Rachel
The entire day had been absolutely exhausting, even before he had been disturbed at work with the troubling news that his wife and a family friend had been attacked, and were now at Mungo’s recovering. He had gotten a late start to his day, his secretary had knocked over a couple of files – it was just one of those days where he knew nothing was going to go according to plan. He just never banked on things getting this bad, which was a mistake on his part. Maybe if he always anticipated the worst, he wouldn’t be so surprised, so hurt when things like this happened.

What kind of miserable existence he would have if he thought like that, though. He’d forever be expecting bad things to happen, and his neuroticism would eventually drive him crazy. He needed to find the middle ground between being consistently paranoid, and being hopeful that the worst was over and done with. It was just so hard to do, when the bar kept being set higher and higher.

He was tired emotionally, physically, mentally, spiritually – however many ways a human being could be exhausted, Donovan was feeling it. He felt hollow, and wasn’t even sure if he’d be able to sleep properly in his own home that night, knowing what had transpired there only hours ago. He wasn’t sure he’d be able to sleep without Danielle laying there beside him, but the healers said they wanted to observe her over night. Maybe that was for the best – at least he knew she was safe there. He’d likely wind up falling asleep in the chair next to her bed, and would wake up with several kinks in his back and neck, but it was the only way he would be able to get any rest at all.

But before he could do that, there was one more thing he needed to do – he needed to see Rachel, the other woman who had been hurt while she was visiting with Danielle, who just so happened to be Gabriel’s wife. He managed to get something of a second wind, gaining enough energy to rise to his feet and approach the nurse’s desk, asking which room she was in. Danielle still wasn’t conscious, but he told the healers to keep him informed if she woke up, so he could be there. Until then, he moved slowly through the hospital corridors until he reached Rachel’s room. A gentle rap was given on the open door, just so she knew someone was in the doorway. He didn’t see Gabriel, from where he was standing, so he had to assume he only had a limited window of opportunity to speak with Rachel while she was alone.

"I'm not disturbing you, am I?"

He barely even recognized his own voice that night. It felt like it took most of his energy, just to produce intelligible words.