I sank into the chair beside the bed, hands curling into my knees, rocking slightly. The note burned in my pocket like fire. My mind spun.
I had failed him. And yet by some miracle he was still alive. I had no right to ask for forgiveness. But I couldn’t look away. Not for a second.
The monitor’s soft beeping was the only sound in the room, but it hit me like a drumline against my ribs. I hadn’t moved in hours. My palms still shook, pressed against my knees, fingers curling into the fabric like it could somehow anchor me to the world. I couldn’t stop imagining the crash—the screech of metal,the smell of burned rubber, the flash of headlights against the dark—and every fragment felt like it had landed inside me.
The chair was too small, plastic and unforgiving, pressed hard against the side of the bed. My hands were folded together between my knees like if I let them separate, I might come apart with them. I’d been staring at the blanket rising and falling with each shallow breath he took, counting them without realizing I was doing it. Proof. Proof he was still here.
The faintest change caught my eye. His breath hitched. Stalled. Restarted. My heart slammed so hard it felt like it would punch through my chest. My body lurched forward before I even realized I was moving.
“Elliot?” I whispered, voice tight, hoarse, cracking with something I hadn’t let myself feel in months. “Hey… it’s me. It’s okay. I’m here.”
His lashes fluttered, uneven and slow, like it hurt to wake. His brow furrowed faintly, confusion creasing his face as if consciousness itself was too heavy to lift all at once. I didn’t move. I didn’t speak. I was terrified that if I did, he’d disappear again.
Then his eyes opened. They didn’t find me right away. They drifted—unfocused, glassy—over the ceiling, the lights, the IV pole. His mouth parted, a quiet sound slipping out that might have been a breath or might have been a question. Panic flickered there, brief but sharp, like he didn’t recognize where he was.
Minutes passed before his gaze landed on me. It locked. The change was immediate. His throat worked. His eyes filled, fast and bright, like someone had cracked something fragile inside him.
I didn’t have words. All the apologies, all the confessions I had hoarded like weapons, swelled up, catching in my throat. I pressed my forehead to the sheet by his hand, almost collapsingon him, breathing him in—the smell of antiseptic, the faint trace of him—and it was too much.
“A…Anthony?” His voice was hoarse, shredded thin. Saying my name looked like it hurt.
I leaned forward instinctively like I was going to kiss him, then stopped myself halfway. Stayed where I was. “I’m here,” I said softly. Not reaching. Not touching. “I’ve been here for a few hours.”
His lips trembled. “You’re… really here?” he asked, and there was something terrifying in the way he said it—like he needed confirmation this wasn’t another hallucination his brain had built to survive.
“Yes.” My chest tightened painfully. “I’m not going anywhere.”
The lie sat between us immediately. Heavy. Unsettled.
He swallowed, eyes never leaving mine. “You said that before.” The words landed without anger. Without accusation. They were merely fact. They were worse for it.
“I know,” I said. My voice cracked on the second word. I didn’t try to steady it. “And I broke it.”
Silence stretched. The monitor hummed steadily, indifferent.
“You left,” he said again. This time quieter. More certain. “You didn’t just walk away. You erased me.”
I nodded once. My hands clenched together harder. “I did.”
“Why?” His breath started to shake. “Don’t say work. Don’t say timing. Don’t say it was for my own good.” Tears spilled over now, sliding into his hair. “Just tell me the truth.”
I closed my eyes.
When I opened them again, there was nowhere left to hide.
“The truth,” I said slowly, “is that I loved you long before I admitted it to myself. And it scared the hell out of me.”
His chest rose sharply. A quiet, broken sound escaped him.
“I watched you fall apart,” I continued, forcing the words out even as my throat burned. “I watched you need me in ways I didn’t feel equipped to survive. And instead of asking for help, instead of staying and figuring it out with you, I convinced myself that distance was safer.”
“For who?” he asked.
The question gutted me.
“For me,” I admitted. “I told myself I was protecting you. But what I was really doing was protecting myself from the fear that if I stayed, I’d fail you.”
His jaw clenched. His eyes burned with something sharper now. “So you abandoned me,” he said. “Because you were scared.”
