by Ginger Scott
“I was hurt because you didn’t tell me something important in your life. You can trust me, Emma. With anything. And the thought that you couldn’t…with Andrew? It hurt.”
I sit in a small chair next to her and look down at my hands. “I didn’t want to hurt you,” I say, not able to look at her when I speak. “It felt like I had to pick, you or him, and I’m so sorry I didn’t have faith in how strong we were. That’s on me, Linds. And I’m so…so deeply sorry.”
I whisper an apology again, but I know its just words. And I know it’s time, like she said, that’s going to truly heal her and me. But she’s here now, when I need her desperately. She’s here. I sense her shadow as she sits next to me on the sofa, and I let myself go, catching her up on what I know—there’s an investigation, they think it’s some smalltime bookie who thought Andrew owed him money.
“So it wasn’t Graham?” she asks. I shake my head no.
It grows quiet between us again for several minutes. I don’t like the quiet. My mind gets carried away, starts imagining the whirling sounds of his machines and beeping and people rushing—Andrew leaving.
“You should try to go home, maybe shower?” Lindsey says, her mouth twisted on one side. “You can…you can come…home. It won’t be easy, but I’ve had time to think, and I don’t want this to be the end of the Emma and Lindsey show. I’m probably going to say bitchy things sometimes, and be totally passive aggressive, but I want to try to…you know…move past it?”
I suck in a sharp breath, my cry surprising me almost as much as her gesture. I reach over and squeeze her hand again, my eyes fluttering as they close and I nod, accepting her offer.
“I missed my classes today. I missed…Miranda,” I say, tucking my lip in, waiting for Lindsey’s response. I’m hoping she’ll give me a solution.
“Yeah, that’s…that isn’t good,” she agrees. “But I think you need to talk to her, Em. You know you can switch mentors, if something’s uncomfortable or if it gets awkward.”
I nod again, grateful for her suggestion—one I’d thought about myself. It’s hard to give up time with the person I admire because her son happens to be an awful human being. Then again, I’m not sure how wonderful Miranda is after all. She saved my life, but maybe that doesn’t make her a hero—maybe it just makes her good at her job. I’ve seen glimpses of the cracks in her selfless façade, and they’re discouraging.
“Just promise you’ll think about it,” Lindsey says, her hand on my knee. “You have options.”
* * *
My conversation with Lindsey stuck with me, even now, hours after she left.
I have options.
I’m not so sure I do, but looking at Andrew…watching him lay here—so much working on his behalf just so he can breathe—I feel a little angry with myself for letting Graham off without any punishment for what he did. I know he’s not the hand that put Andrew here today, but he’s partly the reason. And he is the hand that struck me.
I wonder how many others he’s abused?
My mind keeps replaying the switch flipping in him. I go to all of those moments where he wasn’t quite a gentleman in the first place. He was short, or rude, or curt during a conversation. His hands were always just a little too assuming with me, crossing the line a little too far; his presumption that I was his property happened quickly, and without my consent.
“You should take a break,” Owen says, kicking my foot from the chair he and I have both commandeered as our footstool. He smirks, spreading his enormous feet out on the surface of the seat in a teasing way, taking up all the space.
I sit up, rubbing my face and sliding my advanced bio book back in my bag on the floor. I haven’t slept but for a few minutes here and there, and I can feel the knots in my hair around the base of my neck. I think…maybe…I also smell a little.
“Go home. Take a nap. Get some rest. I promise I’ll text you if anything happens,” he says, holding out a fist for me to pound. I laugh at it, then squeeze it between both of my hands. Twenty-four hours together in this situation has formed an instant bond between Owen and me. I get why Andrew loves him so much.
I pull my bag over my shoulders and head through the door, spinning around before leaving and pointing at him. “You promise. If anything happens,” I say.
Owen crosses his heart, and I believe him. I’ve learned that’s part of the deal with Harper boys—they don’t swear on their hearts often, and when they do, they mean it.
I think about going to my old apartment, and when I hail a cab out front, that’s the address I give the driver. But when I step out of the car, my legs carry me to Andrew’s. The smell is comforting, and I feel him alive here. I need that—the image of him living, him just being. I shower quickly and leave a note for Trent asking him to text me when he gets home. He was taking care of alerting the school and the coach.
My hair dried and my clothes changed, I feel a small reserve of energy kick in my body. I brew myself a double cup of coffee and fill one of Trent’s mugs so I can carry it with me to stave off sleepiness for a few hours longer. I lock up and begin to walk back to the hospital, but I notice the light outside, the glow of late afternoon, and I check the time on my phone. It’s not quite four-thirty, and Miranda’s office hours end at five.
I don’t want to go. I stop walking at least a dozen times, a dozen more I turn around. But Lindsey is right. And Andrew was right. I need to tell someone—I need to tell Miranda first.
By the time I get to her door, I can hear the sounds of her on the other side powering down her computer and packing up her things. With a deep breath, I knock lightly, and her door slowly slides open with the force of my touch. Her body leans back in her chair, and soon our eyes meet.
“Emma, hi. I was just packing up. I missed you today,” she says, no longer looking at me. She’s checking out, moving on to her next thing. I step into her office and watch as she pulls her makeup bag from her purse, pulling out a mirror and lip gloss that she circles around her lips twice. I wonder who she’s wearing that for?
“Yes, I know. I’m sorry I missed today. I…a friend of mine was in a terrible accident. I’ve been at the hospital with him,” I say, sitting down as she stands. She glances as our bodies play opposite, her lips pursing and her brow furrowing with inconvenience. She sits anyhow, because she’s not a rude person. She’s just not as selfless as I always thought.
“I hope he’s all right,” she says, and I notice how rehearsed her sympathy sounds. I think she may be a sociopath—I read somewhere that most successful people are.
“He’s at Mercy, and it’s…well…we’re waiting for him to wake up,” I grimace. On cue, she bows her head—more rehearsed sympathy on its way.
“I see. Well, I’m very sorry,” she says. “We can catch up later this week. I understand, Emma. And I have somewhere I need to leave for soon, so—”
“Right,” I say, standing, my bag in my lap sliding to the floor. I awkwardly bend and pick it up, squeezing my eyes shut as my head is down. Be strong, Emma. Be strong. “I…I’ll let you get going. I just…I only had one thing I wanted to talk to you about first. It…it won’t take long.”
Really, it should take hours. Maybe even days. There should be wake-up calls and interventions discussed, but I get the sense that I have about two minutes to make my case. I pull my phone from the front pocket of my bag, clicking it on, sliding it across her desk, the photo of my face filling the screen.
Miranda remains standing, her head down and looking at the girl on my phone—the one with a deep-purple bruise around her eye, with matching handprints around her arm where Graham dug his fingers in. Miranda only stares, waiting for me to say it.
“I respect you. So much. And it’s more than my heart, though…yeah…my heart has a lot to do with it. But that’s not why I came here. I came here to learn from you, because I believe in what you do, and I want to be like you—professionally,” I say. Her lip twitches at my addendum. “It’s out of that respect that I tho
ught I should tell you first. I’m filing a police report. I’m leaving here and going to the student advocacy center first. And I’m not sleeping until I’ve documented my story. Graham…gave me that.” I move my finger to the screen, pointing to it, then rolling my sleeve up on that same arm and turning it over, exposing the soft flesh of my forearm and the black, finger-sized marks left from his hold on me. “And this,” I add.
Miranda’s eyes dart around the evidence, her look almost analytical. I wait for tears. For an apology. For…something. But she only nods.
“If that’s what you think is best, then do what you think is necessary,” she says, her eyes rising to meet mine. I’m in shock at the complete lack of empathy in them, and I can’t help my candor.
She doesn’t believe me.
“Miranda,” I say, and she straightens at my use of her first name. I’ve called her that before, but something tells me she’d rather show her dominance now. First names make us feel like equals. “Dr. Wheaton, your son needs help. I don’t want this to happen to someone else…or worse,” I say, swallowing hard at the thought of what could have happened. My nightmares play that version, even during catnaps at the hospital—it’s nothing but a teeter-totter of Graham’s anger and Andrew’s pain.
“Like I said,” she says, sliding her chair under her desk and walking to the door, encouraging me to follow. “You do what you feel is necessary. Now, I do need to make an obligation, so if we can talk more at our regular meeting later this week…”
Her lips are in a perfect smile, and I notice how her eyebrows are raised indignantly. I’m not sure what I expected from coming here, but I no longer feel beholden to her for what she’s given me. A weight has been lifted.
I tug my bag over my shoulder and mimic her smile with a clenched-teeth version of my own. I step out of her office and she sends me away with one more condolence for my friend in the hospital, and I walk away, shaking my head and listening to the sound of her heels stamp along the floor in the other direction—all the way to the elevator on the other end.
I leave my sleeve rolled up as I take the stairs down two flights to the ground, and I look at the marks on my arm, renewed strength finding me that I’m right—that I owe nothing to anybody. I push through the main doors, out onto the campus mall, and move my own fingers to the marks on my arms, my hands not able to spread wide enough to meet every mark, and I think to myself how my bruises are like fingerprints—there’s really only one, singular match.
I stop at the advocacy center first. I remember learning about it during orientation, thinking I would never need it. I’m so grateful for it now. It’s after five in the afternoon, but there are people here at the front, waiting—with open arms. From the moment I step inside and utter the words “I was attacked,” I’m surrounded by support. My advocate’s name is Jane, and even her eyes on me while I’m talking let me know she’s on my side. She believes me, and Jane and I—we’ve got this.
The forms with the advocacy center take an hour to complete, but I insist on filing my report with the police tonight. I don’t want to wait—I’m afraid I’ll change my mind, and I’m also afraid of closing my eyes at night. This act I’m doing right now, it feels like a much-needed antidote to the poison Graham left behind.
The officer who greets us at the campus police station is kind. Her last name is Rodriguez. She told me her first name, and I know it’s on the card she handed me, but I can’t take my eyes off of her tag. I’ll remember her last name for now. I don’t think she likes that I insist Jane comes with me. But I can’t do this alone, and reluctantly the officer agrees, ushering me to a private room where I document every single moment of that night—what happened, and the people I know were there to see it. I give them Graham’s phone number, and his friend Brody’s name, the only friend of his I really spoke to. I’m sure his friends will stand up for him—I’m sure they’ve seen a scene like mine before. But I remembered other things from that night. The club’s security guy was named Jax, and he helped me into a cab. I describe a few others, including the cab driver…he saw things, too.
I’m racking my brain, trying to dig out more details, things I can give Officer Rodriguez that will help even more. The longer I speak, the angrier I get, and eventually, the emotion builds up to a boiling point and my hand forms a fist, punching hard against the table.
“It’s okay, Miss Burke. What you gave us, it’s enough for now,” the officer says, her hands still from writing in her notepad and her head cocked to one side. She’s almost being kind, but yet the whole thing feels sterile at the same time—emotionless. My breathing is a little rapid, and it takes me a few seconds to let the heat dissipate from my face.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t really…I haven’t really gone through anger yet,” I say, grabbing the bottle of water she brought for me, twisting the top off and drinking nearly half of it down.
“It’s all okay,” Jane says, her hand moving forward to mine, which is once again balled in a fist on the table. She pats it once, causing me to look up, my lungs finally taking a deep breath. “What you feel—whatever you feel, whenever you feel it—it’s okay.”
I take in Jane’s words, and I unfurl my fingers, flexing my hand and sliding it along the surface of the table outward from me, laying forward and stretching before pulling my body back in.
“It’s okay,” I repeat in a whisper.
“Yes,” she says.
After two hours of rehashing, probing questions into my background, and conversation that almost makes me feel as if I’m the one being investigated, Officer Rodriguez pulls all of the paperwork into a file, then makes some notes on the top cover before stacking it on top of several other folders. I wonder how many of those are cases just like mine?
Jane walks out from the back offices with me, and I can’t help myself—I hug her. She hands me a few of her cards, encouraging me to share them with others I think might need help, and she also urges me to call—whenever. I’m going to. A lot. Then she guides me back out to the front lobby where a homeless man is passed out across four seats. All of his earthly possessions are tucked in a black plastic bag clutched in his hand while he slumbers.
Jane and I part ways when I leave the police station. The air is crisp and cold. I stop at the steps and pull on Andrew’s sweatshirt, then lift my bag over my back and make my way to the train stop near the edge of campus. My fingers are tingling and my feet feel heavy, and in the middle of my walk I have to pause and hold my arms over my head, reminding myself to breathe so I don’t fall over. My stomach kicks in its two cents, and I bend forward and throw up the little contents that are in my stomach. The panic attack comes and goes, but it leaves me feeling even more exhausted.
I buy a ticket to take me back to Mercy and climb aboard the next train to arrive, hugging my bag in my lap—clutching something personal, just like the homeless man from the police lobby. It’s late. Hours have disappeared while I’ve told my story. Time well spent. Empowering, though emotionally draining. No matter how tired I may feel, I don’t dare shut my eyes. I left my half-full coffee mug in Miranda’s office, and as much as I could use the caffeine, I smirk at the thought of how irritated she’s going to be with the smell of stale coffee and the reminder of me, and my visit, there to greet her in the morning. In the midst of so much that’s awful, at least I have this one small win.
Chapter 23
Emma
It’s been sixty hours.
Six. Zero.
The doctors told us not even to consider worrying about things until we start to hit that seventy-two-hour mark.
Those numbers are arbitrary. I know they are, because they aren’t in any of my books. Nothing is for certain, and throwing out hours is just a way for doctors to buy time to find consciousness. The cases run the gamut—some people waking up immediately, others taking weeks. Science points to medians, but medians are just clusters of numbers—they don’t mean anything when the person you love is all that counts.
But I also know Andrew Harper, and I know if there is a number to beat, he’s going to. I spent most of this morning talking to him. He doesn’t talk back, which I jokingly told him was refreshing. Owen was in the room, and he just moved his phone low enough to raise a brow at me, then went back to texting his girlfriend.
When Owen stepped outside for a while, I whispered in Andrew’s ear that I reported Graham. I needed to say it out loud, even in a whisper. I needed Andrew to hear it. I finally let myself exhale a little—the weight lifting for just a moment.
With every hour that’s passed, I’ve watched him like a hawk, waiting…knowing any second I’d hear him. It’s why I’ve ignored the raging growl building in my belly. The floor at my feet is lined with emptied cups, and my breath tastes foul, and the growling—it’s getting harder to ignore, until finally one lingers so long I can actually feel the pang work around my intestines and climb up my esophagus.
“Okay, either you’re shifting into a vampire and the sun coming in through that window is secretly melting away your skin, or you need to feed that monster in your gut,” Owen says, his phone flat against his leg again.
“What?” I ask. My stomach betrays me, growling again—with a vengeance.
“It’s gross. You sound like my grandfather. Seriously, go eat,” Owen chuckles. I shrug and roll my eyes, standing, but stopping at the door. He raises a hand, never looking away from his phone screen. “I know, I know…text you the second something happens.”
“The. Second,” I point at him.
I’ve been very positive this morning. It’s the first time I’ve felt this full of hope since my parents pulled me out of high school to head to the hospital for my surgery. Things feel brighter, and breathing feels easier.
Andrew is going to wake up today.
I have zero doubts.
I head down to the break room on the first floor where a few kids are lined up, all dressed in various costumes—ghosts, goblins, and superheroes with hospital gowns underneath. I’d lost track of time lately, and I realize it’s Halloween.