“You need to wait for the doctor to speak with you. I’m sorry, but I don’t know anything.” She reached out, giving my shoulder a gentle squeeze, and to my shame, my eyes welled with tears. “Do you need me to wait with you?” She asked in a soft voice I hadn’t yet heard her use.
My breath came out in an unintentional huff. Fucking tears. “No. Thank you.” I willed myself not to cry, not yet anyway. Not until I was alone.
I turned my back to her hoping she took that as a cue to leave.
As soon as the door clicked shut behind me, I took off like an animal in captivity. I paced that tiny fucking room over and over, back and forth. I sat down for what felt like minutes, when really only seconds had passed, and I jumped back up again, not content to sit and wait. I walked to the windows, peaked out beneath the shades to the view of downtown stories below me. I’d been there all night; it was early morning, and people were bustling about on their way to work. Work. What a joke. I don’t think I’d ever work again after this. Just days away from finishing a teaching degree, a degree she helped me work through. What was the point? If she’s, fuck, if she’s gone, there won’t be a point. My life would be meaningless.
I gazed down at the street below, the people nothing but colorless specks, wondering what it would feel like to jump. To freefall, flying towards the ground from a dizzying height, letting go of fear. Of everything. I’d never been much of a hopeful person, and right then, I was feeling pretty fucking hopeless. I wanted her to recover. God, I needed her to recover. But I saw the blood. I saw her lying there, a broken mess of limbs. She looked like a fallen angel—broken—yet, still so amazingly beautiful.
The familiar click of the door startled me, and I snapped the shade back as if I had been caught doing something I shouldn’t. They wouldn’t know the disturbing direction of my thoughts.
A tall man walked in, his hair covered by a surgical net, wearing what I assumed to be fresh scrubs. At least he had the decency to change his fucking clothes. There was no way he worked on her and came out blood free. I was going to be sick.
“Mr. Ryan, my name is Dr. Kunst. I am the lead surgeon of the team who took care of Miss Lewis. Please, sit.” He gestured to the chairs beside the desk. Dr. Kunst also wore the tired eyes of the nurse; but in contrast, his were sympathetic and filled with an emotion I couldn’t quite place.
“I can’t. Please just tell me.” I begged. I was done with formal niceties. “Is she alive?”
I knew the answer before he spoke; I could feel it in the deepest parts of me. Maybe if I’d paid attention to my gut earlier, instead of quieting my own thoughts, I’d have known sooner. I could have prepared myself better. I could sense it in the way he took a deep breath, the way he extended his arm to my shoulder, the way his head drooped slightly in acknowledgement to my pain.
“I’m sorry, Mr. Ryan. Her injuries were too extensive. We did everything we could.”
I come back to the present when I feel Tatum’s small, warm hand squeezing my bicep. “It’s okay. I’m here,” she soothes, and when her soft fingers caress my cheek, I realize I’ve been crying.
“Thank you. I’m okay.” I grab her hand from my face and plant a kiss on her palm. “We were on our way to our monthly dinner at her parent’s house. The college we went to was about four hours away, and we lived together in an apartment off campus. We were so…excited. Her dad had recently had a heart attack, but we weren’t able to make it home to see him due to finals. Neither of us could wait to get home and share the news we decided to move the wedding sooner. We had originally planned to get married after we graduated, but Harper was so worried her dad wouldn’t make it until then.
“I was stupid.” My voice cracks on the last word, and I have to clear my throat to continue. “I was distracted. It was raining, and she kept kissing me while I drove and I let her. Fuck, but I should have told her to stop.”
Tatum snuggles up closer to me, sensing my need for comfort. I pull her closer until her body is flush with my own and let the soft strands of her hair sift through my fingers.
“She was getting hot, so she took off her seatbelt to remove her coat. I looked over at her, laughing and scolding her to buckle back up. I didn’t see the car coming right at us.” I feel, rather than hear, Tatum’s gasp against my body. “Yeah. Some drunk fuck crossed the median and hit us head on. I lost control on impact, and we went rolling down a ravine. She was alive on the way to the hospital and went into surgery but she…she didn’t make it.”
She was covered with a sheet up to her shoulders, her pale skin ghostly white, deep purple and blue bruises blossomed across her beautiful skin. It was Harper, my beautiful, beautiful Harper. And she was dead.
I catalogued her features, committing her to memory for the last time. Her dark hair was damp and matted around her swollen face. Her thick dark lashes rested gently, fanning against her pale cheeks. I ignored the scratches marring her delicate skin as I gently traced the curve of her nose, the soft pale pink of her once cherry red lips. I reached down, searching for her hand one last time, and found it hard, limp, unmoving beneath mine.
My world shattered into a million fucking pieces.
“I’m so sorry,” I whispered, my voice breaking, cracking. “I love you, Harper. I’m so sorry.” I squeezed her hand for the last time, kissed her lips for the last time. I touched her for the last time.
Tatum’s voice calls me back. “I’m so sorry. God, I know those words are stupid, but I don’t know what else to say. I’m sorry that happened to you and to her.”
“I appreciate those words from you, Sweetheart, but I don’t deserve them. If it weren’t for me, she’d still be alive.”
She pulls her body off mine before she drops back down straddling my abdomen. She leans down and takes my face in her hands, pressing her forehead to mine. Her scent soothes me, apricots and rain. I close my eyes and take comfort in the way she surrounds me. Her body wrapped around mine, her smell permeating the air, her hair providing a curtain around our faces. The feel of her hands pressing into my skin has me meeting her soft gaze. Her hazel eyes look so sad, and desperate, and determined.
“Jacoby, no. I can tell just from your voice that you hold onto so much guilt for what happened, but you have to let it go. It’s not your fault. You said it yourself, some drunk hit you head on. You were young and in love, acting silly. We all make mistakes, but your mistake is not what killed her. It was the other driver’s actions that led to your wreck.”
“Well, lucky for him he died, so he doesn’t have to live with the guilt. I do. At least I can honor her life by carrying around the weight of her death.”
“If she loved you as much as it sounds, she wouldn’t want that for you. I know I wouldn’t. She’d want you to move on and live your life. The best way to honor her is to go on living, Jacoby. Not carry around your guilt like a burden.”
I appreciate her thinking so highly of me, but the guilt is mine to carry around until I learn not to. Maybe someday I’ll reach that point, but today is not that day. I grasp one of her wrists, and pulling the black band back, I press her soft flesh to my mouth in a tender kiss. Her breathing stalls and gasps before picking up twice as fast. It’s time to change the subject.
“I understand these. Maybe not the exact reason you do it, but I relate to the urge. And it fucking kills me to know you had a pain strong enough the only way to feel was to hurt yourself.”