Rebecca held in the tears as she walked down the hallways of the hospital, searching for the special comforting place she knew had to be there somewhere: the chapel.
Rebecca wasn't exactly showy with her religion, and in fact she seldom discussed it with anyone, Lassiter included; yet she did have a religion. More so than that, as a sickly child with many sickly and elderly relatives, she spent many hours in the chapel of the hospital in her hometown, and had come to think of it as a safe place in general, a place that was always empty but always there, ready to help the people who, like Rebecca, needed an escape but had nowhere else to go.
Sure enough, when she found the chapel of this particular hospital, it was empty and quite dark, lit only by two wall sconces and the dim backlight behind the solitary stained glass window on the wall. The reds and blues of the windows shone geometric patterns and intricate shadows on the carpeted floor and the bench on which Rebecca fell, sobbing silently.
"Hey," Shawn said, sitting down beside her.
"I'm sorry."
"Why?"
"I don't mean to be getting emotional over this, but I can't help it."
"Oh, c'mon, Becca. Nothing wrong with getting emotional! I think maybe you're right. You are spending too much time with Lassie."
"But... That's not..."
"Oh! I get it! Look, Becca, you don't have to worry about Lassie and his lung currently being attached to his chest wall and the possible complications of his tissue being shredded from the bullet. I mean, look on the bright side. At least his broken rib didn't puncture his lungs and cause him to drown in his own fluids!"
Unable to do anything for a moment except stare at Shawn in horror, Rebecca covered her face and sobbed some more.
"Hm. Clearly that wasn't as comforting as it was supposed to be," Shawn said.
"Hey, there," Buzz called from the door, crossing to sit on the other side of Rebecca. "Are you okay?"
Wiping away the tears that were beginning to dry around her eyes and hoping that he hadn't seen her cry, she said, "Yes, I'm fine."
"You didn't look fine. You look like you've been crying."
"I have. I just wasn't going to mention it. I hate crying for an audience."
"I'm sorry. Do you want me to go?"
"No, it's fine. You can stay if you want. I just... I don't know. I just came in here..."
"I did, too. I like it in here." Buzz paused for a moment, then asked, "Do you think Detective Lassiter will be okay?"
Rebecca took a deep breath, fixing her eyes on a particularly mesmerizing piece of sapphire-colored glass in the window. "Yes. Yes, I do. Do you see that panel in the window? The blue one?"
"The dark blue one, on the top?"
"Yes."
"It's the same color as his car. And it's the same color as a policeman's uniform."
"No, it's not," Shawn interrupted. "Those are all separate colors, silly. If anything, it's blue as the Space Window from the National Cathedral in Washington DC. I know, because I worked there as a docent for a while."
Rebecca frowned. "I didn't know you were Episcopalian."
"I'm not."
"Then how...? You know what? Never mind. I don't want to know. But you're right. It's all of those colors."
"I don't think I get the point of this, Becca."
"I don't, either," Buzz confessed.
"It's easy," Rebecca said. "Well, it's not easy. But... Do you guys suddenly feel like everything's going to be okay?"
"No," the men said simultaneously.
"Well. It will be. Whatever happens, it's out of our control. If he lives---which I think he will---then great. If he doesn't, we move on. It's that simple."
"No," Shawn said. "No, it's not that simple. Becca... Lassie could die. He could die right now."
"He could," Rebecca agreed.
"Anything could happen to him, and if he dies, everything that we've come to understand and feel comfortable with will change. Someone could replace him who likes me less than he does. What if Lucinda replaces him? She won't let me get away with half the stuff that he does, and he tries to stop everything I do! ...Well... I guess not everything... And he's helped me and Gus out a lot... And he's our friend. The weird kid down the street who only eats mayonnaise on saltines..."
"I'm sorry, what?"
"Nothing. We had to clear Lassie's name once. It was a long story."
"Okay. Well. I see what you're saying. Things would change. But at the same time... Nothing ever really changes. You live, you breathe, you die. And then someone else lives, and breathes, and dies. Someone before us lived, and breathed, and died. We're doing the same things they did. We're loving people and getting our hearts broken. We're laughing one minute and worrying the next. We're happy and sad and joyful and afraid and angry and loving and young and old and everything else, just like the generations before us were, and just like the generations ahead of us will be. Nothing ever really changes. Someone...lots of someones have been here before us, in this very room, looking that that piece of blue window and wondering if their loved ones will live or die. Some of them left here smiling and some of them left here crying and some of them left here feeling just plain scared. But they all came and they all left, despite whatever else happened. We're all the same. Nothing ever really changes."
"I don't get it," Buzz said.
"That's okay," Rebecca said. "I rarely ever make sense. Thanks for listening anyway."
"I don't like dealing with death," Shawn said suddenly.
"Nobody does," Rebecca replied.
"If you say that dealing with death is something that never changes, I will find some jerk chicken and rub it all over you so Gus will smell you and try to eat you."
"Shawn? Have you been drinking Kaf-Pows again?"
"No. But now that you mention it, I'm going to make a snack run. Buzz, you with me?"
"No," Buzz answered. "But have fun."
"Suiteth thyself, man of large muscles. Shawn Spencer out!"
There was a long and awkward silence in which Rebecca stared at the window and Buzz stared at Rebecca.
"Do you really think nothing ever changes?" Buzz said finally.
"Yes and no. It's complicated. Obviously, the little things change. Technology. Laws. Societies. But the big things don't. Human nature doesn't really change. There are patterns everywhere. And they keep on going, forever. At least, that's the way it looks to me. But I could be wrong. I'm wrong a lot. And everything is subjective."
"I'm not good at subjective."
"You're better than you think you are. Everyone is."
"If nothing ever changes...then...does that mean we don't matter?"
"No. You matter. Everyone matters. Everyone is important. We're living in the greatest story ever written."
"Do you think I'm as important as Detective Lassiter?"
"Yes. At least. Maybe more."
"Why do you think Carte shot him?"
"I don't know. He was...misled, I guess. He was offered two roles to play in the story, and he chose the wrong one. Yet another pattern that doesn't change: people make a lot of bad choices. Some more than others."
"Why do you keep staring at the window?"
"It's pretty. I could use some pretty. I think we could all use some pretty." She didn't want to voice her real feelings, the feeling of being at peace, that life would unfold in the right direction. It was a feeling too private to be shared.
"I think I'm going to go home now," Buzz said. "Are you going to stay here until he wakes up?"
"Yep."
"Alone?"
"No."
"Okay." Buzz paused again. "Goodbye, Rebecca."
"Goodbye, Buzz," Rebecca said, and returned to the waiting room to sit with Woody and Juliet, thinking about what she would say to Lassiter if he woke up, trying to decide whether or not to tell him again that she loved him.
Author's Chapter Notes:
And because every big dramatic death/near-death scene needs a big, dramatic, pointless yet profound conversation....