Better Days

WANDA POV:

I was in a world of pain right now. 

Absolutely everything hurt. My ribs, my arms, my legs, my head, my throat, absolutely everything. If I moved at all, my ribs screamed in agony. If I swallowed, my throat protested. I couldn't get up to go to the bathroom or to do anything else. I lived in this little hospital bed.

That being said, I was beyond grateful that I had been found. My time in the torture chamber had been hell and I was more than ecstatic to be out of that place. 

A lot of my memories from being tortured were still foggy. For that I thanked God. I could remember a lot but I knew that there was more that I wasn't able to remember. I remembered enough though.

Every waking moment, and even several sleeping moments, were spent thinking about my time there. Thinking about how disgusting I felt, even though I was no longer coated in my blood and other bodily fluids. 

I was embarrassed as well. I don't really remember being rescued but I do know that the whole team probably saw me in my fragile, weak state. Now they'd never let me be an Avenger.

I was able to push that aside though as I focused on healing. Nat was by my bedside every single minute of every single day. I still felt incredibly guilty but I needed her right now. It was obvious she loved me and I loved her more than anything.

I really didn't think that she was going to find me. Hell, I didn't even think that she was looking. I know now more than ever how wrong I was though. 

Ever since I woke up, Dr. Cho had insisted that I do physical therapy. The only problem was, it hurt like a son of a bitch. Just breathing ached, moving was a whole lot worse. 

I was in the middle of a P.T. session and I was trying to hold back tears. Nat was in front of me as her and Clint guided me from lying down into a sitting position. I now had to hold this position.

Granted, it had been almost a week since I had woken up after my long stint of sedation, I still didn't think I should be moving this much. It was excruciating and I dreaded every minute of it. 

Nat kept telling me, "Good job sweetie, you're doing great," but I didn't feel like I was doing great as tears streamed down my face. This was also only part of my P.T.

The other major part of physical therapy was making sure that my muscles didn't atrophy. This is easier said than done. Each day, several times a day, I need to make sure that I move every single part of my body. And I mean every. single. one. 

Tasha has been helping me with this. She starts with my legs, gently picking them up and moving them at the ankles, the knees, and the hips. Each toe needs to move as well but I can usually manage to do this myself. My broken leg gets a little less movement than the other but it's still enough to hurt.

She rolls each joint out and makes sure that they can each bend. Although the bending hurts, the one time I missed P.T., I was in so much pain from lying still that I had to be given major doses of pain meds to knock me out so that my joints could be moved.

After the legs, she moves to my arms. She does the same thing with my arms as she does with my legs, making sure each joint moves all around. I move my fingers while she takes care of my wrists, elbows, and shoulders. Again, my broken hand gets a little more of a break but regardless, it still is incredibly painful. 

My head and spine also need to move. I would say that this is the most painful one. I have to lay on my back and arch and bend my spine. It hurts. A lot. 

Moving my spine results in my abdomen moving which means that each one of my bruised and broken ribs ends up crunching and twisting painfully. My head also has to roll around but luckily the worst that happens is a bad headache. Apparently I fractured my skull and each roll of my head aggravates it a bit.

Soon I'll have to start some breathing exercises for my ribs and lungs but since my ribs are too painful, no one is making me do them. Thank gosh.

So far, I haven't made it out of a single P.T. session without full on sobbing. Dr. Cho says that each one should get easier though and soon it shouldn't be as painful.

Almost every member of the team has been up to see me since I've been awake. Each one asks how I'm doing, tries to get me to eat, and then spends the rest of the time telling me stories. It's entertaining and I like the company, although Nat's with me 24/7. 

Bruce and Dr. Cho have taken me for many scans since I've woken up. I've gotten ultrasounds, CT scans, MRI's, a bone density scan, lots of blood work, and some x-rays. All of these are to ensure that I'm healing.

One of my biggest worries when I woke up was if they had known about the sexual assault. I was torn. On one hand, I didn't want everyone knowing how I was raped while being held hostage but on the other hand, the last thing I needed right now was to be pregnant. 

Luckily, Dr. Cho had been able to tell when they first brought me in and she gave me a pill to try to limit pregnancies and STD's. So far, the pill has worked as I haven't tested positive for pregnancy or any other sexually transmitted disease. At least one thing was going right.

My bones were healing and I was making improvements but it didn't mean that I wasn't in pain. I also wasn't getting much sleep at night. Every time I closed my eyes, I was reminded of all of the pain and agony I went through while kidnapped.

Nat kept trying to get me to talk about what had happened when I was held captive but I dodged the question again and again as I didn't want to relive anything that had happened. I knew she was just trying to help me process everything but I really didn't want to.

Eating was painful but I was told that if I didn't get food down, I would be placed back on the tube and that was not going to happen. 

The guys on the team would bring in food for me to eat but there was one problem. I felt absolutely horrible about it but I was scared of them. Each time a man was in my room, I was reminded of everything that happened during my time spent in the warehouse. 

I tried to hide it as best as I could but sometimes I would flinch if they came too close or if they spoke a little too loudly. I think they were all starting to notice and I felt like a monster as they all made efforts not to come near me. I didn't want them to think that I hated them, I was just scared. It was stupid.

The next day, Nat told me we were ready to start our next PT session. I groaned but moved into a more comfortable position so she could start. Before she started though, she said something that made me a bit nervous, "Wanda, today we're going to try something a bit different. Helen feels that you've healed to the point where you can start moving a bit more. We need to eventually get you out of this bed and today's the day."

My heart sped up. My normal PT was painful enough. I couldn't imagine how bad getting out of bed was going to feel. I took some deep breaths, or as deep as my broken ribs allowed.

Clint walked into the room. So far, I was relatively comfortable around him. He was really the only guy that I wasn't absolutely terrified of being in the room with though. I wasn't as comfortable with him as I was before the kidnapping but it was good enough.

"We're going to move slow and if something hurts too bad, tell me, okay?" Nat asked gently.

"Okay," I breathed out, trying to build up the courage to move out of bed.

Clint came to the edge of the bed and gently folded the blankets back before holding out a hand. I slowly reached out to grab it. I then went to pull myself up using his hand. Almost immediately, I stopped and let myself fall back to the bed, tears filling my eyes. 

As soon as I had tried to pull myself up, my ribs screamed in agony. Falling back to the bed didn't exactly feel good either. I was panting as I lied in the bed, not moving to try to reduce the flaring pain in my abdomen.

"Wanda, you okay?" Clint asked.

I hesitated but nodded, reaching back out to grab his hand. This time, Nat moved so she was at the top of my bed. She reached a hand behind me to help push me up. My ribs still hurt but it was less than the first time.

Once I was sitting up, they gave me a second to catch my breath and to situate myself. Everything was blurry from the tears in my eyes but I held them back, not wanting to cry this early on.

"You're doing great sweetie," Tasha told me as she rubbed my back carefully.

I sat there for another minute or so before Clint asked, "You ready to keep going?"

I really didn't want to but I nodded, getting ready for more pain. "You're doing so good," he told me. "Now all you have to do is get your legs to the edge of the bed." This consisted of my swiveling my body to face one of the side walls, moving my legs until they hung off the side of the bed.

I tried moving my legs first, allowing my waist to follow. My ribs made an awful crunching noise as I moved my waist a little too much. I bit back a scream, letting out a mangled whine.

I sucked in a breath as I kept moving to the edge of the bed. I now had a few tears trailing down my face, although I tried to bite them back.

Once I got my legs to hang over the edge of the bed, I was ready to be done. My whole body was aching. This was the most movement I had done in awhile. I wanted to go back to lying down but I knew my PT session wasn't over.

"Good job baby," Nat told me as she squeezed my arm. "You're doing so great. All we have to do is get you up and over to that chair," she said as she pointed to a chair across the room.

More tears fell as I thought of how far I needed to go. I wasn't ready for this, I couldn't do it. 

"Nat," I whimpered, looking to her, trying to get her to stop.

"I know honey, but you're doing so great. We need to get you moving sweetheart. I love you." She brushed some tears from my face as she said this, only for them to quickly be replaced by more.

"I can't," I cried.

"Shh," she told me. "Just to the chair and we're done." Each heaving sob caused more pain in my ribs. Clint's hand was placed on my back, rubbing firm circles. 

I was shaking but I knew I needed to do this. I scooted a little more until my foot was touching the floor. My broken leg was hovering over the floor. 

"How can I do this with one leg?" I asked, sniffling.

"We're going to get you into the wheelchair and then get you transferred to the chair," Nat explained. This was better than walking, or in my case, hopping, all the way over to the chair.

"Okay," I cried, trying to blink away the tears.

"Ready?" Clint asked calmly, gripping onto my non broken arm.

"Yeah," I said as I nodded. I pushed my strength onto my one leg, letting Clint help by lifting my arm and the side with my broken leg.

Unfortunately, when you haven't used your legs in over a week, they get weak and can't hold your body weight.

Almost as soon as I had pushed myself up, I felt my good leg buckle, sending my body falling towards the floor. Clint and Nat both reached out to grab me, Clint being closer, meaning that he was the one who saved me from slamming into the floor. Being caught didn't hurt any less than I expected hitting the floor to hurt.

When Clint caught me, he wrapped his arms around my waist, pressing on all of my broken ribs. This was enough to make me burst into tears.

"Oww," I moaned through my sobs. "Oww, Nat," I cried, trying to breathe through the pain.

Clint was quick to lift me back onto the bed, setting me onto the edge.

"Oww," I said through my gasps for air. My ribs were shooting pain through my chest and abdomen and I couldn't breathe. This was causing me to panic which made breathing even harder.

"Wanda, Wanda," I heard cut through my panicked thoughts. I looked up to see Nat in front of me, her eyes worried. "Honey, I need you to breathe."

"I can't, it hurts," I whispered.

Nat climbed onto the bed, pulling my body with her. This caused even more pain and it took everything in me not to scream out in pain. She leaned me back until my back was against her chest.

I relaxed my body into her, letting her hand run through my hair.

"Oww Tasha," I cried. "Oww." 

"Shh, I know, just breathe."

I let my head fall onto her shoulder, trying to breathe past the pain.

It took awhile but soon, my ribs were less painful and I was able to breathe again. My crying slowly ceased and now I was just exhausted.

"I don't want to go to the chair," I said quietly after I had calmed down.

"We aren't doing that today, don't worry sweetie," Nat told me, hushing me before I could work myself back up.

She slowly pushed me up enough so that she could get out from behind me. I was upset by the loss of contact but my body was also starting to hurt pressed up against hers.

She spoke something quietly to Clint before leaving the room. 

"Where's she going?" I asked quickly, not wanting her to go.

"She'll be right back, she just went to go grab Helen," Clint explained.

I continued to take as deep of breaths as possible with my painful ribs to stay calm until Nat got back. She got back relatively quickly, Dr. Cho following behind her.

"Hey Wanda, I heard PT didn't go as planned."

"Yeah," I said quietly, eyeing the syringe she had in her hand. She set it down on the counter before washing her hands, walking closer to me but leaving the syringe on the counter.

She checked my IV machine and then asked if she could check my abdomen.

"Sure," I said, not wanting her to sedate me. She leaned the bed back slightly, beginning to reignite the pain in my ribs, before stopping when I was almost completely laying back.

She lifted up my gown, making sure the blankets still covered my legs, until the gown was bunched around my chest. It allowed her to get a complete view of my bruised abdomen though. I wasn't really able to see it from my position and when I lifted my head to try to catch a glance at my stomach, my ribs screamed out in pain, quickly causing me to relax back into the bed.

She warned me before she did anything. Dr. Cho let me know she was going to touch and gently press around my abdomen to make sure I didn't seriously hurt anything. I was slightly surprised by the chill of her hands but other than that, the gentle touching was fine.

It wasn't until she started pressing my abdomen that I started getting slightly upset. I tried to hold in my whimpers but a few escaped as she moved around my abdomen. She got to my painful ribs and I tried jerking away, only making the pain worse.

"Ouch," I whispered under my breath, trying to hold back the tears. 

"Sorry Wanda," she said apologetically as she moved to another area. I closed my eyes and squeezed my one good hand into a fist, waiting for it to be over. Luckily, it wasn't much longer before she finished the exam on my stomach.

Helen turned to face Nat and Clint as she seemed to have a silent conversation with them. Clint nodded slightly before looking at me, back at Nat, and then leaving the room. Nat walked closer to me, sitting down right next to the bed.

"Hey Wanda, you have been doing great with your recovery! Everything looks like it's healing up nicely. Helen has one more thing she wants to check though."

"Okay," I said, kind of curiously.

"I know we haven't really talked much about it but we need to check and make sure that you are healing from the sexual assault." All of the breath left my lungs and it felt as if the entire world paused. Natasha really hadn't mentioned this my entire recovery. The only time the rape was mentioned was when they told me that I had been given a pill to prevent pregnancies. I had gotten pregnancy tests after that but it was never mentioned, they just tested some of my urine. 

I could practically hear my heart beating in my ears and it took Nat gently shaking my shoulder to bring me back. "Wanda? Are you okay?" she asked gently.

It took me a second but I nodded, quickly following that with a small, "Uh, yeah, sorry."

"You have nothing to apologize for sweetie," she told me, squeezing my hand.

"All I have to do is a quick vaginal exam to make sure everything is healing and nothing is infected or problematic," Dr. Cho explained to me. "I will try to make it as quick and as comfortable as possible."

"Will it hurt?" I asked carefully, scared of the answer.

"It might, I'm sorry," she responded. 

That's when Nat cut in, "but we're going to do everything to reduce the pain and to make it as painless as possible, okay?"

"Okay," I whispered, nodding my head. I had a catheter so I hadn't had to deal with that area of my body since I was rescued. I didn't even want to think about what had happened but this exam was forcing me too. 

"Okay Wanda," Dr. Cho started, moving a chair to the bottom of the bed. She pulled these two leg rests out from the bottom of the bed, setting them up for the exam. "All I need you to do is set your legs onto here." She patted the leg rests, showing me where she wanted me to put my legs. 

I couldn't move. I would be vulnerable when I put my legs onto there. 

Helen seemed to see that I was nervous. "Take your time Wanda, I still need to grab a few things." She walked over to a little cart that was sitting in the corner. She grabbed the handle to roll it over to where I was laying. 

My legs were shaking at this point. Nat was gripping my hand. 

"Wanda, can you move your legs? Do you need help?" she asked me. I looked at her. 

"I don't want to do this Nat," I spoke, barely above a whisper. I knew if I tried to talk normally, my voice would crack. 

"I know sweetie," she placed a hand on my forehead, brushing my hair out of the way. "It'll be quick, we just need to make sure you're healing. It's just Helen and I, no one else will come in."

"Please," I begged quietly, tears now spilling out over my cheeks.

"Baby girl, I'm sorry but we need to make sure you're healing. If something is not healing correctly, that can cause issues later down the road. I'm right here sweetie."

I still didn't move my legs as I started to cry harder, trying not to jostle my ribs too much.

I saw as Nat looked towards Helen. I turned towards her as well.

"Wanda, if you'd be more comfortable, we can sedate you for the exam?" Dr. Cho offered. 

"No!" I shouted. So that's what the syringe was. I wanted to know what was going on. I wanted control of my body.

"Okay, we don't have to, it was just an option," she quickly explained.

I tried to calm my body down from the idea of being sedated while also knowing that this exam needed to happen sooner or later.

"Everything is healing fine," I tried to convince them. "It doesn't even hurt." That wasn't a complete lie, I didn't move very often and the rest of my body hurt bad enough to distract me from any pain in that area.

"Wanda, you need an exam," Nat told me. "I know it's scary but it needs to happen. You can do this."

I was shaking as I lied there for a few more minutes not moving. Both of the adults in the room were waiting patiently, giving me plenty of time.

"What're you going to do?" I questioned after a good five minutes.

"All I'm going to do is look around the outside and make sure everything is looking okay. Then I'm going to do a brief internal exam. I will let you know when I'm going to touch you and what I'm doing at every moment, okay?" I nodded. "I have a small tool that I will use to get a better look but other than that, I don't have anything I'm going to use other than my hands."

"Okay," I replied shakily, preparing myself. I slowly inched my legs towards the stirrups, continuing until my legs were fully placed on the rests.

"Good job Wanda," Nat exclaimed.

"Alright Wanda, I'm going to use these straps here, just to keep your legs in place," Helen began. I panicked, remembering the restraints.

"No!" I cried out. "Please, I'm sorry, I'll stay put!"

"Okay," Dr. Cho was quick to comply, setting the straps to the side. "We don't have to use them. I will keep them off, just promise you won't move during the exam?"

"I promise," I replied, willing to do anything to not be strapped down. 

"Okay, then the straps stay off."

I took some deep breaths, gripping Nat's hand. "Shh, you're doing great honey," Nat whispered, rubbing a soothing hand up and down my arm.

Helen was true to her word. She told me what she was going to do before she did it, waiting until I was ready. The first part of the exam wasn't so bad. I was shaking the entire time but not from pain, just from anxiety of what was going on. 

Nat was there the entire time, gripping my hand, running her fingers through my hand, offering me comforting words, brushing away my tears, and overall just being there for support. I gripped onto her hand like a lifeline, squeezing it when the exam reached a painful part or when it was just getting to be a little too much. I was also being flooded with memories of what had happened in the warehouse.

Then Helen told me she was moving onto the internal part. I was fine until she inserted the tool. I screamed in pain. Nat jumped, whipping her head back towards me and asking what was wrong. I was crying, trying to move away from the tool.

"Ow! Stop! Ow!" I cried. 

Dr. Cho removed the tool. "The tool is gone Wanda," she assured me. "I'm sorry, that should not have hurt. Are you okay?" My heart rate was going a mile a minute but I managed to nod.

"Can we be done?" I cried, not wanting to go through the pain.

"Unfortunately Wanda, I need to be able to see what caused you that much pain. I won't use the tool again but I have to do just a few more things before we can be done."

This worsened the crying and it took everything in me not to move my legs. "You're doing great baby," Nat told me, kissing my temple. She was now sitting on the edge of the bed, blocking my view from anything Dr. Cho was doing. 

"Deep breaths sweetie," she encouraged me.

"Alright Wanda, I'm not going to use the tool but you're going to feel my hands."

"Okay," I whimpered, trying to stay calm. Tears were still running down my face, the panic pressing against my chest.

I did feel hands and luckily, they didn't hurt. It was slightly uncomfortable but there wasn't much pain. She told me she was doing a swab and then checking with her hands one last time.

I was finally feeling a bit calmer after there wasn't really pain and the exam was finishing. She was almost done when I felt the searing pain again.

I jumped, yelping out in pain, trying to move up the bed to escape the pain. "Ow!" I cried out again. "Ow! Ow, it hurts!"

Helen spoke over my screams of pain. "I know Wanda, just try to hold still. I think I found what's hurting you, I just have to see it. You're doing great." She stayed calm, even over my screaming.

"Ow, please stop!" I cried, the pain continuing. "Stop, please!" I begged. "It hurts! Tasha, why won't it stop?"

"Shh, you're doing great sweetie, you're almost done. Breathe. You're doing so good. I love you baby." She repeated comforting phrases but it did nothing to ease the pain inside of me. 

I squirmed, trying to get away from the pain. I moved my legs away from the stirrups, trying to end the exam myself, but Helen just moved her hand with me.

"Ouch, stop! Please, it hurts a lot, please," I whimpered and begged.

"Done," Dr. Cho announced, taking off her gloves and moving away from the bottom of the bed. She placed a hand on my knee, "You did so good Wanda. I'm sorry for the pain. You have an infected wound inside of you, that's why it hurt so bad. I'll get you put on some antibiotics and hopefully we'll get that all healed up."

The pain was still there, just less. I had a throbbing sensation inside of me as I continued to cry. Nat was off of the bed and talking to Dr. Cho while I lied there, trying to relax.

My ribs hurt from the crying and screaming and I was even more exhausted than earlier. Crying really took a lot out of me, especially right now.

Dr. Cho left after a few more minutes and Nat came back over to me. "That really hurt mama," I whimpered, leaning towards her.

"I know baby, you did amazing. I love you so much."

"I hurt all over," I cried. "I don't like it, please mama."

"Shh sweet girl, I know, you're gonna start feeling better real soon." She brushed her hand through my hair, cupping my cheeks. 

"I don't want to do this anymore," I cried, trying to turn over but being stopped by the pain in my ribs. "It all hurts."

"I'm sorry baby. Close your eyes, try to get some sleep, it'll all be better when you wake up."

I followed her instructions, allowing my eyes to fall closed. I was exhausted so it wasn't hard and soon, I felt myself drifting off to sleep.

NATASHA POV:

I felt my heart breaking as I watched Wanda recover. She was having a hard time with basically everything. She had been broken up badly when she was kidnapped. Thank gosh we found her when we did. She probably wouldn't have made it much longer.

PT sessions absolutely killed me. Hearing her cries as we moved her damaged body shattered my heart. Helen had told Clint and me that we were ready to move onto bigger physical therapy. She felt as if Wanda's body was ready. When I told her my concerns about how much pain she was still in, Helen explained to me that she was going to be in pain until we started to move her body more. It sucked but that was the only option.

She had told us that we could start off slow. Get her from the bed to the wheelchair and then from the wheelchair to the chair across the room. That was it.

Unfortunately, it did not go as planned. Wanda was in way more pain than we had all thought and the session ended with her basically screaming in pain after Clint had to catch her when her good leg buckled.

I had to calm her down from a panic attack after that. We hadn't even gotten her to the wheelchair. I was dreading the next PT session. Causing her pain caused parts of me to die. Watching her cry and beg for me to stop putting her through so much pain was heartbreaking. I knew it needed to be done to get her to heal though so I did it.

Despite how horrible the PT sessions were though, Wanda was doing surprisingly well given everything that had happened to her. Bruce and Helen had both explained that she was blocking all of her emotions regarding what had happened, that's why she seemed to be doing so well. They told us that when she started processing everything, that it wasn't going to be pretty and that she was going to need support.

We knew that we would eventually have to force her to talk but right now, we needed to get through the immediate, physical recovery. Emotional recovery could come when she could breathe without extreme pain.

Her eating wasn't where we all wanted it to be but it was still better than I had expected. Everything was actually going pretty well until Helen had called me out during one of Wanda's naps to talk.

"Everything is healing well, or at least, everything that I can see. I haven't done a single vaginal exam on her since she first came in here. I really need to do one soon, I have no idea what is going on down there. Her last set of labs had an elevated white blood cell count too which means there is likely an infection. All of her other wounds seem to be healing well though so that's the only other thing I could think of."

"Shit, okay," I started. "She probably won't take it well."

"I know, we can always sedate her if she would like, but it really needs to be done sooner rather than later."

"Yeah, maybe sometime this afternoon??

"I can definitely do that."

"Awesome, thanks Helen, really, you're doing great taking care of her."

"No problem Agent Romanoff," she replied. I smiled at her before walking back into the room quietly, trying to keep Wanda asleep.

"What was that about?" Clint asked. He had been spending the most time with us as Wanda didn't seem to mind. That was the only thing that really showed any kind of emotional relation to what had happened. She didn't seem comfortable around any of the men on the team anymore. I didn't blame her, I wouldn't either after what had happened. Clint just stuck with her though and so now she's relatively comfortable around him.

"Helen needs to do a vaginal exam on her. She's showing signs of infection and that's the only place she hasn't checked."

"When's that happening?" he asked after looking at Wanda worriedly.

"Sometime this afternoon. She's not going to like it."

"She'll be okay, she's got you to get her through it."

"Yeah," I sighed as I looked at her. Poor, sweet Wanda. She looked so small in the big, white bed. I just wanted to scoop her up and hold her, keeping her safe from the evil in this world.

I was pulled out of my thoughts by my phone ringing. I quickly picked it up to check who it was, not wanting to wake up Wanda. 

"It's the school," I told Clint before I left the room once again. I had honestly completely forgotten about the school. They're probably calling to see where Wanda was as she hadn't been there for a while.

"Hello, this is Natasha," I said as I answered the phone.

"Hi Natasha, this is Caitlin from Mills High School. Wanda hasn't been to school in quite some time now and we were just calling to see if everything was okay?"

"Hi, yes, Wanda has been in a car accident and in all of the chaos, I have completely forgotten to call her in. I'm so sorry. She is still recovering and probably won't be in for a while. I can send you in a doctor's note if needed."

"Oh no! We are so sorry to hear that! Totally do not worry about sending in a note or anything, we can worry about that when Wanda is doing better and is ready to come back. I will let all of her teachers know what is going on and we will figure out a plan for her. I can call you back or email you later with some more information about any plan that may form. Right now though, do not worry about anything. We will get her school work figured out and her teachers will work with her closely when she is feeling better to get her all caught up. Is there anything we can do for you guys?"

"I don't think so. Thank you so much for being so understanding. Again, sorry I haven't called her in, I've just been so busy making sure she's okay."

"Definitely, is she doing okay?"

"Yes, she's stable and is awake, she just got banged up pretty badly."

"Oh, well I'm glad she's doing okay. Well you just let us know if you need anything."

"Will do, thanks."

"Alrighty, bye-bye."

I hung up the phone. That woman was always so cheery. I pocketed my phone before heading back into the room. I told Clint what they had wanted.

I obviously wasn't going to tell the school the truth about what had happened to Wanda. I didn't need the entire school spreading lies about the kidnapping, coming up with all of these terrible possibilities in their head. Wanda didn't need that, when, or if, she went back. I had been thinking about keeping her home more and more lately. If she wanted to go back, she could, but so far, that school has done nothing but hurt her. It hasn't done anything good and I wasn't sure I wanted to send her back. I could figure that out later though. She definitely wasn't in shape to be going back anytime soon.

It wasn't long before Wanda woke up. We did the dreaded, horrible PT session and then let her rest until Dr. Cho came in to do the exam. She did one more check of the rest of her body to see if there was any sign of infection there. When there wasn't, she looked back at me, signaling that it was time for the other exam. Clint left after that, knowing it would probably only cause Wanda more stress if he was in here.

I took a deep breath, knowing Wanda was going to need a lot of support through this and that I wasn't going to be able to show my own emotions during this exam. We started slow by explaining what was going to happen.

I knew immediately she wasn't going to comply easily. She was crying before the exam even started. Her tiny body was shaking and she was gripping onto my hand, trying to take deep breaths. It didn't help that her ribs were extremely painful.

The exam felt like it took forever. I tried my hardest to keep Wanda calm but nothing was working. She was panicking and shaking, tears continually flowing down her cheeks. I felt horrible, allowing everything to happen. Not just this exam but everything. If I had been gentler with her, she never would have left the compound and then she never would have gotten kidnapped.

I was beating myself up but I knew that now wasn't the time after Wanda squeezed my hand exceptionally tight and let out a scream.

"What's wrong? Are you okay?" I asked her quickly, listening as her sobs increased.

She kept saying something hurt and I saw as Helen pulled away a tool. 

We waited for Wanda to calm down and I shifted to the bed, trying to offer Wanda more comfort. She was doing so good. I knew this was hard for her.

The rest of the exam went fine until Helen tried to finish the internal exam. Wanda's body jumped as she let out another scream, saying that it hurt again.

"I've almost got it Wanda," I heard Helen mumbling. "I've just got to look and see what this is. Try to keep her still," she told me when I looked at her to ask what was going on. I placed my hands on her shoulders, rubbing up and down to try to offer her comfort.

"Shh baby, you're doing so good." 

Wanda was twisting around, still letting out screams and whimpers. Helen was trying to look at something and was having a hard time as Wanda kept moving.

Finally, she finished, moving away from the bottom of the bed to give Wanda space. I watched as Wanda's body sagged into the bed, tears still falling. 

Helen explained how there was an infected wound inside, caused from the rape, that was causing her the pain and the signs of an infection. She told us she would just start some antibiotics and that that should be enough to fix it.

I almost threw up when I heard her give the diagnosis though. I couldn't believe that Wanda had an infected wound inside of her from being raped, over and over again. I didn't throw up because it was gross, I threw up because I could picture how many times she was raped and how horrible it had to be to cause a wound so bad that it could get infected. My poor baby girl. 

She was having a hard time with everything right now and I told her to try to get some sleep. She was in so much pain. My sweet baby. I loved her so much and it killed me that I couldn't take away her pain.

Luckily, she fell asleep quickly. I watched as her face fell into a peaceful expression once she fell into a deep sleep.