all you can to save her.”
“It’s no problem and I’ll continue to do my best. I’m just sorry I couldn’t have intervened sooner,” Nadja assured her.
“I could tell she was depressed and all that when she was here visiting the family, and I expected that much after all she’d been through. But I had no idea she would go to such extremes. I wish I’d seen it coming, but again I thank you for your help. I just don’t understand how you met her. Was it online?”
“Yes. We met online on a language learning site.”
“I see.”
“Kelisha, I’m glad to be of any help I can possibly be, but what could really help the doctors is to know if she’s allergic to any medications or has any known medical conditions you could tell me about.”
“No, no real conditions. At least not of a serious nature. But she does have ADHD and is two-thirds deaf.”
“I thought I noticed a hearing deficit.”
“What I don’t understand is why she picked Germany of all places to end it all. I know she was studying languages, German being one of them, but why you?”
“I’m not sure,” Nadja said, unsure if she should say anything more as to her hunches.
“Let me ask you this,” said Kelisha. “I’m aware of my sister’s sexuality. I know she’s bisexual and I’m a pretty open-minded person, so tell me, Nadja, do you think she might have a fondness for you?”
“She has admitted to being attracted to me, and I too, am very open and accepting so it never bothered me. It was actually quite a compliment to be told at my age that I’m so good-looking, especially by someone who’s quite lovely herself. I’m just really worried about her and if she may be dangerous.”
“Me too, though I can assure you she’s of no danger to others.”
“Oh, that’s not what I meant. I’m sorry if I implied that she would harm others. My English is not perfect,” Nadja said, feeling foolish.
“That’s quite alright. It’s her that’s in danger of herself and she’s obviously been pushed over the edge by the devastating events in California and the loss she experienced with both her husband and her home.”
“I just wish I’d acted sooner. I kept having this nagging feeling that something was wrong. I feel so terrible – even guilty – that I didn’t act sooner. I might have been able to stop her.”
“Oh, please don’t blame yourself, Nadja. As it is she would have absolutely no chance at all of survival had you not acted at all. And if it wasn’t in Germany, it would have been somewhere else if she was that determined to try to take her life.”
They talked some more about the events that led up to Rainbow’s attempt to kill herself, and whether or not Kelisha should fly to Germany at that time. However, it was decided that there was nothing Kelisha could do until there was any change in Rainbow’s condition be it for the better or the worse. They prepared to hang up on a sad but hopeful note and agreed to keep in touch on Facebook to save on the costs of overseas calls.
“So you say your name is Nadja Keller, is that correct?”
“Yes,” answered Nadja.
“I do believe I’ve seen that name on my little sister’s friend list.”
“And I think I recognize yours as well,” said Nadja, promising to keep in touch regularly.
After Nadja turned her phone off, she lay on her bed and fell into a deep sleep that was haunted by images of Rainbow. Rainbow seemed to be calling out to her for help from under water. Nadja reached out for her, desperately trying to grab hold of her and bring her to safety. But with every attempt she made the girl sunk further and further away and was eventually forever lost from her rescuing grip.
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