I swipe my palm down my face, dragging the tears with it, as I smear them into my skin.
“You don’t know shit.” I exhale, but it shakes too much to sound like relief. “I’m here because she tore my life apart and I fucking let her. She walked into my world like a goddamn wildfire and I didn’t want to put her out.”
I pause, swallowing down the sob building in my chest. “I watched her cry and still smile like her heart wasn’t breaking. I watched her try to hold herself together when every fucking thing in her life was falling apart, and, she still made room for me.” My throat tightens as I tap my fist to my chest. “She lives right fucking here.”
I look at them, really look at them, as my voice splinters. “She made me feel like I was more than a broken shell. Like I fucking mattered. I’m not good with words, I fucking know that. I’m cold, angry. I’ve never been easy. But she stayed. And now she’s in there—” I jerk my chin toward the ER doors, my voice catching on the edge of it, “and I might fucking lose her.” I blink once, but the tears still fall. “And if I do, then I don’t know who the fuck I am anymore.”
The silence afterward is deafening. Layla’s already crying, Reed won’t look up, and Amelia looks like she’s trying to breathe through her heartache.
I sit back down, burying my head in my hands, whispering to no one in particular.
“She’s everything. And I don’t know how to survive the world if she’s not in it.”
carter
. . .
Left, right, turn, repeat.
It’s muscle memory now—this loop of helplessness. I’ve scuffed a permanent path into the linoleum, my boots dragging like they’re just as fucking exhausted as I am.
I’ve been walking since they took her through those locked doors. Since they looked me in the eye and said the word I fucking hate more than anything.
Wait.
That fucking word shouldn’t exist when you’re in love with someone who might not wake up. I don’t wait, I rip apart whatever’s in my way. But now? I’m just a man pacing a hallway, holding onto pieces of a woman who slipped out of my arms hours ago.
Baby…I’m still here.
A voice cuts through the static.
“Family for Catalina Ajemian?”
My head jerks toward the sound, already moving before I know I’ve made the choice. My boots strike the tile, loud, fast, the pace of a man who will tear the world apart to get to her.
The doctor steps through the doors, clipboard in hand, as his eyes scan the corridor like this is a goddamn routine check.
“Who’s here for Catalina?” he asks, casually. Like she didn’t fucking die in my arms hours ago.
“Me.”
He looks at me for a long beat, like he sees everything I’m trying not to say. The bloodshot eyes, the scuffed boots, the days I’ve aged in hours.
“She’s awake.”
The words hit so hard my knees nearly fold beneath me. I stagger a step back, needing something to hold onto but finding nothing but air.
“She got fortunate. We found traces of fentanyl in the pills she took. We managed to get everything out of her system. Her vitals are stable, and she’s responsive.”
My eyes close, just for a second. Just long enough to let that sink in without falling apart.
“She’ll be placed under a seventy-two-hour psychiatric hold, maybe even longer depending on her mental state.”
My eyes snap open. “What?”
“It’s standard protocol after an intentional overdose,” he says calmly, like he hasn’t just gutted me. “We need to ensure she isn’t a danger to herself or anyone else.”
“Three days,” I whisper to myself.
