“Then find out, preferably before you nearly cark it again.”
Logan says more things. Nice things. Grumpy things. I zone out, and I’m not sure how the conversation ends. Just that Sonny lowers the phone and slips me a guilty look.
“This is my fault.”
“What is?”
“All of it.” Sonny waves a shaky hand. “I freaked out in the water.”
“Didn’t crash that coach, though, did you? Or have me put my feet in stupid places.”
“But—”
“No. This is the job. And we all do it knowing it might kill us one day.”
Sonny’s unconvinced, and he steps out of the cubicle I’m stuck in to have himself a moment. I use the solitude to check my dick is still where it should be. That I haven’t frozen my balls off. Then I start planning my escape, finding my best smile for the docs and nurses still checking my organs are shipshape.
Heart.
Lungs.
Head still screwed on my shoulders.
“You’re going to be pretty sore and tired for a few days,” a doctor warns, handing me a prescription for fuck knows what. “I’d recommend you spend your Christmas on the sofa with a nice cup of tea.”
My comprehension is shot. I don’t know where we are in the festive swing of things, and I don’t much care. I lever my legs off the bed, grateful Sonny’s magicked me up some clothes and shoes, and then I book it before the friendly doctor changes her mind.
I’m dizzy, and my legs feel like they’re wedged in quicksand. But I know this hospital too fecking well, and it doesn’t take melong to navigate through the twists and turns to find the nearest exit.
Somehow, I manage to dodge most of my crew, but Sonny catches up with me by the lifts, pressing something hard and cold into my hand. “I got you a taxi. It’ll be here in ten minutes.”
Grand. And I should tell him so, but this thing he’s pressed into my hand…it’s my fecking phone and I find myself turning it over in my palm as though I’ve never seen it before.
It’s still on, battery fifty percent, an old photo of my ma staring back at me, reminding me I need to call her before she gets wind of this nonsense and gets herself in a state.
Then I swipe the screen to a madcap family group chat and realise Logan’s done it for me. That he’s spoken to everyone who needs to be spoken to and all my people want from me is to know I’m on my way home for a kip.
That, I can give them. I bash out a message that hopefully makes some kind of sense. Then I tap out of the chat, leaning heavily against a nearby wall while Sonny shadows my every step as though he expects me to collapse at any second.
It makes me wonder what he’s seen for however long I’ve been here. If I’ve put him through the same wringer I did Logan two Christmases ago. And I want to tell him I’m fine, but as every bruise screams, my bones as rickety as a bag of spanners, I don’t have the energy to lie.
Need my bed.
My mattress on the floor.
Feck, that bench outside will do.
I push off the wall, still blearily thumbing at my phone, concentration capacity somewhere in line with my Christmas cheer, and?—
Wait—
I freeze, stopping so abruptly Sonny has to grab my arm. Blinking like I just woke up from a coma at the tiny notification below the shitshow of group chat messages.
A text.
From Sab.
A real message, not some DM on a bullshit swingers app, andHoly Mary, this must be what it feels like to have a stroke.
