A minute later, a woman in scrubs greets us. She leads us back through the emergency department and stops when we reach the far back corner where there’s an enclosed room.
The lullaby-like beeping coming from the nurse’s station behind us fades. The woman points to a few chairs outside of the room. Sebastian moves to sit in one, and I hate that Violet follows. Hate it even more that I don’t speak up and tell her how much I fucking appreciate her being here despite not being able to show it in this moment.
On the outside, I’m a rock-hard shell of the man she’s gotten to know. On the inside, I’m liquid goo and slipping between my own fingertips with each step I take.
I try my damnedest to reach for any words I can find. Something to make me feel like my world isn’t caving in around me as my vision narrows and a buzzing takes over my senses. I squeeze my hands into fists, hoping it’ll relieve me of the tingling sensation that spreads through them. My heart hammers in my chest, thumping like the beat of a drum. Over and over and over until it covers the buzzing, and it’s all there is.
My eyes lock on the door, the barrier between having a mom who’s alive and one who has fallen victim to her addiction. I’ve imagined this moment more times than I care to admit; walking into a room and finding Mom lifeless.
I don’t want to step through that door. I don’t want to see her frail body void of life. I’d rather spear a knife into my gut than drag my feet inside. There’s so much I’dratherdo. So many other places I’d rather be. In some weird way, I’m still the little boy who watched his mother’s greedy habit enslave her.
It makes me want to retch, but I swallow down the foul taste that creeps up the back of my throat and spreads over my tongue. My heartbeat creeps up the back of my throat and into my head. It’s what I focus on so the nausea swimming deep in my stomach doesn’t overpower my senses and take over.
“Colson?” Aunt Bess’s voice seeps in, and I snap my gaze in her direction. She looks at me as if she didn’t mean to startle me. “Did you hear what I said?”
“Sorry, what?”
“We think it’s best if you go in first. You can find your peace without anyone being in your space.”
Yeah, something tells me I won’t be finding that for a while. Still, I nod and look toward the door. It’s the most daunting thing I’ve ever stared down.
“Unless you’d like me to go in with you?” Aunt Bess suggests.
“No.”
“Okay. Take all the time you need.”
I take one step in front of the other, my eyes settling on Violet’s golden-brown orbs. Sadness, so much of it, fills in the edges of them that it floods my chest with an insurmountable pressure.
I stop directly in front of her and kneel to my haunches. I don’t miss the surprise in her expression. I’ve been aloof with her since the fundraiser, barely offering much in return. I’ve been too in my head to give her what she needs in such an awkward situation as this one, but I can’t go in there without giving her one last piece of the person she knew before.
Before the overdose.
Before that car ride.
Before claiming Mom’s body.
The Colson she knew before his mother sailed into the horizon without so much as a goodbye.
I’m also doing it for myself. There’s so much integrity within Violet, so much strength she doesn’t even realize she has, that I want a sliver of it before I face Mom’s lifeless body.
My palms stretch over the material of her dress atop her thighs. I grip softly, getting the response I’m hoping for. She reaches out, holds my face, and looks down at me. Her bottomlip trembles, just barely, and like all the times we’ve done in the past, I look into her eyes and tell her without words just how much I fucking need her to be here when I come out.
She leans forward, and when her lips brush mine, this intense urge consumes me. The kind that always seems to push in unannounced when I’m with her. Always at the perfect moment. Always breathing life into my lungs when I can’t gasp damn near deep enough.
I reach up and grip the back of her neck as I lick the seam of her lips and ask—no,beg—for all the strength she’s willing to pour into me. When she pulls away on a strained breath, I roll my forehead against hers twice. Her eyes, lighter than they were a second ago, bore into mine. And while she silently tells me I’m going to be okay, I don’t quite believe I will be.
THREE
COLSON
There’sa blanket over Mom’s body. The air in my lungs pushes out, and for the life of me, I can’t pull more back in. I glance away from the stark white cloth and take in my surroundings. Counters with drawers holding various medical supplies line both sides of the room. A quiet monitor, the kind that usually beeps with a patient’s heart rate and blood pressure, stands at the head of the bed, a bright orange hazardous trash bin sitting not far from it.
My hands tingle all over again, and my vision goes hazy. I twist and drop my head on the wall next to the door, my back to my dead mother.
My.
Dead.
