“I was sleeping,” he said. “Did you fall out of bed?”
“I didn’t mean to.” I defended myself.
He half smiled, but it disappeared when he saw my arm. “Oh shit! What happened?” he asked, coming forward.
The mattress pressed into the small of my back as I followed his stare to the bloody tissue I was clutching against the inside of my elbow.
“Did you rip out your IV?” he asked, grabbing several tissues from the bedside table.
When he reached for me, I flinched, and he drew up short. “Here, I think you, ah, need these.”
I glanced between him and the offering. When I didn’t say or do anything, he cleared his throat. “You’re applying pressure to the wrong area.”
Realizing he was right, I tossed the bloody tissue onto the bed and grabbed the ones he was offering, wadding them up into a ball and pressing them against the wound to hopefully stop the bleeding this time.
“I’ll get the nurse,” he offered, straightening to go do just that.
He was taller than me. Honestly, most guys were, but at least he didn’t tower over me like most.
“No!” I said.
He glanced over his shoulder. “Uh, I think you need to get that looked at.”
“You’re right,” I said, agreeing with him even though I actually didnotagree. “But, uh, I’ll go.”
“I think you should sit down. You look pale,” he said, sweeping his eyes over the bandage on my head.
“A little movement will be good for me,” I said. “Get the circulation going.”
My roommate gave me a funny look, which I pretended not to see, and then I moved past him. Our matching hospital gowns brushed as I went by, and the heat from his body seemed almost luxurious compared to my cold toes and limbs.
Before he could say anything else, I scurried from the room, bare feet slapping on the floor. Out in the hallway, the lights were bright, and I squinted, becoming all too aware of the throbbing in my head.
I really hadn’t thought this through at all. I mean, I wasn’t even dressed. Wouldn’t it look suspicious for me to sneak out of here wearing nothing but a hospital gown? I wasn’t even sure where my clothes were. I hoped they hadn’t cut them off of me when I was brought in. I didn’t have many clothes, and the hoodie I’d been wearing was my favorite.
At the end of the hallway, I stopped, thoughts of my hoodie making me look back. Maybe it was in my room.I should go check.
The doctor who had told me my MRI results turned the corner and started down the hall toward my room. Adrenaline shot through me, and I rushed forward around the corner before he realized I was there. Up ahead was a bank of elevators, and if I could make it into one of them, I could totally sneak out of there.
Ding!One of the elevators chimed like it was in on my escape, and I ran a little faster, stumbling as I went.
The second the silver doors began to part, I headed toward them, half expecting someone to yell for me to stop. Anxiety and adrenaline created a cocktail inside me, making me slightly drunk.
In my haste, I slammed into something hard and large, which had flashes of the car crash from hours before flying through mybrain. I cried out and bounced back, feet going up over my head as I hit the ground.
I groaned, sprawled out on the floor, feeling pain but not knowing where it was coming from. The fluorescents overhead were so bright they were practically blinding, and my eyes watered so heavily that a tear dripped from the corner of one.
The elevator dinged again, and I jolted, realizing my ride was trying to leave without me.
I surged up, only to sway and fall back to my hands and knees. Nausea roiled my stomach, and I took a few deep breaths, trying to stop the world from spinning.
“Are you okay?” a deep voice rasped above me, the sound more effective than anything I’d been trying to do to steady myself.
Still on hands and knees, I lifted my face, ignoring the stabbing pain the movement caused to crane my chin back far enough to see the owner of that voice.
My Adam’s apple bobbed as my stare climbed up a set of long legs covered in black trousers. His button-up shirt was the same midnight color and was tucked into his pants, which were secured with a black belt. My eyes kept climbing all the way up past the open collar at his throat, over the golden skin there, and to the neatly trimmed midnight scruff covering his jaw.
His looming presence was a dark embrace just like the long trench coat shrouding him in shadows. From his voice to every stitch of clothing on him, his beard, and hair. Except for his eyes.
