Destroy Me (22 page)

She reached for his phone and handed it to him, suddenly concerned that he must be more seriously hurt than they had told her.

She heard him talking to the doctor. “Yes, it’s fine. Please explain to her.”

Her anxiety rocketed again.

“Dr Robertson. Room 624, on the fifth floor. He’s expecting you.”

“Ok.”

She left her case on the floor by his bed.

Coming out of the elevator on the fifth floor, she quickly looked for the room.

Finding it she knocked on the door.

“Come.”

She went inside.

“Dr Robertson?”
“Yes. Tara?”

“Yes.”

“Please take a seat.”
He was grey haired, with a beard and glasses and sharp grey eyes, smartly dressed, sitting behind his desk.

“What’s wrong?”
“Damien has asked me to talk to you. It’s easy to explain; not quite so easy to fix, but he wants to try, and that is the most important part.”
“What do you mean?”

She noticed his name tag. 

“Psych doctor?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not about his injury?”
“Not physical injury, no. Damien started seeing me a couple of weeks ago. He should have come to me a lot sooner ideally, but the good news is he will get better.”
“I don’t understand. What’s wrong with him?”
“Physically nothing, well apart from a gunshot wound! He has something called Survivor’s Guilt; it’s a form of PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress; an extremely common condition for men who have seen some of the things he has. Many military veterans have it; few seek to face it and conquer it, but that’s what Damien has chosen to do. And for that I admire him. Many choose to drown themselves in drink, drugs, or promiscuity to seek a solution. Fortunately he has never succumbed to any of those.”

He paused as she tried to take in what he was telling her.

“He feels guilt at being alive, frankly, when others have perished. Guilt at not being able to save everyone, and that gives him flashbacks, nightmares. It also heightens his worries for people he cares about, and I take it that especially means you, given that he has told me you are to be married. Essentially, he doesn’t think he deserves to be happy, and so he sabotages the good thing in his life to ensure he cannot be happy. He pushes the thing that makes him happy away from him. He realises he’s doing that, but he wants to stop. If he continues to see me, for a very short while, he will stop. Things will get immensely better. He will understand that he does deserve happiness.”

The doctor smiled kindly at her.

“Will he be ok?”

“Yes. Of course. He’s completely fixable.”

“Thank you Doctor, for explaining it to me. I really do appreciate it.”

She rose and left him, knowing he must be a busy man, not wanting to take too much of his time, and wanting to see Damien again now.

She realised she had had no real understanding of the suffering Damien went through at times, no perception about it’s cause, and she felt a deep sense of sorrow for him now, realising how hard it had to be to admit to something like that, and have brave of him to open up about it.

She wandered the corridor slowly as she processed the implications of this. She was glad he had sought the Doctor out. That he wanted to get rid of the pain. That it could be taken away from him. He didn’t deserve it.

She saw a strong ray of hope for them, and the realisation came to her that he did want her; that he could love her.

She made her way back to Damien’s room.

“You spoke to him?”
“Yes. Thank you. I’m sorry Damien. I didn’t know.”

“Come here please. You have absolutely nothing to be sorry about. It’s I who needs to make it up to you. And believe me, I fully intend to.”

He lifted his hand toward her and she took hold of it.

“Tara, I know I’ve been difficult, and I know it won’t always be easy for you, but I’m in love with you, and that’s never going to change. I want you to be my wife. Because I love you. For that reason. And, let me add, I might be in this hospital bed, but I’m warning you, I will hunt you to the ends of the earth if you leave me. I’m never going to let you go. So don’t even think about trying it.”

He was smiling; the look in his eyes both threatening and seductive, and she knew there and then that he would.