I grin, liking that she’s checked me out. I help her sit up and wait for her to steady herself before getting to my feet.
“You want me to pause it?” she asks, catching the tail end of the movie.
“Nah, it’s alright, I’ve seen it before, anyway.”
She shrugs and leans back to watch. I head to the restroom and take the world’s longest piss. While washing my hands, I hear a thump.
I pull the door open. “Delphi?” When she doesn’t answer, I head back to the living room. The movie is at the penultimate fight scene, where all the spaceships converge with the enemy fleet, rapidly firing lasers until the whole thing explodes.
I glance around the room. “Hey, chestnut, where’d you go?” I head to the kitchen, passing the sofa as I do. I freeze when I see Delphi on the ground, her whole body convulsing.
“Del!”
I drop to my knees beside her and get my thoughts in gear. I yank out my cell phone and dial 911, wedging it between my shoulder as I gently hold either side of Delphi’s head so she doesn’t injure herself further.
It feels like it takes forever for me to get through to dispatch, but when I do, they quickly tell me an ambulance is on its way.
“Alright, is she breathing?”
I press my fingers to her pulse and feel it thundering wildly under my fingertips, and her chest is moving up and down rapidly. “Yes, she’s breathing.”
“Good, make sure her airway is clear, and that there is nothing around her that she can hurt herself on.”
I shove the table and the sofa away from her and line either side of her with cushions. “Alright, done. How far out is the ambulance?”
“About eleven minutes, sir. Do you know if she’s taken anything? Any kind of narcotics or foreign substances?”
“No, all she’s taken were her prescribed painkillers about three hours ago.”
“What are those for, sir?”
I can hear her tapping away in the background as I watch Delph slowly start to calm.
“She had brain surgery a little while ago.”
“What was she doing before the convulsions started?”
“Sleeping. No, she just woke up. I came back into the room, thinking she’d still be watching the movie. The movie—fuck. It was all flashing lights.”
“Okay, sir. That helps. Do you know if she has a history of seizures?”
“Not that I know of.”
“That’s okay. Don’t worry, we’ll get it all figured out.”
Fuck me, she better, because I refuse to lose her now.
Chapter Eleven
DELPHI
To say wakingup in the hospital yet again was alarming would be an understatement. Especially because this time, I had no idea what I’d done to end up here.
When my eyes land on Kruger, his head lying on the bed next to our joined hands, I question if everything before this was a dream.
I assess how I feel and look for new injuries, but I’m coming up blank. Actually, there’s a lot of blankness. My stomach churns, making me feel sick and dizzy, and the urge to roll over and go back to sleep hits me hard. Before I can make head or tail of things, the door opens, and a doctor walks in.
“Oh, good, you’re awake. How are you feeling?”
