I have a thousand questions, and can't verbalize any of them.
He puts his hand on mine. "I know, I know—you have questions and you can't ask them. We'll get to it all. But you do have other injuries. You broke several ribs and one of them punctured your lung. That's coming along nicely, but you've got some work ahead of you to get your lung back where it needs to be. You also have a compound fracture of your tibia." He indicates my left leg, which is in a cast and elevated. "You were in a hell of a wreck, Ms. James. You're truly lucky to be alive—if EMS had gotten to you any later, that punctured lung could've been…well, no sense dwelling on that. Just try to remember to be thankful, okay? You're alive. You’ll recover. In time, you'll be back to normal. But for now, just rest, okay? Get some sleep."
I widen my eyes, fear filling me. "C—coh…coma?"
He gives me a reassuring smile. "You won't go back into a coma. Youwillsleep very, very deeply, and there will still be some confusion and disorientation, speech difficulties, everything you're feeling now." He pats my hand. "I know it's all scary and confusing." He indicates Felix. "But lucky for you, you've got this fella here. He hasn't left your side for a second since you came in."
That makes my heart do funny things.
Felix is stoic through all this, just holding my hand and listening—when the doctor mentions him, Felix ducks his head and moves to withdraw his hand—I hold on as tightly as I can, and he allows me to keep holding it.
The doctor slaps his knees. "Well, I think that's enough for now. You need to rest. And don't fight it, okay? If you fall asleep, youwillwake up. And don't be shy about pain control, okay? If it starts hurting so you can't rest, you hit that call button. You're in good hands, Ms. James. We'll take the best possible care of you."
"Th—thay…"
He winks at me with what is, I assume, his most charming smile; he's a good-looking man and he knows it. "No worries, Ms. James. I'll be by in a while to check on you." He gently taps Felix on the back of the shoulder with the iPad. "Take good care of our girl, huh?"
"Yeah, I will. Thanks, doc."
When he's gone, I meet Felix's eyes. For a long time, we just look at each other. There's so much I want to say, but it's all behind that impenetrable wall of fog.
Eventually, the leaden weightiness in my limbs spreads to my eyelids, and I find myself drifting.
I force them open and squeeze Felix's hand as hard as I can. "F-Fee…"
"I'm here, Ember. Not goin' anywhere." His voice is rough and ragged, as if he's swallowed gravel. "Got you, Ember. I've got you."
I don't want to sleep. I want to remember what happened. I want to know why there's a rattling little hot hard ball of anger in my belly when I look at him. I want to know why the thought of California brings such sorrow. I want to know why I got in a wreck—I'm normally a very careful driver. I've never gotten a ticket, never been in a fender bender, and I've covered literally over a million miles. Dutchie and I did some back-of-a-napkin calculations, using estimates of places I know I've been since I personally started driving—it'd probably be more than double the number if you include the years I was just mom's passenger as a kid.
Felix lifts my hand to his lips and kisses it—I wriggle my fingers, feeling the scratch of his stubble under my fingertips.
"Bee…Beer…beard," I whisper. "L-lie…like."
He gives me a lopsided grin, putting my palm to his cheek and jawline. "You like the beard, huh?"
"Mmm."
“Then I'll leave it." He touches my cheekbone with a fingertip. "Rest, Ember. I’ll be right here when you wake up."
I can't fight it anymore.
This time, there is no darkness, no eigengrau…just the nothingness of sleep.
Seventeen
FELIX
TWO WEEKS LATER
"No wheelchair," Ember snaps at the nurse holding the device that is the bane of Ember's existence. "Walk."
The nurse looks at me for help, but I shrug. "Don't look at me. I can't make her do anything."
Willa, the nurse, knuckles her forehead. "It's just hospital policy, Ember. We all know how hard you’ve worked on using your crutches."
Ember narrows her eyes at the wheelchair. "I hate thing that." She growls at the slip. "That thing."
"It's no different than the crutches, honey," Willa says—Willa is an actual saint, I'm pretty sure, anointed and shit. Or, she has the patience of one, at least. "It's just a tool to help you. And in this case, hospital policy is that every admitted patient must be wheeled to the exit by the nursing staff." She leans forward toward Ember. "Dr. Richardson broke his leg and got a nasty infection a few years ago and had to be admitted. And wouldn't you know, he pitched an almighty fit about being wheeled out like every other patient? But you know what happened? I wheeled his ass out of here. You can't out-stubborn me, sweetheart."
