I open my eyes lazily. But once they catch a sight of the beautiful face of Jennifer in front of them, a tangible smile immediately appears on my face. The smile only grows wider as my left hand strokes some of Jennifer's long hair that reaches it while my left upper arm has voluntarily been her pillow since last night.
To have this moment alone repeated every morning, I feel like I am in Heaven. Not to mention.. I stretch my right arm a little to slowly and gently rubs Jennifer's belly. Yup.. I am indeed in Heaven.
It's been almost a month since the day I decided to give up being an assassin. After some considerations, couple days later I finally moved into Jennifer's apartment. I know that I wasted a lot of money. I just rented new apartment while still having my old apartments, and both were just abandoned. But I didn't want to give Jennifer troublesome to move into my apartment with her condition. Despite, her apartment is slightly bigger and more appropriate to welcome a baby than mine.
The next thing I did after moving in was to give the news to Thief and Andy. I thought I would have hard time telling Thief about my decision since.. well she really adored my job as the better justice system. Turned out, she took it very calm. She said that I've made the right decision, to choose my baby over my job. I was so surprised on how wise she became.
As much surprised as Thief gave me, Andy's reaction was even more bewildered me. He was totally in shock and instantly in fumed. He said I was just being too emotional and couldn't think straight. I convinced him that it was my final decision, and he said I was crazy and hanged up the call.
Only after some long battle of chats in reasoning and convincing each other, he finally gave up with "I hope you won't regret your decision someday" sentence. If only Andy was not my best friend, I would thought he was threatening me. When I asked him "Why would I regret ?", he just replied shortly with a nothing.
Beep-beep-beep
The sound of Jennifer's phone's alarm is pulling back my mind and also opening Jennifer's eyes at once.
"Morning, Beautiful," I greet her without losing my smile.
"Morning, Handsome," she replies me before yawning.
"Sleep well, Baby ?" I ask again.
"Ahem," she nods then turns her body to face me and pecks my lips. "Aaa.. your lips are hot!" she exclaims in shock.
"My lips are always hot for you, Baby.." I tease her.
"No.. I mean hot.. as its temperature," she argues. Quickly, she touches my temple with her palm. "You're having a fever !" She says in worry.
I catch her hand and bring it to my lips. "I'm okay. It's just a slight fever," I try to calm her.
"No! It's not okay !" she says in rebuked. A worry is still vividly appears on her face. "How long have you had it ?"
"Just last night," I finally give up to deceive and tell her the truth.
She abruptly goes off the bed and walks to the bathroom. Less than a minute later she comes back with a thermometer and shove it to my mouth. I obey her without any protest, just act as calm as possible, ignoring all the aching that I have always felt.
"O my God !! 101 ?!?!" Jennifer shouts in shock. I close my eyes and tries to deafening my ears to reduce my headache due to her sudden loud voice. I can't imagine how loud her scream was if I told her that the temperature is actually slightly lower than before I took some medicines few hours ago.
"Babe.."
"We need to go to E.R now !!" she insists.
"No, Baby.."
"We must !!"
"No, Baby.. it is no use .."
"You would not no that !! We must try everything !!"
"What should I tell them ?!! That my body sabotage me ?!?!"
"I don't care !! I don't want to lose you, Damn it !!" she yells in high pitch before bursts in cry. I reach her into my embrace as quick as I can. As her tears start dampen my chest, I kiss her head and rubbing her back.
"You won't lose me, okay.. I promise you," I whisper to her.
"Then fight for it," she says.
"I am, Baby.. I am fighting it.."
"Maybe,, maybe the doctors in hospital can help you.. you can not fight it alone.." she says in between her sobs.
"I have my help. Han has been helping me to medicate, that's why I have still been able to sleep despite all the torture. And you.. you are my greatest helper. You are my strength.."
"But that's not enough, isn't it ?" She asks, suddenly letting her head apart from my embrace. Still with teary eyes, she begs me, "Please, Baby.. please go to hospital. For me .. please ??"
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I stare blankly as a nurse takes away a thermometer from my armpit. After some serious pleading by Jennifer, I finally gave in. Now I know what people said: Even powerful men would be obedient dogs in front of their wives. I would stand arguing with Jennifer all day long. But once she pleads with her teary eyes and sobs, my heart just can't bear it.
"A hundred," the nurse says in solemn. Jennifer sighs then looks at me in worry. I rub her hand gently to calm her down.
"It's okay," I tell her without a voice. She squints her eyes as a disapproval. Before she can rebukes me, the doctor that has taken care of me since my arrival comes into my unit.
"This is the final dose of injection I can give to him," he says.
"Is there nothing else you can do, Doc ?" Jennifer asks even before the doctor can close his mouth.
"We need to wait for his result before we can do anything, Ma'am," the doctor says in a calm tone. After saying it, he injects the syringe into my vessel. It is the third injection I have received today.
"How many more hours until we can know the result ?" Jennifer asks.
The doctor glances at his watch. "Maybe after 1 PM," he says. Jennifer sighs again, this time is trying to reduce her irritation.
"Relax, Baby.." I whisper to her. She replies me with a sharp dagger look that makes me only able to smile wryly.
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When my result is out, frowns on the doctor's forehead appear deeper. As I expected, nothing is wrong with my health. Everything is normal, in fact I am healthier than a healthy person. This pain is just created by my body to remonstrate my decision.
Ever since my decision, my body has been continually creating hell by making pain after pain. At first there were those stiff muscles and skin pricks I have been familiar with. When I totally disregard them, the squeezing pains and nausea were added. That was when I came to Master Long for help. But he is still in Mainland up until today. So Han teaches me a meditation technique to distract the pain out of my mind. It helps a lot. It even helps to reduce the over-sensitive senses of noise, light, and taste that all a sudden I have. These make me having headache all the time.
"There is some trouble in the office. I have to go, Babe," Jennifer says in a great reluctancy.
"Hey, that's okay, Babe. Don't worry about me. I have a bunch of paramedics that take care of me here, right ?" I reply to her in light.
Despite of my good result, both Jennifer and the doctor insist me to stay in the hospital for further observation. Although I can ignore the doctor's order, how on earth I can argue with Jennifer's plead ?
"You on the other hand," I continue then kiss her hand, "You must take care of your own health. Don't forget that you are carrying our beloved."
Jennifer smiles and pats my hand with her other hand. "Of course."
"You better rest at home after office. No need to go back here. Or else.." Jennifer wants to rebuts but I quickly continue whispering, "I will go back home with you and punish you to scream in climaxes all night long."
"You.." she squints her eyes in disbelief with a red face, "How can you still have a pervert thought in this condition ?" she hisses in shame while smacking my hand.
I laugh heartily. To be honest, it's been a while. The hell created by my body makes me also unable to perform well. Fortunately, Jennifer never complains about it. I will make it up to you, Babe, I promise to her inwardly.
After Jennifer is gone, I finally close my eyes. Actually they are very hard to open since my body heat seems to be outburst from them. I was not trying to be tough, but having her around is really giving me strength thus make an ease of whatever is going on in me.
I feel the heat is increasing. It is like there is a hot air blower in front of my face. I decide to meditate, hoping it may reduce this agony. I start doing mindful breathing for over five minutes just being aware of how the air come in and out of my body. I try to ignore the hot breath that comes out of my mouth. A cold sweat drops from my temple as my head becomes heavier. as I force it to concentrate on my meditation.
A long vibrate comes from my phone beside me. I try to ignore it, but the one on the other line is very persistent. I finally open my eyes and sighing before receiving the call.
"Mr. Bennet.."
"Yes, Han.." His number is unknown but I recall his voice.
"Master has come. He tells you to come to the temple right away," Han says.
"I can't.. I'm at the hospital now," I tell him.
"That's exactly why he insists you to come immediately."
"I will find a way.:
"You must.. now"
I just say a short okay then hang up the call. Though my headache is getting worse, my spirit lifts up. Finally.. Master Long is here now. I've been waiting anxiously for his arrival. Han tried to contact him the first day I came to the temple, but he was just unreachable. Only sometimes later after today I will be informed that Master Long was in a very important mission in Mainland and he immediately came back here once he finished the mission since he could sense something was wrong here.
Defying my body's urge to lay down and rest, I force my self to get up and get dress. My instinct tell me that I must obey Master Long's order. He seems to know what is wrong with me.
Beside, being held in this hospital won't make me any better. The doctor hasn't come to see me again after made me went all through procedures, including MRI, and the nurses only comes once every three hours to inject me with another dose of febrifuge.
Once finish putting my clothes on, I open my room door. I am lucky. It looks like something has happened in the E.R room, all paramedics are running toward that section, leaving their posts.
Holding on to the wall beside me, I walk as fast as I can. My head is spinning, thus I can not see straight. Only half of the way, my back is already dampen with cold sweat.
I might decide to just give up and got back to my room if I didn't feel something popping inside my stomach. It is literally popping, like a small ballon being pricked. Less than a second later, I can feel something is oozing out from it. I don't know what it is. Is it possible that my internal organ was exploded ? But I didn't feel any pain. Exploded organ must create pain, right ?
I feel terrible nausea, but I keep it in and keep on walking. My feet are trembling as they don't have strength to bear my body. This condition makes me even determinate to see Master Long. Something is definitely wrong with my body, but modern medical treatment can not help it.
So, I push my final energy to make my feet walk out of the hospital. Fortunately, there is a taxi just dropped of its passenger. I hourly slip my body in and close the taxi's door. Ignoring the angry yell of a man who was supposed to ride this taxi.
"Dragon temple, please. Hurry," I ask the driver, barely have the energy to mouth it out.
"Are you okay, man ?" the driver asks. Not receiving any answer from me, he knows the answer is no. so he drives his taxi in full speed, leaving me jolt and bump in the back seat.
After having enough energy, I open my eyes and my sight is caught on to my hands. Even with a very blurry sight, I can clearly see something is wrong with my hands. The tips of my fingers change color. They are no longer pale, but bluish black.
My body jolts when the taxi runs through a speed bump. It causes me an instant vomit. My eyes bulge in terror to see my now stained clothes. IIt is not yellow, nor white. It is not even red as indication of blood. My vomit is.. black!