The burns on my arms throb beneath the bandages the nurses wrapped earlier. They wanted to admit me, run tests, and check my lungs for smoke damage.
I told them tofuck off.
Well, not in those exact words, but close enough.
They settled for treating me in Queenie’s room, hovering with their equipment while I refuse to move from her bedside.
My throat is raw, every breath tastes like ash and char. My eyes sting, watering constantly from the smoke exposure. The doctor mentioned corneal irritation and gave me drops I haven’t used because I can’t be bothered to care about my eyes when Queenie can’t breathe without a machine.
I sit in the uncomfortable plastic chair they brought in, and they periodically give me oxygen treatments for the smoke inhalation that Sin was right about me having because my carbon monoxide levels were high. Whatever the fuck that means. And I am currently hooked to an IV for fluids because I have to keep hydrated.
My hand wraps around hers. Her skin is paper-thin, translucent, showing every vein and age spot. Her fingers are cold despite the warm blanket tucked around her.
Too cold.
The monitor beeps steadily, tracking her heartbeat, but it’s weak. Thready, the doctor called it, like her body is giving up, too tired to keep fighting.
Pneumonia is likely setting in.
The words echo in my head, delivered in that clinical, detached tone doctors use when they’re preparing you for bad news without actually saying it.
The smoke inhalation damaged her lungs. She’s eighty-six, her immune system isn’t what it used to be, and the stress of the trauma…
Basically, they’re telling me my grandmother might die.
And there’s nothing I can do except sit here and watch her fight a battle I can’t help her win.
The door opens quietly, and I don’t look up. I don’t care who it is unless they’re coming to tell me Queenie is getting better.
“Brought you a coffee.” Sin’s voice is low, respectful of the sterile quiet.
I finally drag my gaze from Queenie’s face to find my president standing there with two cups from the cafeteria. Victoria is with him, her eyes red, suggesting she’s been crying.
“Could’ve brought something stronger,” I rasp out, my voice barely working.
“Drink it anyway, brother.” Sin sets one cup on the small table beside me. “You’ve been here for eighteen hours. You need something.”
Eighteen hours.
Has it really been that long?
Time doesn’t work right in hospitals. Seconds stretch into hours, and hours collapse into moments, all of it blending intoone long nightmare of beeping machines and terrible antiseptic smells.
“How is she?” Victoria asks, moving to the other side of Queenie’s bed.
“The same.” I swallow, and it feels like broken glass. “Pneumonia is setting in. They’re pumping her full of antibiotics, but…”
But she’s eighty-six.
But her lungs are damaged.
But I might lose the best mother I’ve known.
Because some psycho ex-boyfriend decided to burn down a retirement village.
What kind of lowlife does something like that?
“We’re all outside,” Sin offers, settling into the chair against the wall. “Ghost, Bear, Koa, Deek, everyone. They’re not going anywhere.”
