FanFic100-Dracula-065. "Passing"
Title: None.
Fandom: Dracula: General Novel
Characters: Jack Seward, Emma Hawthorne, Doctor Gilmore, Arthur Holmwood, Professor Van Helsing, J. Richard Seward, Evelyn Seward
Prompt: 065. Passing
Word Count: 3058
Rating: PG-13
Author's Notes: LTD here. Longest I've written so far, probably because I'd been wanting to write this one for so long. This story delves into Seward's past some. (Gasp! I wrote a Seward-cetric fic! No way! [/sarcasm]) Anyway, please enjoy, as this baby took me quite a bit of energy. (Also, Jack, Art, and the Professor are Stoker's, but Emma, Gilmore, Dick, and Evelyn are mine.)
May:
“Doctor Seward?”
Seward looked up. One of the newer nurses, the one with honey-blond hair, was standing in the doorway with a stack of papers. He wracked his brain hard, but could not remember her name for the life of him. He could hardly remember his own name, really. He had been working for nearly thirty straight hours with only a fifteen minute nap, and he couldn’t even remember how long ago that had been. Four of the senior doctors, including Seward’s advisor Doctor Gilmore, had mysteriously fallen ill, and the young intern was now on his third shift.
The nurse had come up to him and now handed him the papers. “It’s a new case, just in. He seems to have mental symptoms, so they said to give it to you. Are you quite all right, doctor?”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine, I’m just a bit tired, that’s all.” The twenty-two year old felt much older than his years, especially with this odd shift. He gave a weak smile to the young woman.
She smiled back. “It’s Emma Hawthorne, doctor,” she said, seeming to recognize the mental lapse caused by his weariness. She reached out and took the sheaf of papers back from him. “Why don’t I settle the patient into his room and take his statements about his condition. You can slip into Doctor Gilmore’s office and get a bit of rest.”
“I really couldn’t. I mean, not with a patient and all.”
“I could come and get you. Make sure you don’t sleep too long or anything like that.”
Seward gave her another smile, this time very grateful. She checked the hallway to make sure it was clear, and they both ducked out, her toward the waiting room and him toward the stairs which lead to the office.
June:
Gilmore motioned for Seward to finish stitching up the incision while he rinsed the blood off his hands. He knew his young intern hated the surgical theater, but as usual they were short staffed and Seward had been the only one available to assist. Now another doctor had just called him away to an emergency. He gave the younger man a quick nod and took off.
Seward stitched the incision carefully, for he was always careful about such things, but the blood was completely drained from his face. He tied it off, splashed some water over his hands, and tore out of the room. He gave vague directions to the orderlies he passed in the halls but didn’t stop until he was outside. There he feel to his knees and doubled over, dry heaving so hard his sides ached. He was still staring at the grass and not trusting himself to sit up when he felt a hand on his head.
“I brought you some water. Do I need to go get someone?” said Emma gently. Seward shook his head. She knelt on the grass beside him as he lurched forward again.
“Some doctor I make, not even being able to stand the sight of blood,” he murmured. Shakily he took the cup she offered and drank his water in slow sips. Gradually his stomach settled and the color returned to his face. “Thank you, Miss Hawthorne, I appreciate this.”
“Certainly, Doctor Seward. Are you certain you’re all right now?” she said. Her gentle voice and the concern in her look were genuine. Seward knew she’d be a very good nurse indeed, much better than he’d be a doctor. He nodded to her. “I just need a few more moments to clear my head, that’s all.”
She patted his arm gently and rose to go back inside. Seward was glad he’d been so pale, otherwise she might have seen how terribly he’d blushed when knelt next to him.
July:
“Jack, old boy!” Seward looked up to see Arthur Holmwood dashing toward him. He laughed and the two embraced. “Jack, where the devil have you been? You took off for that forsaken school in Amsterdam and I’ve hardly seen you since. How long have you been back in London?”
“Only since February, Art. I passed my exams early and hauled home to intern.”
Arthur grinned and clapped his friend on the back. “Well, I suppose I can’t blame you for avoiding us so long, what with all that difficult with your father over the medical school and such. Still, I can’t believe you’ve been back nearly six months and we’ve never crossed paths ‘til now! Come on, let me buy you a drink.”
The two ducked into a nearby pub, one of their old haunts from university days. They laughed and chatted, first recalling their days together at school, then catching up on the few years since Seward had left England. Finally the conversation turned to the present.
“I actually saw your father the other day, Jack. He asked about you; you ought to call on him. I don’t think he knows you’re back,” Arthur said as he refilled his brandy.
“He probably doesn’t care,” said Seward when he lowered his glass from his lips. “He always though I was a fool for going into medicine, especially when I left to study with Professor Van Helsing. He didn’t think I’d ever make it under the Professor. I’d probably stop his heart if I told him how much the Professor likes me.”
“Or he might just be too proud to speak,” said Arthur. He shrugged it off, noticing his friend’s growing discomfort with talk of his father, and changed the subject. “So, old boy, what’s occupying your time besides studying and practicing your newly acquired medical skills. I do hope you don’t say you’ve got all sorts of fine new friend you go out with.”
Seward laughed into his glass. “Oh, hardly. I most spend my off time with Doctor Gilmore-”
“Jack, really! Are you ever going to have any fun anymore”
“That’s exactly what Emma says.”
“Emma?” Seward immediately turned bright red, and Arthur grinned broadly. “First name basis even. Come on, Jack, tell all. You were as quiet as a monk about girls before you left, and about as knowledgeable as one too. Let’s hear it.”
“There’s nothing to hear,” said Seward quickly. “She’s…she’s a friend. I’m a doctor, she’s a nurse, we work together a great deal. And I knew plenty about girls before; for heaven’s sake, Art, you do have to study anatomy to become a doctor.”
“Yes, but most men prefer live specimens over a textbook,” Arthur jibed.
Seward gave his look somewhere between annoyance and embarrassment. “Em-Miss Hawthorne is a very sweet girl and a friend and a colleague, and that is all, you dirty-minded lout. Let’s have another drink.”
August:
The summer turned to autumn early that year, and the cold began to set in even before the middle of August. The hospital began making preparations, such as it could, for the sick season which would blow in with the chilly winds. Seward, much to his dismay, found himself relegated to paperwork because he was too tired to do anything else. One morning he woke up only to find he was running a fever. He stayed home.
“Bloody, I’m suppose to be making people well, not staying in sick,” he muttered to the stacks of books, papers, and goodness-knew-what of his one-room flat. His messy habits had always been yet another sore point between him and his father. He had never seen why it should matter, as he knew exactly where everything was, but his father had insisted on an immaculately clean room. Art had been a blessing as a roommate, as he didn’t care what Seward did on his half of the tiny living quarters they had shared.
Seward had to make a conscious effort to steer himself away from that train of thought. Family was never a good place for his mind to wander when he was sick. Sick in the bloody middle of August…it was utterly ridiculous, that’s what it was. And he was supposed to have been helping manage the ward of suspected mental patients too. Doctor Gilmore had given him more responsibility there , as Seward had confessed to him his preference of working with the mind over the body. Maybe it was because of the queasiness about blood that he had always steered in that direction.
He was jolted out of his feverish mental rambling by a soft knock on the door. “Unlocked,” he said. The door opened, and he was startled by the entrance of Emma.
“Dear, that what I was afraid of,” she said. “We were all worried when you didn’t come in. You’d been so tired, I wondered if you might be sick.”
“You don’t know where I live…you didn’t,” Seward corrected himself and started to sit up. With a gentle firmness, she pushed him back down and pulls his coverlet back up. “Lie down. I slipped into Doctor Gilmore’s office and looked up your file. I wanted to make sure you were all right. I brought soup.”
Emma stopped in the flat periodically throughout the day every day for a week before she finally decided that Seward was well enough to get out and return to work. Embarrassed but grateful, Seward asked if he could take her to dinner to thank her, with a proper chaperone, of course. Shyly, she said she had no one to care if there was a proper chaperone or not, and accepted his offer. They settled to go on the twentieth.
September:
Seward was estranged from his parents, whether by his choice or theirs, and a doctor both for the love of it and to prove his father wrong. Emma was an orphan almost since birth, raised by the church and thrust into nursing because she would have done anything to stay out of a factory. Perhaps it was natural that they should be drawn to each other. He was young, she was younger, but as the cliché goes, they felt old beyond their years. And of course, they both blushed incessantly whenever the other paid a complement.
They woke up the next morning and sat awkwardly in the mess of Seward’s flat. Seward was glad their days off had coincided, because they would need it to sort this out. They sat for over an hour without even making eye contact. Finally Emma reached over and slid her hand into Seward’s.
“I suppose…I mean, it’s not as if either of us has anyone to be upset, John,” she said, “so we should be upset either.” She gave his hand a squeeze.
They hadn’t intended on walking back to he flat, he was supposed to be walking her home. They hadn’t intended on having a drink together there, or getting into a heated discussion of Dickens versus Collins, or loosing complete track of the time of night. And they certainly hadn’t intended wake up still in various states of undress, curled against each other and tangled in Seward’s sheets. They may not have intended it, but there was no going back and changing it now.
Seward squeezed her hand back. “I’m not upset if you aren’t, Emma,” he said just as quietly. “I love you.”
She smoothed his messy brown hair, ignoring the fact her own honeyed curls were tumbling around her face. He lifted the hand he held and kissed her palm.
The young lovers passed their days noticing only what they wished to. She did not see the tell-tale marks on his arm or hear the strange shakiness in his voice. He did not see her complexion growing pale, or hear the deep coughs that seemed to last longer each time they came upon her in a fit. They were in love.
October:
Gilmore had seen over the years that doctors often work double hard to heal one of their own. However, he could see that Seward had reached almost the point of obsession. He didn’t want to interfere, but he knew he had to intervene.
Considering that she worked in a hospital, Emma had hidden her illness remarkable well from everyone else, especially the young doctor who loved her so dearly. The day after she had accepted his marriage proposal, she had collapsed in the hallway. Even Seward could no longer deny her state, not after holding her as she had coughed up blood all over his white coat and his shirt. He had been at her side all day and night, acting like a madman.
Gilmore was not a fool, and he knew that in his current state, Seward would not listen to him not matter how much he respected him as a mentor and a colleague. So Gilmore wrote a letter, asking a favor from a man he hardly knew, although he certainly knew of him.
Seward was sitting in the corner of Emma’s hospital room, scribbling furiously in a notebook. It was not until he heard a slight “Hmmm,” that he stood and turned around. A gray-haired man still in traveling clothes was gently checking Emma’s pulse and intently studying her face. Seward started to go toward them, but held himself back. When the man finished, he turned to Seward.
“Doctor Gilmore is right about your lad, Jack, and I see about you as well. You come with me outside and we walk, eh?”
Bundled in coats, the two walked in the freezing October air. They walked until they reached the small graveyard some way from the hospital. They sat on a bench.
“Gilmore, he is a good man, a very good doctor. You are not listening to him, Jack,” said the older man.
“She’s fine,” said Seward. “She just needs rest, and someone to look after her. It’s nothing, it’s the cold weather getting to her, I mean, even I was sick back in August-”
“Jack, my dear Jack, my dear boy,” the old man sighed. “Listen to old Abraham Van Helsing, yes? You are a good boy, and a good doctor, but you are acting like a fool. Take the girl to her home and let her be comfortable and loved and at peace. She loves you, yes? She would not like you to be acting this way, neither do I.”
Seward pulled his coat tighter and shivered. “Professor, she don’t have anyone to go home to. She has me, and I don’t intend to leave her. She’ll get better.”
“That is what the drug says.” Seward started, but his old teacher gazed evenly. “Oh yes, I know your vice. I always know for my favorite, hm? When you we in Amsterdam, you seemed not to need it, and now you have come home and it has come back. It will not help her, and it will not help you. Gilmore, good man Gilmore, he wrote me to come because he sees it too.”
Seward closed his eyes. Being scolded by his mentor, the man he looked up to more than anything, was a thousand times worse than being constantly berated by his father. If that had been enough to drive him to “his vice”, this was now almost enough to stop him from ever touching it again.
Van Helsing held the young man and let him cry. In the solitude of the graveyard, with only the dead and his teacher to hear, Seward allowed himself to admit that the girl he loved was going to die.
November:
Inevitably, November was the month in which this hospital had the most consumption patients. It was a common disease, and no one from prostitutes to princes was exempt from the possibility of it.
Seward transferred himself completely to the ward which dealt with mental cases. He had never been able to stand so much blood anyway. Gilmore fully approved the transfer on the condition that, when the time came, Seward took a full week off. The intern agreed, and threw himself into his work with a tenacity and dedication almost frightening to the nurses working under him.
The morning of the third Sunday of November, Seward gave notice of his week’s leave to Gilmore and went home to his flat. That evening he held his would-have-been wife until she gave one last breath. Monday morning, he buried her in the small graveyard near the hospital.
December:
John Richard Seward spent his Christmas Eve much the way he did any other day. He began with his tea and breakfast in the dining room, but then moved into his study to work on his bookkeeping. As far as he was concerned, bankers never had holidays, and especially not at the busiest times of the economic year. He normally would have read his paper next, but decided to defer that until tea so that he could work uninterrupted with thoughts of the world.
His fluttery wife Evelyn went out early for one of her endless social what-nots, but was home always for tea. They sat down precisely on the dot of four o’clock, the only thing making this day different from any other being the presence of a decorated tree in the parlor. Evelyn was just launching into a tale about her visit to some friend when they heard the knock at the front door. An interruption at teatime was an unthinkable occurrence in this household, and yet, here it was.
“Dick, you weren’t expecting anyone, were you?” asked Evelyn.
“It is four and six minutes, Evelyn; I am never expecting anyone between the hours of four and five in the afternoon, and never will be,” he answered sharply. “It must be some bothersome charity collectors; I’m of a mind to throw a copy of that damn Dickens book at them if it is.”
Richard had stood from the table and was headed for the door when the visitor appeared and stunned both of them into silence.
“Hullo Father, Mother,” he said, removing his snow-covered hat and running a hand through his tousled hair. “Sorry I’m late, the weather’s dreadful.”
For a long, difficult moment they all were frozen. Painfully, awkwardly, Jack looked at his father. “I was going to go back to Amsterdam for a while, but Professor Van Helsing thought I should come spend Christmas with you. I’ve got a lot to tell you both.”
When his father embraced him for the first time in a decade, Jack fought back tears.
Fandom: Dracula: General Novel
Characters: Jack Seward, Emma Hawthorne, Doctor Gilmore, Arthur Holmwood, Professor Van Helsing, J. Richard Seward, Evelyn Seward
Prompt: 065. Passing
Word Count: 3058
Rating: PG-13
Author's Notes: LTD here. Longest I've written so far, probably because I'd been wanting to write this one for so long. This story delves into Seward's past some. (Gasp! I wrote a Seward-cetric fic! No way! [/sarcasm]) Anyway, please enjoy, as this baby took me quite a bit of energy. (Also, Jack, Art, and the Professor are Stoker's, but Emma, Gilmore, Dick, and Evelyn are mine.)
May:
“Doctor Seward?”
Seward looked up. One of the newer nurses, the one with honey-blond hair, was standing in the doorway with a stack of papers. He wracked his brain hard, but could not remember her name for the life of him. He could hardly remember his own name, really. He had been working for nearly thirty straight hours with only a fifteen minute nap, and he couldn’t even remember how long ago that had been. Four of the senior doctors, including Seward’s advisor Doctor Gilmore, had mysteriously fallen ill, and the young intern was now on his third shift.
The nurse had come up to him and now handed him the papers. “It’s a new case, just in. He seems to have mental symptoms, so they said to give it to you. Are you quite all right, doctor?”
“I’m sure I’ll be fine, I’m just a bit tired, that’s all.” The twenty-two year old felt much older than his years, especially with this odd shift. He gave a weak smile to the young woman.
She smiled back. “It’s Emma Hawthorne, doctor,” she said, seeming to recognize the mental lapse caused by his weariness. She reached out and took the sheaf of papers back from him. “Why don’t I settle the patient into his room and take his statements about his condition. You can slip into Doctor Gilmore’s office and get a bit of rest.”
“I really couldn’t. I mean, not with a patient and all.”
“I could come and get you. Make sure you don’t sleep too long or anything like that.”
Seward gave her another smile, this time very grateful. She checked the hallway to make sure it was clear, and they both ducked out, her toward the waiting room and him toward the stairs which lead to the office.
June:
Gilmore motioned for Seward to finish stitching up the incision while he rinsed the blood off his hands. He knew his young intern hated the surgical theater, but as usual they were short staffed and Seward had been the only one available to assist. Now another doctor had just called him away to an emergency. He gave the younger man a quick nod and took off.
Seward stitched the incision carefully, for he was always careful about such things, but the blood was completely drained from his face. He tied it off, splashed some water over his hands, and tore out of the room. He gave vague directions to the orderlies he passed in the halls but didn’t stop until he was outside. There he feel to his knees and doubled over, dry heaving so hard his sides ached. He was still staring at the grass and not trusting himself to sit up when he felt a hand on his head.
“I brought you some water. Do I need to go get someone?” said Emma gently. Seward shook his head. She knelt on the grass beside him as he lurched forward again.
“Some doctor I make, not even being able to stand the sight of blood,” he murmured. Shakily he took the cup she offered and drank his water in slow sips. Gradually his stomach settled and the color returned to his face. “Thank you, Miss Hawthorne, I appreciate this.”
“Certainly, Doctor Seward. Are you certain you’re all right now?” she said. Her gentle voice and the concern in her look were genuine. Seward knew she’d be a very good nurse indeed, much better than he’d be a doctor. He nodded to her. “I just need a few more moments to clear my head, that’s all.”
She patted his arm gently and rose to go back inside. Seward was glad he’d been so pale, otherwise she might have seen how terribly he’d blushed when knelt next to him.
July:
“Jack, old boy!” Seward looked up to see Arthur Holmwood dashing toward him. He laughed and the two embraced. “Jack, where the devil have you been? You took off for that forsaken school in Amsterdam and I’ve hardly seen you since. How long have you been back in London?”
“Only since February, Art. I passed my exams early and hauled home to intern.”
Arthur grinned and clapped his friend on the back. “Well, I suppose I can’t blame you for avoiding us so long, what with all that difficult with your father over the medical school and such. Still, I can’t believe you’ve been back nearly six months and we’ve never crossed paths ‘til now! Come on, let me buy you a drink.”
The two ducked into a nearby pub, one of their old haunts from university days. They laughed and chatted, first recalling their days together at school, then catching up on the few years since Seward had left England. Finally the conversation turned to the present.
“I actually saw your father the other day, Jack. He asked about you; you ought to call on him. I don’t think he knows you’re back,” Arthur said as he refilled his brandy.
“He probably doesn’t care,” said Seward when he lowered his glass from his lips. “He always though I was a fool for going into medicine, especially when I left to study with Professor Van Helsing. He didn’t think I’d ever make it under the Professor. I’d probably stop his heart if I told him how much the Professor likes me.”
“Or he might just be too proud to speak,” said Arthur. He shrugged it off, noticing his friend’s growing discomfort with talk of his father, and changed the subject. “So, old boy, what’s occupying your time besides studying and practicing your newly acquired medical skills. I do hope you don’t say you’ve got all sorts of fine new friend you go out with.”
Seward laughed into his glass. “Oh, hardly. I most spend my off time with Doctor Gilmore-”
“Jack, really! Are you ever going to have any fun anymore”
“That’s exactly what Emma says.”
“Emma?” Seward immediately turned bright red, and Arthur grinned broadly. “First name basis even. Come on, Jack, tell all. You were as quiet as a monk about girls before you left, and about as knowledgeable as one too. Let’s hear it.”
“There’s nothing to hear,” said Seward quickly. “She’s…she’s a friend. I’m a doctor, she’s a nurse, we work together a great deal. And I knew plenty about girls before; for heaven’s sake, Art, you do have to study anatomy to become a doctor.”
“Yes, but most men prefer live specimens over a textbook,” Arthur jibed.
Seward gave his look somewhere between annoyance and embarrassment. “Em-Miss Hawthorne is a very sweet girl and a friend and a colleague, and that is all, you dirty-minded lout. Let’s have another drink.”
August:
The summer turned to autumn early that year, and the cold began to set in even before the middle of August. The hospital began making preparations, such as it could, for the sick season which would blow in with the chilly winds. Seward, much to his dismay, found himself relegated to paperwork because he was too tired to do anything else. One morning he woke up only to find he was running a fever. He stayed home.
“Bloody, I’m suppose to be making people well, not staying in sick,” he muttered to the stacks of books, papers, and goodness-knew-what of his one-room flat. His messy habits had always been yet another sore point between him and his father. He had never seen why it should matter, as he knew exactly where everything was, but his father had insisted on an immaculately clean room. Art had been a blessing as a roommate, as he didn’t care what Seward did on his half of the tiny living quarters they had shared.
Seward had to make a conscious effort to steer himself away from that train of thought. Family was never a good place for his mind to wander when he was sick. Sick in the bloody middle of August…it was utterly ridiculous, that’s what it was. And he was supposed to have been helping manage the ward of suspected mental patients too. Doctor Gilmore had given him more responsibility there , as Seward had confessed to him his preference of working with the mind over the body. Maybe it was because of the queasiness about blood that he had always steered in that direction.
He was jolted out of his feverish mental rambling by a soft knock on the door. “Unlocked,” he said. The door opened, and he was startled by the entrance of Emma.
“Dear, that what I was afraid of,” she said. “We were all worried when you didn’t come in. You’d been so tired, I wondered if you might be sick.”
“You don’t know where I live…you didn’t,” Seward corrected himself and started to sit up. With a gentle firmness, she pushed him back down and pulls his coverlet back up. “Lie down. I slipped into Doctor Gilmore’s office and looked up your file. I wanted to make sure you were all right. I brought soup.”
Emma stopped in the flat periodically throughout the day every day for a week before she finally decided that Seward was well enough to get out and return to work. Embarrassed but grateful, Seward asked if he could take her to dinner to thank her, with a proper chaperone, of course. Shyly, she said she had no one to care if there was a proper chaperone or not, and accepted his offer. They settled to go on the twentieth.
September:
Seward was estranged from his parents, whether by his choice or theirs, and a doctor both for the love of it and to prove his father wrong. Emma was an orphan almost since birth, raised by the church and thrust into nursing because she would have done anything to stay out of a factory. Perhaps it was natural that they should be drawn to each other. He was young, she was younger, but as the cliché goes, they felt old beyond their years. And of course, they both blushed incessantly whenever the other paid a complement.
They woke up the next morning and sat awkwardly in the mess of Seward’s flat. Seward was glad their days off had coincided, because they would need it to sort this out. They sat for over an hour without even making eye contact. Finally Emma reached over and slid her hand into Seward’s.
“I suppose…I mean, it’s not as if either of us has anyone to be upset, John,” she said, “so we should be upset either.” She gave his hand a squeeze.
They hadn’t intended on walking back to he flat, he was supposed to be walking her home. They hadn’t intended on having a drink together there, or getting into a heated discussion of Dickens versus Collins, or loosing complete track of the time of night. And they certainly hadn’t intended wake up still in various states of undress, curled against each other and tangled in Seward’s sheets. They may not have intended it, but there was no going back and changing it now.
Seward squeezed her hand back. “I’m not upset if you aren’t, Emma,” he said just as quietly. “I love you.”
She smoothed his messy brown hair, ignoring the fact her own honeyed curls were tumbling around her face. He lifted the hand he held and kissed her palm.
The young lovers passed their days noticing only what they wished to. She did not see the tell-tale marks on his arm or hear the strange shakiness in his voice. He did not see her complexion growing pale, or hear the deep coughs that seemed to last longer each time they came upon her in a fit. They were in love.
October:
Gilmore had seen over the years that doctors often work double hard to heal one of their own. However, he could see that Seward had reached almost the point of obsession. He didn’t want to interfere, but he knew he had to intervene.
Considering that she worked in a hospital, Emma had hidden her illness remarkable well from everyone else, especially the young doctor who loved her so dearly. The day after she had accepted his marriage proposal, she had collapsed in the hallway. Even Seward could no longer deny her state, not after holding her as she had coughed up blood all over his white coat and his shirt. He had been at her side all day and night, acting like a madman.
Gilmore was not a fool, and he knew that in his current state, Seward would not listen to him not matter how much he respected him as a mentor and a colleague. So Gilmore wrote a letter, asking a favor from a man he hardly knew, although he certainly knew of him.
Seward was sitting in the corner of Emma’s hospital room, scribbling furiously in a notebook. It was not until he heard a slight “Hmmm,” that he stood and turned around. A gray-haired man still in traveling clothes was gently checking Emma’s pulse and intently studying her face. Seward started to go toward them, but held himself back. When the man finished, he turned to Seward.
“Doctor Gilmore is right about your lad, Jack, and I see about you as well. You come with me outside and we walk, eh?”
Bundled in coats, the two walked in the freezing October air. They walked until they reached the small graveyard some way from the hospital. They sat on a bench.
“Gilmore, he is a good man, a very good doctor. You are not listening to him, Jack,” said the older man.
“She’s fine,” said Seward. “She just needs rest, and someone to look after her. It’s nothing, it’s the cold weather getting to her, I mean, even I was sick back in August-”
“Jack, my dear Jack, my dear boy,” the old man sighed. “Listen to old Abraham Van Helsing, yes? You are a good boy, and a good doctor, but you are acting like a fool. Take the girl to her home and let her be comfortable and loved and at peace. She loves you, yes? She would not like you to be acting this way, neither do I.”
Seward pulled his coat tighter and shivered. “Professor, she don’t have anyone to go home to. She has me, and I don’t intend to leave her. She’ll get better.”
“That is what the drug says.” Seward started, but his old teacher gazed evenly. “Oh yes, I know your vice. I always know for my favorite, hm? When you we in Amsterdam, you seemed not to need it, and now you have come home and it has come back. It will not help her, and it will not help you. Gilmore, good man Gilmore, he wrote me to come because he sees it too.”
Seward closed his eyes. Being scolded by his mentor, the man he looked up to more than anything, was a thousand times worse than being constantly berated by his father. If that had been enough to drive him to “his vice”, this was now almost enough to stop him from ever touching it again.
Van Helsing held the young man and let him cry. In the solitude of the graveyard, with only the dead and his teacher to hear, Seward allowed himself to admit that the girl he loved was going to die.
November:
Inevitably, November was the month in which this hospital had the most consumption patients. It was a common disease, and no one from prostitutes to princes was exempt from the possibility of it.
Seward transferred himself completely to the ward which dealt with mental cases. He had never been able to stand so much blood anyway. Gilmore fully approved the transfer on the condition that, when the time came, Seward took a full week off. The intern agreed, and threw himself into his work with a tenacity and dedication almost frightening to the nurses working under him.
The morning of the third Sunday of November, Seward gave notice of his week’s leave to Gilmore and went home to his flat. That evening he held his would-have-been wife until she gave one last breath. Monday morning, he buried her in the small graveyard near the hospital.
December:
John Richard Seward spent his Christmas Eve much the way he did any other day. He began with his tea and breakfast in the dining room, but then moved into his study to work on his bookkeeping. As far as he was concerned, bankers never had holidays, and especially not at the busiest times of the economic year. He normally would have read his paper next, but decided to defer that until tea so that he could work uninterrupted with thoughts of the world.
His fluttery wife Evelyn went out early for one of her endless social what-nots, but was home always for tea. They sat down precisely on the dot of four o’clock, the only thing making this day different from any other being the presence of a decorated tree in the parlor. Evelyn was just launching into a tale about her visit to some friend when they heard the knock at the front door. An interruption at teatime was an unthinkable occurrence in this household, and yet, here it was.
“Dick, you weren’t expecting anyone, were you?” asked Evelyn.
“It is four and six minutes, Evelyn; I am never expecting anyone between the hours of four and five in the afternoon, and never will be,” he answered sharply. “It must be some bothersome charity collectors; I’m of a mind to throw a copy of that damn Dickens book at them if it is.”
Richard had stood from the table and was headed for the door when the visitor appeared and stunned both of them into silence.
“Hullo Father, Mother,” he said, removing his snow-covered hat and running a hand through his tousled hair. “Sorry I’m late, the weather’s dreadful.”
For a long, difficult moment they all were frozen. Painfully, awkwardly, Jack looked at his father. “I was going to go back to Amsterdam for a while, but Professor Van Helsing thought I should come spend Christmas with you. I’ve got a lot to tell you both.”
When his father embraced him for the first time in a decade, Jack fought back tears.