It goes something like this [Part Seven]
Previous Parts: I - II - III - IV- V- VI
~
The news broke…everybody knew about the accident on set and that Matt Smith had been taken to the hospital…and that his fiancée and co-star Karen Gillan hadn’t left his side since the accident happened.
Everyone knew…
Karen burst out of the private waiting room after watching the news and hid in a bathroom stall to cry.
That was 8 hours after Matt had first entered the hospital…
~
Matt’s mother was a rock…and she reminded Karen so much of her son, that she couldn’t leave her side. She had the same strength, the same soulful eyes, the same way to reassure her. They had met beforehand, of course: dinners and brunches, and week ends, but in those hours Karen got to really know her, as they were waiting for news from the doctors, as they were waiting for Matt’s sister and his dad to come…and she fell in love with her.
She couldn’t rationalize how relieved she felt when Matt’s mother assured her over and over that it wasn’t her fault, that no one didn’t even think about blaming her.
“Matt loves you so much, darling…you know how he is” She had said, holding her hand.
She was scared, terrified, but she was being strong for her, and Karen had never felt so grateful, so humbled in her life.
Steve left about a hour after Matt’s mom came, he apologized and promised he would be back, and wanted to be updated, he asked as a friend, but Karen knew that he had to deal with a shit storm, one of epic proportions, and didn’t hold it against him. She let herself be hugged, Steve told her he would send someone from set with a change of clothes and then hugged Matt’s mother before leaving.
“Matt called me to tell me you had gotten engaged” The woman said after a few minutes of relatively comfortable silence. Karen smiled, despite herself, she wasn’t looking at the woman, her eyes were fixed on the door, her heart beating fast in her chest, yet the smile was there, and it felt weird on her face.
“Yes, he told me…” Karen said. Matt had been alternatively amused and almost disappointed by her mother’s reaction to the news.
“I’d wager he saw it as anticlimactic” Matt’s mother said. Karen did look at the woman and her breath caught in her throat for a moment…the look in that woman’s eyes, was all Matt: the same intelligence, the same brilliance…the same soulfulness.
She nodded and said, “He said he was expecting more of a reaction”
The older woman shook her head, a small smile playing on her lips, “I hope you didn’t take offence, Karen…but it didn’t come as a surprise, not since I first saw you two together”
It hurt hearing those words…and Karen didn’t even understand why…it hurt because it was before, before the accident, before Matt’s hand went limp on hers, when she didn’t know just how red Matt’s blood really was and how it was wrong so wrong that it stained his shirt and pooled all around him, and ended up on her cheek when he tried to talk…
“Now listen to me, Karen!” the voice of Matt’s mother was almost harsh, breaking her train of thoughts, bringing her to the present, as painful and heart wrenching as it was. Karen nodded.
“You need to be strong now, and live here in the present…you need to be very strong for Matt, can you do that?”
Karen nodded, fighting the tears and Matt’s mother brushed her cheek with a hand, “Cry if you must…it doesn’t make you weak…but you need to be strong for Matt, because he’s going to need you when the worst is over”
Matt’s mom seemed so confident, so sure Matt would be okay, that she couldn’t help believing her, again. She cleared her throat and said, “Matt kept saying that you were talking about your husband’s car, he was like, ‘I just told her I’m engaged and she brushed it off!’
Matt’s mom smiled, and let out a little sigh before saying, “When he was a child, Matt once asked me about love, how one knew when he was in love.”
Karen smiled, trying to imagine Matt as a child, all eyes and floppy hair, asking questions about love to his mother.
“What did you tell him?” Karen asked…and for a moment she missed Matt, so much that she had trouble breathing.
“What every parent has ever said to their child, my dear…what you will probably tell to yours” The woman shrugged and added, “I told him that he would just know, he would just feel it…that someone would be so important to him, so dear to him that it would be like his heart cannot contain it all”
Karen could imagine Matt trying to absorb her mother’s words, his mind probably creating weird scenarios or stories in his mind, while listening to her, and she wanted to know more…she knew so much about Matt: what he loved, what he loathed with a burning passion, what scared him and what excited him. She knew his dreams and his nightmares, she knew how he took his tea and how he took a deep calming breath before exiting their car when they went on set. She knew he was a slob but his cd collection was alphabetized, but she didn’t know the kid he had been…and she wanted to.
Matt’s mother gave her hand a little squeeze and said, “I’ve seen Matt with girls, I have seen him in love…but I’ve never seen him so happy, so whole…” Lynne looked at her, for a moment, “and I’ve never got a phone call in the middle of the night telling me, ‘I think I understand what you meant, mom…I think I really do’ until he met you”
Karen felt breathless, her eyes stinging with tears, her heart threatening to burst in her chest; she had never been so scared in her life…and more determined to fight and hope.
“I think I really understand that too…” She said with a nasal voice.
“Somehow I had no doubts about it” The older woman said. She took a look at the clock on the wall and sighed, “And I still haven’t seen your engagement ring”
Karen smiled, through the tears, “Well…almost no one has” she took off the chain she wore around her neck and showed the ring to Matt’s mom who smiled.
“It suits you…it suits both of you” She said.
She gave the chain back to Karen and she held it in her hands, she was about to wear the chain again, but then shook her head and took the ring, wearing it on her ring finger…where it belonged.
“He did it to protect you, you know?” The other woman said, “You’re young and he wants the best for you”
“He is…” She said simply. Her priorities had changed…all the things that had seemed important, that had made sense until that morning - career, just a few months, attacks to her, rumors and innuendos - seemed so trivial now. What it mattered was Matt…and what she felt, indeed felt like it couldn’t be contained in her heart: fear, hope, regret…and love for her Matt.
~
The doctor said the operation had be a technical success, but they had to wait at least 24 hours. Matt was still into the woods. And Karen? After crying her eyes out in the bathroom stall, she scrubbed her face clean, picked up her hair and changed into jeans and one of Matt’s jumpers, and she started to wait.
If Matt was in the woods, Karen was there, with him. She never left the hospital.