“I have to do those things. I want to before—before—”
I pulled her hand out of my shirt and ran back to my room for my cell phone. I had it up to my ear. I’d forgone talking to the after-hours urgent care and just called 911.
When I got back to her room, she was unconscious again.
Goddamn it.
I scooped her up in my arms, blanket and all, and shouted commands into the phone. There was no way the EMTs could bring an ambulance to the house, and I wasn’t going to wait for them to wheel a gurney across Bay Island. Instead of taking the time to call the caretaker to meet me at the front door with a golf cart, I scooped her up and carried her across the footbridge. And damn, she was so light that it was hardly a burden at all.
My gut twisted with fear and worry. She was stirring against my chest.
“It’s okay, I’m going to get you to the doctor right away,” I said.
She was mumbling so that I could hardly hear her. “I don’t want to but… going to die. I deserve it, after what I did…”
Everything inside me dropped as if I’d suddenly shot up inside a fast-moving elevator. Nausea made my head swim, but I swallowed it and concentrated on what I had to do. In short minutes, I met the ambulance at the bridge from the island to the mainland and they spread her on the gurney, buckling her in. I squeezed into the back of the ambulance beside her and we sped away.
Hours later, I rubbed my sore eyes. It was four in the morning and she lay peacefully in a hospital room, an IV dripping into her arm. She was still and pale and hadn’t stirred since we’d arrived. The doctor had said it was dehydration and exhaustion. She’d had a bad reaction to the new meds and her oncologist had been notified and would be coming by to examine her first thing in the morning. For now, sedated and hydrated, she was safe and stable. And I was a wreck.
I deserve it after what I did. Her words rolled around and around in my mind. That ball of sickness hung in my gut like a boulder. Was she losing her will to live?
My face sank to my hands, the heels of my palms against my eyes. I was lost, with no idea what to do. Physically, for now, she was going to be okay. But her will was flagging. And if she lost her fight, who knew what would happen?
An hour later she stirred, her eyes cracking open. She turned her head to me. “Adam,” she croaked.
I closed my hand over hers. “I’m here.”
“I know,” she whispered, a wan smile appearing on her cracked lips. “You’re always here.”
I didn’t have anything to say to that so I just squeezed her hand.
“What happened? Why am I in the hospital?”
“You had a bad reaction to the new meds.”
“God, my head is killing me.”
“You got dehydrated. You don’t remember anything?”
“Uh. I remember power-puking all over the bathroom and then passing out. That’s about it. Is that how you found me?”
“Yep. Do me a favor next time and hit the goddamn button, please?”
She frowned. “I think I actually was trying to but I thought about it too late. I was being stubborn.”
“I’m shocked.”
“Don’t be sarcastic. It doesn’t suit you. Now… you need to go home and get some sleep.”
“I’m fine.”
“You are not. Go and at least catch a nap.”
“It’s five… your doctor is going to be here in a few hours. I want to be here for that.”
“You haven’t gotten any sleep all night. Now who’s being stubborn?”
I shrugged. “We’re matched well, then, aren’t we?”
She smiled and sighed. “I suppose you could say that.”
I watched her, haunted again by the words she’d spoken in her delirium—words that apparently she had no idea she’d spoken.
“What’s wrong?”
I shrugged. “Just worried about you.”
“I’ll be okay.”
“Yeah? You really believe that?”
She tilted her head at me. “Did I say something to you?”
“You just seemed…it seemed like you were losing hope.”
Her lips thinned. “I’m sorry. I don’t remember saying that. But if I did say something it’s probably just borne from being so tired. I’m getting tired of the constant puking.”
I nodded. “You made me write down a bucket list.”
Her eyes widened. “Shit. I don’t remember that at all. Like, what was on the list?”