A Fire That Burns (23 page)

Chapter Forty-One

AUSTIN’S
head swirled with
the new drugs and she didn’t know if this was an apparition, or a bad dream,
but with Natasha now standing at the end of the bed, she was hoping to snap
back to reality as soon as possible. She had awoken to her bed shaking, and it
did nothing for her uneasy head, and as her senses slowly floated back together,
she realized that Natasha’s domineering figure at the foot of her bed was more
than real. God, she was so much like her mother with her general persona.

 
Great! Just fucking great!
Austin’s thoughts
manifested as she tried to grapple at reality.

“Want some help waking up?” Natasha asked casually and grabbed the cup
of water and threw it over Austin. “Try that.”

Trying to respond, Austin spluttered and pushed
herself
up shakily as the water ran from her face. She was soaked and the assault did
nothing to make her feel better. At that moment, Austin would do anything to
sink back to sleep and get away from this, but alas; she knew that wasn’t going
to be a wish she could have granted. The devil wasn’t that kind.

Helplessly, Austin looked around the room as though trying to work out
where everyone gone, and then she remembered – everyone had decided to give her
some peace for an hour or so when she finally began to fall asleep. It was more
a ploy to get Tyler to eat something proper.

“I waited for them all to leave,” Natasha commented as she observed
Austin’s
behavior
. “I thought this was more a thing
for just us two. No interruptions.”

“Why are you here?” Austin asked helplessly, and hated
herself
for sounding so pathetic. Why couldn’t this bitch
fight arrive when Austin was up to it and not riddled with infection?

“It was all about you, that is why I’m here!” Natasha started, her tone
still irritated and incensed to the extreme. She couldn’t withhold her final
outrage that, once again, Austin had ruined her life in some way or another.
“For six fucking years, I had to listen to him
whine
and
moan
about how he wished you were there. Even when I got him to propose it wasn’t
enough. He still pined over you, and you were the one that upped and left him.”
Natasha let out a loud, infuriated growl, “You come back and get the fucking
good life! After six years, you come back, and have it all handed back to you
on a silver fucking platter!”

“Yeah,” Austin responded with exhausted sarcasm, “This is the good life.”
Slumping back down, Austin didn’t admit defeat; she just didn’t want to lock
horns with this bitch. What was the point?

“He still loves you!” was all Natasha seemed to be able to finalize it
as, “Doesn’t matter what Aussie does, because good ole Tyler will forever love
her and save her.”

“What did I ever do to you to get this treatment?” Austin asked as she
tried to ignore her rant. After twenty-five years, Austin wanted answers as to
why she always had to bear the brunt of Natasha’s jealousy. “All I ever tried
to do was be your friend!” Austin cried out at Natasha, “But you always made me
feel like the third wheel with your flirting with Tyler. He wasn’t even
interested in you, but you were just so persistent.”

“You felt like the third wheel? You were the one loving on Tyler and I
just sat there and took it! I thought that if I could, I would manage to win
him over, but then he proposed to you and you got pregnant and everything
seemed to just get serious and I felt like I had finally lost! Then I got my opportunity.”

“And look where it’s got you now,” Austin responded exasperated. “A jail
sentence, a guilty conscience and a whole lot of hate later and you’re still no
better off.” Austin inspected Natasha and saw a lonely, hateful woman and she
felt bad for her. “How can you be happy with that?
With all
of this?”

“Believe me, Austin; I am so pleased to know that you’ll be forever
scarred from that piece of trash house burning down. I am so glad I ended that
for you too. However, if only it had killed you then we wouldn’t be in this
mess!” Natasha shouted at her and then paused for a second, a sly grin lacing
itself onto her lips. “Well, let me see, that miscarriage really did kill you
first didn’t it?”

Austin felt like her heart was caught in an icy grip at that comment and
feeling as ill as she was, she didn’t withhold from letting herself cry out at
that. She had felt a part of her die that night when she had started to bleed,
her stomach had cramped, and crippled her body with so much pain that she knew,
before she even made it to the hospital with Tom, that she had lost that baby.
She didn’t need to be reminded of how dead she felt inside to know that Tyler
never knew he was going to be a father because the moment of glory was stolen
so quickly from them. She still felt numb as a result, a part of her would
always remain that way, and she accepted that. She never expected to have it
thrown at her in such a way her heart immediately iced over.

“You do not know how happy I was to see the back of you six years ago,”
Natasha gloated with a self-righteous smirk.

“Not half as happy I was to arrest your sorry ass the other day,” Tyler
scolded from behind her as he stood in the doorway, his posture stiff, his
hands clenched by his side.
“I really can’t fucking
believe I thought you ever loved me! Fuck! I can’t believe
I
ever loved
you! All this time you were just biding time and taking pride in the fact that
you ruined someone’s life; someone that happened to mean the world to me!”
Tyler laughed in disbelief at what he had just watched, “If anyone was the
coward around here it was you!”

“But I loved you enough to stick by you!” Natasha shouted back at Tyler,
fearing she was left with nothing left to lose. “I loved you enough to stay
here even when she left! It might have been my fault, but that didn’t matter,
Tyler. I was a constant when she just left!”

“Just get her out of my face,” Tyler spat as the hospital’s security
finally made it up there. He had stood there long enough watching Austin and
Natasha to know that he wanted Natasha to divulge the truth to everyone after
six years of baited silence, and then he wanted her arrested again for assault.

Tyler left the room as Jane went to tend to her daughter. He smacked the
wall with a fisted hand before releasing it and running it over his head as he
tried his hardest to control his breathing. He was through with this life,
through with trying to make it all right, and he was through with letting
Natasha cause more upset than possibly perceivable. He had lost out in this and
he had no way to make it right. He felt like he would never make it right and
he knew that Austin deserved that.

He had rounded everyone up, thinking that Austin would appreciate a
little gathering to lift her spirits. However, now everyone had just found out
how big of a fool Tyler Armstrong really was, and for that, Tyler felt
embarrassed to even be looked at.

“Tyler, son, you need to calm down,” James spoke to his son calmly.
“This isn’t going to do any good.”

“Don’t tell me to calm down!” Tyler bellowed back and put his hands to
his head, “Sorry.” He faltered apologetically, “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry,” he
began to lose himself in a depressive demise. “I deserve hell for this. I’m
sorry for everything.”

“You’ve got nothing to apologize for,” Nicolas advised Tyler with an
even tone. “This is not your fault. Austin being here is not because of you.
You saved her that night.” Nicolas knew exactly where Tyler was going with this
and he needed to stop the young man’s thoughts from darkening.

“I let this happen though,” Tyler said mournfully as he looked at
Austin’s father. “I helped kill a part of Austin, and I might as well have
fucking packed her bags six years ago as well!” he huffed out his exhale and
looked over their shoulders into the room; he was feeling remorse and guilt
begin to build like bile in his throat. “This isn’t how my life was supposed to
turn out!” he said as he dropped to the seat beside him and put his head into
his hands. “I should have a wife and children by now. I should be chief and be
proud of all of my achievements. I should have loved Austin more than I did! I
should have been there for her and I let her down! I was a failure, and that’s
all I’ll ever be to her.”

“Tyler,” Austin said as she stood just outside of her room, ignoring all
of the protests to get back into bed, allow the nurses to check her over, and
have her dressings changed. She was being ignorant of the damp bandages and her
soaking
pajama
top, because in that moment, it wasn’t
only her that was caught up in this mess. Tyler was stuck in it too and he
always would be.

Austin clung onto the doorframe, her legs shaky from misuse. The only
strenuous therapy she had been given was to make sure she kept full mobility of
her burnt arm, but the amount of drugs administered to her system had kept her
so weak and tired she didn’t have the energy to get up and gallivant around.
Standing now was a struggle, but she needed Tyler to come back to her. He was
her incentive.

“Get back in there, Aus,” Tyler scolded her lovingly. “Get changed and
I’ll be in, in a minute.”

Shaking her head, Austin accepted support from her mother to remain
stable as she stepped out from her room for the first time in what felt like an
eternity. “In the six years I was gone, I always checked in to see what you
were up to. I lied to a point when I said I didn’t. It was always you that
filled my thoughts; it was the memories that I had with you that got me through
the day. I might have felt like I lost you, but when I was gone, I realized you
gave me so much and I just left it all behind. In the end it didn’t matter
about the baby mostly because you made me into who I am. My thoughts were just
consumed with what you were up to and what you were doing now.” She gulped her
emotions away, “I wanted to come back the second I left, but I felt like I had
burnt every bridge possible. Then one day I just knew I had to come back.”

“What did make you come back?” Tyler asked cautiously. He really did
what all the answer.

Austin smiled weakly as she let her reserve disperse, “You.” She then
began to cry as everything came to a head. “You don’t know how much I wished
that dream was mine. I want nothing more than to be married to you and have
your children, but I lost your child once, Tyler. I don’t want it to happen
again.”

“It won’t happen again,” Tyler said and watched Austin falter all the
more. He realized that his wording didn’t make it seem like they had a
prosperous future ahead of them. Running a hand across the back of his neck, he
looked at her with sincerity. “It won’t happen again, because this time, I will
do everything to make sure you know how much I love you and want you, and when
you get pregnant, I will make sure that no one ever so much as touches you.”

Standing there, Austin felt
herself
give a
genuine smile at the prospect of her future. All she could see was a happy life
in Point Arena. This could really be happening now.

“I don’t mean to interrupt,” Austin’s lead nurse, Alice, interrupted
with a small smile, “But this is disturbing some of the other patients and,
Austin, we need to change those dressings as soon as possible,” she alerted
Austin, “Not only that, but you’re due for a new dose of medication and your
vitals need to be checked.”

“C’mon, Aussie,” Tyler said as he stepped in, “Let’s get you changed and
comfortable.”

“Someone will be in to change the bedding in a minute or two,” Alice
told them politely.

Jane looked at Alice and smiled, “I’ve got it sorted if you’ll show me
the bedding. We’ll make sure Austin’s settled for you to change her bandages.”
Jane watched as Alice nodded and she followed her as Tyler gently guided Austin
back into the room and sat her on the edge of the bed.

He looked to Austin and smiled at her, he put his hand to her face to
wipe the pearls of fallen tears, the moment he did; he felt her fevered skin
and frowned. “I cannot wait to get you home so I can look after you better.”

“Is that a promise?” Austin teased tiredly as her entire energy reserve
faltered.

“One that I will make to you from today to forever, Sunny,” he said with
such certainty and for once he looked forward to the future. Tyler was through
with living day to day now because he didn’t have to. He could plan ahead and
smile at the idea of forever.

“I’ll believe it if you bring me an ice cream bonanza
Strongson
style,” Austin asked meekly, not
sure if Tyler would remember the creation they had made one night when the
power went out during a freak thunderstorm. The freezer had no power and so
they had decided to eat most of the perishable foods. The ice cream bonanza had
become somewhat of a tradition, stupidly named after them both. It was a memory
that Austin still kept close to her heart. She even sat, late at night, with a
bowl of ice cream just to remember Tyler. They had combined their names to
create a dish that was purely theirs and theirs alone and she had tried to keep
it alive every single day.

Tyler’s face lit up then. “I can make that happen,” he said with such
certainty. “Mint, strawberry, raspberry ripple, chocolate marshmallow, rocky
road, and French vanilla; topped with strawberries, raspberries, blueberries,
chocolate flakes, and extra marshmallows,” Tyler recalled the sickly concoction
that they had experimented with. One he had tried to repeat with Natasha, only
to be met with absolute gross disgust. She didn’t even want to share it with
him like Austin did.