was still merely standing when Derek and Amelia approached the waiting room.

Daisy could usually tell if it was good or bad news. Like when Mom had died, the grief was etched into the doctor's face so prominently as he had to give the news to the woman's husband and eight-year-old daughter.

And when Dad died, the police officer had sported tears in her eyes, which Daisy thought was funny considering she hadn't even known the man. It made Daisy angry, because why did she get to cry over a stranger? It was Daisy's dad, not hers.

The two doctors approaching didn't hold tears in their eyes, nor did they have that grief-filled expression. The expressions that they wore remained firm and unreadable, and Daisy genuinely couldn't tell if they had saved her sister or if they had killed her.

"Mark." Amelia's voice came out softly as she regarded the man she hadn't seen in a while, a small smile on her face. "How have you been?"

Daisy hardly thought this was the time for small talk when there were bigger issues at hand, and she had no problem interrupting the quaint reunion before Mark could even answer Amelia.

"Is she okay?"

Amelia turned to Daisy, her eyes focused on the nervous-looking girl. Amelia's bright smile dimmed as she remembered the pressing issue. "Do you want to take a seat?"

Daisy furrowed her eyebrows, not sure why the woman wanted her to sit down. Standing did her better anyway, and it made her not so jittery.

"I'm okay standing."

The doctors were always encouraged to have their patient sit when delivering the news that somebody they loved was dead. It provided stability, and lessened the threat of anybody blacking out and falling to the floor upon hearing the news.

The doctors were always encouraged to have their patient try to take a seat when delivering the news, and Mark was painfully aware of that fact as he grimaced.

"Come sit down, Daisy."

Daisy frowned, but she didn't question it as she took a seat in one of those waiting room chairs.

The chair was stiff, uncomfortable, and uninviting. Daisy thought the hospital should invest in better ones. Nobody wants to sit and wait for the news on their loved one in rigid chairs that make their back ache.

Daisy felt uneasy as she sat in the stiff chair, looking up at the doctors and waiting for them to tell her Calypso's impending fate.

Her nerves were building rapidly on the inside, pounding against her as they waited for a release. Daisy tried to be as nonchalant as possible, drumming her fingers against her thigh to release some of her anxiety as she held eye contact with the female doctor stood in front of her.

"She was..." Amelia began to speak slowly, clearing her throat after a moment. "Calypso was in...bad condition when she came in, suffering blunt trauma to the head. Her skull was fractured in multiple places, and her brain kept throwing bleeds throughout her surgery, we-"

"Is she dead?" Daisy found the voice to ask, her tone above a whisper. Daisy hadn't meant to rudely interrupt, but all she really wanted to know was if Calypso was okay—because all she really wanted was to be given the green light to cry. "'Cause you keep talking about her in the past tense. And you don't need to make a whole speech if you're just going to end it by saying that she's dead."

Derek winced, still not saying a word as Amelia pursed her lips.

"We did everything that we could." Amelia spoke, and Daisy felt herself sink down an inch in her chair.

That's what they had said with Mom, too, and Daisy wondered if all doctors were the same.

Daisy wondered if they all had the same script to abide by, the promise that they had done everything in their power without someone actually being able to know if everything had been done.

Mom's doctors really had done everything in their power, because Daisy had seen. She had watched the excessive rounds of chemotherapy over and over and over again as Mom died a little more each time.

But Daisy couldn't physically see what had happened to Calypso in the OR, and she hated things she couldn't control.

What if the doctors had nicked an artery and caused all that bleeding? What if it was malpractice? What if Calypso was okay, and then they killed her?

Though Daisy knew the chances of that were low, reasonably speaking, because she saw the images on repeat every time she blinked. She saw Calypso's bloodied body gone limp, her head sunken in and producing more of the red liquid than Daisy had ever seen in her life. Calypso was a lost cause before she had even arrived in the hospital; Daisy felt stupid for believing some miracle would really pull through.

Daisy didn't speak as the two doctors stood there watching.

She didn't react at all, actually, which she was sure was what they were waiting for.

They were waiting for Daisy to scream out and yell things at them.

They were waiting for Daisy to break down sobbing and crumple up into a pile on the floor.

Daisy only blinked though, one of the few things she had control over.

Her heart was beating, and her lungs kept a constant motion of air coming in and out, but those were subconscious actions. Daisy didn't control those things, they just happened naturally without thought.

Daisy couldn't control those things in the same way she couldn't control the events that transpired within her life. Daisy couldn't control those things in the same way she couldn't control whether Calypso lived or died.

The girl blinked, her brain telling her when to do so. She had control over the motion, the swift movement of briefly giving her eyes the shortest nap known to civilization.

"We have a team of psychiatrists here, if at any point you feel you need to talk to somebody, you can always-"

"We got it." Mark cut Amelia off. "Thanks."

Amelia nodded, deciding not to continue with the speech. Mark knew the speech already, because truthfully, doctors were the same in that aspect.

There was the same relative spiel to go by. It was a calculated process, trying to explain to somebody that the person they loved was gone.

It was impossibly difficult to stay neutral. It was hard to show that you did care without being overly-invested emotionally.

Derek struggled particularly in that aspect as he stood beside his sister. The hard look on his face didn't reflect the thoughts he was thinking or the emotions he was feeling. He remained silent, not able to properly form any words as he watched the two people sitting in front of him enter an eerily silent sort of grief.

Amelia sensed it was time to go, beginning to walk away as Derek painfully followed suit.

Daisy watched both doctors trail further and further away from her line of sight. She paid attention to all the tiny particular details.

She noted the way Amelia walked confidently, Derek a bit more deflated. She noted the colors they wore, both adorned in navy blue scrubs that felt gentler on her eyes than some of the other scrubs she saw people wearing. She noted the scrub caps still tucked on their heads.

Amelia wore a purple and blue cap with designs that reminded Daisy of those puffy white dandelions. Derek's cap was various shades of white and blue, depicting images of ferry boats.

Ferry boats.

Daisy hadn't ever been on a ferry boat, but she liked to imagine that she'd float on one someday. She imagined she'd feel weightless and free as the wind slapped her face and the boat glided across Puget Sound.

Daisy pretended Calypso would be there too, and the girls would be happy. They wouldn't have to worry about scary things like brain bleeds and black SUVs and death.

Mark and Daisy sat side by side in a somber silence. It felt a bit like a sociopathic thing as no emotion was expressed between the two. There was merely silence as Mark thought of Calypso and Daisy thought of ferry boats.

Silence was okay, because there truthfully wasn't anything to say.

The silence kept Daisy sane as she continued to tap against her leg, the drumming taking up a more rapid pace as Daisy counted.

15, 30, 45

Ferry boats are nice.

60, 75, 90

Are ferry boats dangerous though?

105, 120, 135

Surely they're safe or else people wouldn't book tickets to go on them. Derek wouldn't have a scrub cap with ferry boats on it if they were murdering machines.

150, 165, 180

Maybe they are deadly though, because that wouldn't make sense, and things that don't make sense happen everyday because nothing really makes sense. Calypso dying doesn't make sense.

"Dr. Sloan?" A timid-looking intern approached the pair, glancing down at a clipboard she held in her hands. "Uh...they have some questions for you to answer, the people down at the, uh...the..."

"The morgue?" Mark questioned, hoping the woman in front of him didn't act that wary and shy in front of all of her patients.

"The morgue. Yeah." The woman confirmed quietly, her eyes flitting between a zoned-out Daisy and an annoyed-looking Mark.

Mark stood up from his seat, saying nothing as he plucked the clipboard from the intern's hands.

He flipped through the pages, which mainly consisted of consent forms and agreements. Mark found it particularly pathetic that the intern had written down notes of what to say to Mark, how to let him know that the people at the morgue needed to talk with him.

"You're usually supposed to wait until the family's had time to grieve before you send them to talk with the morticians. You don't spring right into funeral arrangements." Mark spoke coldly, not looking up as he continued to flip through pages.

The intern was flustered, wringing her hands together. "I...I know, I just...I thought maybe..."

"Why are you still standing here?"

The woman immediately frowned, turning to walk away from the man she regarded as a cold human being.

Mark was tired, and he wanted to go home to process things. The warm hospital that he spent nearly every day at didn't feel quite so warm anymore.

Mark was ready to take a few steps when a thought crossed his mind, and he turned his attention over to Daisy.

"Do you know what she would've wanted?" Mark spoke to Daisy for the first time in hours. "Did she ever talk about what she wanted? A cremation, or a traditional burial, or...?"

Daisy broke from her weird trance of counting and obsessing over ferry boats to look up at the man. "She was seven."

Mark hesitated at the point Daisy had brought up. Calypso was seven, and seven-year-olds didn't ever talk about if they preferred to be cremated or buried when they died.

"What do you want for her, then?"

Daisy was Calypso's sister, she had known the girl from the moment Caly entered the world. Mark figured Daisy should get to decide what was best for her little sister.

But Daisy couldn't think straight, and she hardly had a clear enough mind to decide whether she wanted the tiny girl to be burned or lowered into the ground.

"She was seven." Daisy's tone wavered as she was reminded again how painfully short Calypso's life had been.

Mark frowned at that, deciding to let Daisy silently grieve instead of choosing death arrangements.

The man turned over to the nurses' station, walking ten feet from the waiting room to obtain a pen as the few nurses working gave Mark pitiful looks.

Mark decided he would meet with the morticians, but not now. He still had to process the whole situation, and he knew Daisy needed to process everything as well. He had no intention of leaving Daisy sitting alone in the waiting room.

Naturally, though, Daisy was gone when he turned back to the waiting room.

The girl was going on a walk, she decided, because walks made sense to her.

Death didn't make sense and blood didn't make sense and unresponsive Calypsos on pavements didn't make sense but walking did.

The action of putting one foot in front of the other in a constant motion was so simple, and it made so much sense to Daisy.

She walked, trying not to let any of the scary thoughts plague her head.

Ferry boats are good, Daisy thought to herself as she entered the empty stairwell. One foot in front of the other, she walked down one step, and then another, and then another, and then another.

She repeated the action over and over again until she reached the bottom floor, walking out into the lobby.

Fingers drummed against her thighs as she took a step and then another and then another.

15, 30, 45

There are so many people in the lobby.

60, 75, 90

Because it's raining outside, Daisy. Nobody wants to be outside in the rain.

105, 120, 135

Rain is good. Rain is water and water is good because water washes over you and makes you clean again. We like being clean.

150, 165, 180

Daisy leaned against one of the double doors, pushing the heavy metal forward as she walked outside. The outdoor sidewalks were completely deserted, seeing as nobody in their right mind wanted to be out in the rain.

Daisy wasn't ever in her right mind though, so she didn't think it was exceptionally odd for her to step out into Mother Nature's fury.

The air outside was cold in a bone-chilling way, despite it already being the beginning of May.

It hadn't been raining earlier in the morning. Daisy wished it had been, then maybe her and Calypso wouldn't have gone outside. Maybe if Mother Nature had decided to let down a torrential downpour a couple hours prior, Daisy would still be able to hold her sister.

But Mother Nature's timing was still appropriate as she let down an outpouring of tears in the form of raindrops, seeming to be grieving the girl that had died. The sky was an ugly gray color, and all of nature knew it was time to mourn Calypso.

Daisy continued her walking, letting the raindrops bounce off her head in a forceful manner.

Her hair dampened in a matter of seconds, and she could feel the moisture attacking the soft cloth of the Dartmouth sweatshirt she wore.

One foot in front of the other.

Daisy didn't know where she was going, truthfully, but she knew to keep walking.

One foot in front of the other.

One foot in front of the other.

One foot in front of the other.

One foot in front of the other.

On Daisy's sixth step, she was met with a slosh sound, and she looked down to see that she had unknowingly submerged her foot into a puddle of water.

She felt the cold liquid infiltrating her shoe, seeping right through the fabric of the white sneakers that had been turned red.

Daisy frowned, noticing for the first time that she was still wearing the shoes she had been wearing earlier. Her white shoes still had those red smears, and coffee-colored mud was added to the mixture now.

Daisy didn't like red. Red was bad, and Daisy hated that Calypso's blood was still all over her shoes.

Daisy hated that Calypso's blood was still all over her. It had been scrubbed off in the shower, but Daisy could still feel it. She recalled how warm the liquid felt against her skin, how heavy it was as it weighed her down.

Warmth was bad, Daisy decided. She wanted to be cold. She wanted to never feel as warm as she had when Calypso's blood was on her.

Daisy took another step forward, sinking her other foot into the puddle. Mud looked much better on her shoes than blood did, and she wanted the red to be erased from her sight.

Daisy could see the blood on her shoes as she tried desperately to scrub the fabric that had already been stained.

Daisy could see the blood on her hands still. She could feel the wetness in her hair, the liquid smeared across her face. Daisy knew it was still all over her, and she knelt down in the puddle of collected rainwater as she frantically tried to scrub her hands.

The girl was normally a germaphobe freak, and she knew how dirty the water was. The rain itself was pure and clean, of course, but she knew that the moment the drops touched the Earth, it became waste as it mixed with dirt and silt and pebbles.

Daisy knew there were probably infinite little organisms making their home in the mud, infinite microbes moving all about and infesting Daisy's body as they swarmed her in overwhelming numbers.

But Daisy didn't care about microbes as she knelt in the puddle. Daisy cared about getting the feeling of blood off her skin and not feeling so warm.

The temperature thing was working, Daisy feeling numb as the cold water pooled around her thighs, copious amounts of drops falling from the sky and attacking Daisy.

Her fingers were still warm, and Daisy scrubbed harder. Daisy wanted the warmth to stop. Daisy wanted to be so cold that her fingertips turned blue. Daisy wanted to lose feeling in every part of her body, she wanted the rain to act as a natural anesthetic and numb her completely.

Daisy was spiraling as she counted, her brain telling her to count up to 700 in increments of fifteen. Daisy thought 700 was an excessive amount, but her brain had her in a chokehold.

But 700 isn't divisible by fifteen.

I can't count because if I count by 15 I'll never reach 700, it's not a perfect divisible.

But I don't want to count.

Daisy had no real control over her brain, and she quit arguing with the demanding organ inside her head as she began to count.

15, 30, 45

My hands are turning red.

60, 75, 90

We're scrubbing too hard.

105, 120, 135

The red on your skin is a lighter red than Calypso's blood.

150, 165, 180

Scrubbing is good. Keep scrubbing.

The girl's hands were shaking as she scrubbed, the skin excessively red as a result of harsh motions.

Daisy continued to count without fail, and she made it all the way up to 525 when Mark appeared.

Daisy knew how this looked, genuinely. She knew she looked insane, soaked as she knelt in a muddy puddle, scrubbing and scrubbing and scrubbing at her hands. Her eyes were focused on those hands of hers, her lips parting so slightly as she mouthed the numbers she was counting in her head.

"Daisy."

The girl ignored the man in front of her, counting up and up and up. Counting was the only thing that made sense to her. Counting was the only source of stability that Daisy could think to rely on during this.

It wasn't until Mark knelt down and held Daisy's hands in place to cease the scrubbing that she snapped her eyes up.

Everybody who knew Daisy knew not to interrupt her counting. Mark knew not to interrupt Daisy's counting. Why would Mark interrupt Daisy's counting?

"Calypso is dead."

"I know that." Daisy's expression hardened as she stared at Mark. "You...you made me lose count."