"You look tired," Lima said, handing him a coffee, which he gratefully accepted. He needed the fog clearing boost and the scalding heat on his tongue.

"Thank you," Gabe replied. "Did you get much sleep?"

"No." She slumped down on the seat he had just vacated. Long legs drawn up to her chest. She was wearing a grey hoodie, with the hood pulled up on her head exposing wavy strands of hair. She had deep circles under her eyes and her small nose was red and pinched, like she had been crying the whole journey to the hospital.

"How did you get here anyway?" Gabe asked.

"Ty dropped me off," came her answer. She was staring at Natalia, she was fixated on her face, as she stroked it with the back of her hand. "He had to get to work," she explained as an afterthought. It neither detracted or added anything new to the conversation. If you could call it that.

"Mm," Gabe grunted in reply. His mind was numb, polite small talk was beyond the realms of his capabilities right now.

"Why don't you go and have a shower. Shave. Grab some breakfast. How long have you been here now? 6 days? You need a break. I can hold down the fort."

Gabe froze at her suggestion, his ambivalent mood switching to agitation so fast he couldn't pinpoint what had triggered him exactly. He didn't like her suggestion one bit. He didn't like her waltzing in and assuming her post at Natalia's side like she hadn't been harder to reach than Osama Bin Laden in his cave just days prior. He didn't like her telling him what to do. He didn't like her assuming she knew how to take care of Natalia better than he did. When Natalia had always been the caretaker in her and Lima's relationship.

Leaving Natalia was a hard boundary, the only other person that he had allowed to sit with her while he tended to his human needs was his mother. She was currently at her home, catching up on sleep and probably cooking up a storm. She had been keeping everyone on the ward fed, the nurses, the doctors, the staff, patients and visitors alike.

"My mom will be by in the afternoon, I can wait 'til then," Gabe said coolly.

Lima turned around to face him, her ears had pricked up at his frosty tone. "You don't trust me?"

"I didn't say that," Gabe returned, not wanting to pick a fight with his girl's best friend.

"You didn't have to."

"Mm," he said noncommittally, refusing to engage further.

"I can watch her for half an hour, seriously," she laughed a little at the end so it wouldn't seem so aggressive but Gabe saw through it. She was at a loss, riddled with guilt and was trying to reassert herself in Natalia's life. Well, she wasn't going to do that at Natalia's expense.

"No offence but where the fuck were you when Natalia was trying to reach you all these weeks?" He saw her visibly wince, her eyes instantly going glassy with tears.

She wore her heart on her sleeve just like someone else he knew. Fuck, so much for not starting shit with his girl's best friend. Now he'd made her cry. Her tears didn't even bother tracking down her face, they spilled on the floor straight from the source, like a cartoon.

She wiped at her huge brown eyes with the sleeve of her sweater and Gabe could swear angels, fairies and woodland creatures were all throwing curses at him, he felt the dull and slow spread of remorse, "No–yeah, I deserve that. I've been a shitty friend. I have no excuse except the truth, which I will tell Natalia in due time."

"Whatever it is, it's none of my business. Natalia will probably choose to overlook it, as she always does." He couldn't help but to add the last bit in a sniping tone.

"'It's none of my business,' but I will still judge you for it," she threw out bitterly. "Do you know how hard it was to keep it from her? I've never kept any secret from her, she's the other half of my soul. I wanted to call every day, but I knew I'd hear her voice and..." The tears were pooling at her feet again. "—I'd just word-vomit everything out. I did it because it's not her job to bail me out and she would have done. She would have flown half way across the world pregnant or not, screw all the consequences because for so long it was just me and her, the two of us against everything and everyone...So I'd like a little less judgment from you, please!" She took a shaky breath, her eyes flickering over to Natalia again, devastation splashed on her face.

"Look Lima, I —" He felt pink and puckered. Like an asshole. He was an asshole.

"There's literally nothing you can say to me that I haven't told myself in a thousand different ways and yes, I'm hoping Natalia forgives me, because I am nothing without her in my life. I'll be outside."

"Jesus Christ, Lima. Of course you can stay. I'm not —"

"—As if you could remove me from my best friend's bedside? Are you hearing yourself. Wallah, I knew white men were entitled but this is a new frontier.

We're spreading bad energy, how is she supposed to recover if we are poisoning the positive aura around her? And you should deffo shower and sleep when your mum gets here. I was being polite before, but you look and smell like a walking carcass."

Gabe grimaced, he was feeling less sorry for the girl, ire and annoyance were starting to take its place. "Fine," he snapped. "Anything happens and you come and get me asap and I mean ASAP."

"Of course," she said unperturbed, her attention was back on Natalia. "Have these white people even been moisturising your hair?" she murmured, running her fingers through Natalia's locks. "Don't worry I'm going to take care of your crown and glory."

Gabe picked up his bag of toiletries and headed for the family bathroom he knew was at the end of the corridor. He couldn't remember the last time he had been there; maybe a day and a half again or two if the way Lima was describing him was anything to go by.

God, he had picked fights with enemies more benign than her. It had drained the energy from him and he felt every year of his 39 years. But it was done now. They could both draw a line under it.

He didn't even care about whatever it was that had kept Lima away, the bottom line was that Natalia would probably forgive her for it. He also had no doubt that whatever it was would have had Natalia boarding a flight.

She was loyal to a fault, so he supposed he was a little grateful Lima had the sense not to disclose it. He had been wrong to interfere, whatever point he had to make would get lost in the pages of the decade old friendship between the two women. He knew when he was outnumbered, outgunned and outmanoeuvred.

Green, bloodshot eyes peered back at him in the foggy mirror after his shower. He'd been sleep deprived before, he'd been trained for it. But this bone tiredness he felt was different, untempered by adrenaline and a mission purpose he didn't know how to deal with it.

What was the reason for this? Why did the worst things continue to happen to the best people? He didn't have the answers. No one did, and that was perhaps the worst thing for a brain devoid of the logic that came with rest.

When he came out, dressed in a fresh T-shirt, joggers and slides, someone he wasn't sure who had dropped off, he headed back down the corridor intending to see Natalia to make sure nothing was amiss before he went down in search of food.

"There you are. Come take a turn with me," His mother said. "Leave the girls in each other's company, come on. They'll be fine," she ushered him towards the elevator, not really giving him a chance to protest.

"How are you?" his mother asked, piercing him with his own identical eyes when they were in the elevator.

"Ok, I guess."

"Really? I heard you and Lima got into it."

Gabe looked down at his mother in surprise. "Oh, please. The nurses tell me everything around here in exchange for cookies," she said, crossing her arms.

"I wouldn't say it was an argument per se..."

"Gabriel," his mother said, disapproval dripping off the tone in which she said his name. "I'm going to give you a piece of advice all men ought to get, can you guess what it is?"

"Hmm...let me think, could it be don't argue with a woman? You'll lose?"

"Close. Never get involved between a woman and her best friend. You'll lose." 

"Ah," Gabe said, understanding. "I could have done with that maybe 30 minutes ago?"

"We live and we learn." Elizabeth patted him on the back.

______________________

Not me with an update!
What did y'all think? Was Gabe right to get prissy? Do you think Lima was right to withhold what was going on with her?