"Station three." She jerks her chin. "ABCs, tag, move them. We're overflow. Most criticals are already inside somewhere, but we'll get the ones in limbo. Vitals, quick interventions, onto the next."
Airway. Breathing. Circulation. I step into the current and let it carry me.
For the next hour, maybe two since time has lost its shape, I live in thirty-second slices.
There's a woman in her fifties with a head wound and slurred speech. I check her pupils, steady her, keep her talking until we're sure she's not slipping. Then a teenage boy with glass in his forearm. I clear debris, use pressure dressing, and reassure his mother that yes, it'll scar, but he'll have full range of motion. The flow of patients doesn't end.
I treat a security guard with burns on his hands from pulling people out of stuck elevator doors. An older man who wasn't near the blast but whose panic attack convinced him he was having a heart attack. A woman in a designer suit whose only injury is a cut ankle, but whose hands shake so violently I have to wrap both of mine around hers to keep the bandage steady.
"You're okay," I hear myself say, again and again. "You're here. You're safe. Breathe with me. In. Out."
My voice is calm. My face composed. My hands are steady but the pulse in my neck won't quit.
Every time an EMT calls out vitals, I hear echoes. That same cadence in a different wing, under softer lighting, withnicer sheets and better snacks. "We've got another one coming through the back. Dr. Chamberland wants labs but no chart. Dr. Mercer said to put him under an alias. Don't ask."
Every time someone mentions back corridors or private rooms, my pulse stutters.
You wanted in, I remind myself, taping down an IV line. You wanted to help. You wanted to make it better.
That is the line I repeat when the memories start crowding in. The truth sits heavier than that. I did want to help. I did want to make things better. But somewhere along the way, the clipboards stopped making sense and the exam rooms started locking from the outside.
My father's. Not theirs.
The girls I saw in those back corridors weren't patients. They were inventory. And I was the quality control.
"You're doing great work, Sloane," my father had said once, hand heavy on my shoulder outside an exam room. "These girls are lucky to have someone who cares."
I'd believed him. For longer than I should have. I believed I was helping. The medical clearances, the health screenings, the gentle voice all felt like mercy. I called it mercy. It was packaging. I blink hard, forcing attention back to the security guard's burns. The blisters are weeping through the first layer of gauze. I peel it, repack, tape clean edges. I move faster.
"Hey." A paramedic I've seen at other scenes, tall, freckled, hair shoved under a beanie, nudges me with his elbow as we both reach for the same gauze. "You okay?"
"I'm fine." I soften it with a tired smile. "Just need more coffee."
"Preach," he mutters, handing me the gauze.
I finish wrapping the burn. My patient winces, then gives me a tight nod.
"You did good," I tell him. "You saved people."
His eyes fill. "Did I? Because I can't stop thinking… what if there were more?"
I squeeze his wrist. "There are always more," I say before I can catch the hardness in my tone. He flinches. I revise. "There will always be more people who need help. That's not on you. You did what you could with what you had. Today, that's enough." He breathes out. I move on.
Next patient. Move.
Somewhere between patients, my stomach growls loud enough that the nurse at the neighboring cot snorts.
"When's the last time you ate, Turner?"
"Define ate."
She rolls her eyes. "Of course."
I open my mouth to lie when the air shifts. The tent shifts. Conversation drops in a tiny radius. Boots on concrete. Steady, sure, familiar. I exhale. My posture drops an inch. I don't look up right away. Finishing vitals, I loop a blood pressure cuff back onto its hook.
"Sloane." His voice is low and close.
I turn. Knox stands just inside the entrance to my section, worn leather jacket half-zipped over a plain black shirt. Hair damp, as though he showered in a rush and didn't bother drying it. Beard is a little overgrown from the late night; fine lines fan from the corners of his eyes that I swear weren't that deep a year ago.
