Love For Hire

His family had come by a few times through the next few days to see him, but Nicholas had left orders with the medical staff to send them away. He did not want to speak to anyone. He had spent a lot of his time thinking. The nurses told him he needed to get up out of bed, so at least once a day, they put him in a wheelchair and wheeled him out to the hospital atrium so he could get some air. When they brought him back to his room, Nicholas asked them to park his wheelchair by the window and to open it so he could hear the birds.

He had been sitting by the window for a while when he heard footsteps come into the room. They were too heavy to be female, and since he was not taking visitors, they had to be Dr. Horton’s. “Hello, Doctor.”

He heard Dr. Horton chuckle. “How did you know it was me?”

“Lucky guess,” he lied. He did not feel like explaining his process.

“My nurses told me you asked to see me when I came on duty.”

“Yes, thank you for coming.”

“How could I say no to my favourite patient?” He could hear Dr. Horton pull up a chair and sit down. “So, you wanted to talk.”

“How is your research coming?”

Dr. Horton sighed. “Honestly, I am getting nowhere. I do not know how to help you.”

His heart sunk, but it was what he had expected to hear. “Be honest with me, doctor… I am at the end, are not I? I am failing fast.”

“Nicholas, there is always hope.”

“No, there’s not. You know it as well as I do. I am about two steps away from the grave,” Nicholas held a hand out. “I want to sign a DNR.”

could hear Dr. Horton gasp.

stop breathing or my heart stops for any reason, the hospital staff is not to resuscitate me with

do this. Think about your

myself. Just let me die. I promise you may have my body for your research. Maybe one day, you can save someone else… but where I am concerned,

have given this

am not doing it anymore.

that is what you

“It is.”

will have the paperwork drawn up. I will see they are signed by the end of my shift. I will call your family and tell them you are being discharged. But I

“Fair enough.”

the chair drag against the floor, and he assumed that Dr. Horton had stood up. The sound that followed was Dr. Horton leaving the room.

to figure out how he was going to

***

house to the parlour, where she found the others. Octavius had received word from Dr. Horton saying that Nicholas had left the hospital against the doctor’s suggestions, and they were sending him home in an ambulance. Everyone was gathering in the parlour

one hand resting on the mantle and a glass of bourbon in the other. Teegan and Kinsley sat together on the couch, discussing their theories of why Nicholas was refusing medical treatment. Naya took a seat on the couch across for the girls. “He should be here any minute,”

him to check himself out,” Teegan said. “He is not

at the door. He was dressed in a pair of black slacks and a deep blue button-up shirt. His eyes were sunken, and he was very thin. He was still seated in a wheelchair, and Octavius

breaking Kinsley’s heart to see him. She remembered the man he was the first night they met, and now he was a husk of that man. He looked like a living corpse. “Nicholas,” Naya spoke as she went to his side. “You are not well; you should be the hospital where the doctors can care for you. What will

hand up, and Octavius took a document out of the bag hanging on the back. “I took the liberty of having the doctor and the hospital draw up some papers,” he said when Octavius placed the papers in his hand. “This is a living will. It states that I am not to be kept on life support if something happens.

let you die?” Naya

may leave. I did things your way. All I received in return was misery and suffering. No more. I am done with it. His document is legally binding. Make your choice. Accept it and stay until the end or leave now in protest and be