I shook my head, but it barely moved. My chest constricted, each breath shallow, useless. Too fast. Too tight. I couldn’t get enough air in.
“Hey…” His hand moved, like he was reaching for me again.
I flinched hard, stumbling back into the wall this time.
“Don’t…”
My voice cracked. The world narrowed, sound dropping out, blood rushing in to take its place.
“Sophie?”
Not his voice. A different voice. Closer. Familiar. A hand lay on my shoulder. Grounding. Steady.
“Hey, hey…it’s okay. Look at me.”
I tried. My eyes couldn’t focus. Her face. The corridor. A leather cut. Everything was spinning.
“Breathe with me,” she said firmly. “In… and out. Come on.”
I pulled in a ragged breath, not even half filling my lungs.
“Good. Again.”
Her hand tightened slightly against my shoulder, anchoring me there.
“In. Out.”
I clung to the rhythm she set. Focusing on her voice. At the gentleness. The confidence.
In.
Out.
In.
Slowly, the room stopped spinning, and my eyes focussed on her face. At the dark lashes and thin black eyeliner. At blonde hair scraped back off her face in a ponytail, every strand neatly secured. Not like the curls that hung over my forehead, escaping from the bun I’d pushed it into this morning.
Around us, people watched. A patient supported by a nurse. A porter wheeling someone in a bed. Every one of them staring as I pushed up off the knees I hadn’t even realised I’d sunk to. Everyone but him. The man in the cut with the Southern American accent was nowhere to be seen.
“Where did he go?” I whispered.
“That biker? What did he say to you? Did he hurt you?”
I shook my head.
“I didn’t know him. He was just…”
“Dodgy. Yeah. There’s been a few in A & E recently. Never seen so many in here in my life. Wonder what’s going on?”
“Yeah. Wonder.”
The nurse wrapped a hand under my arm and eased me to my feet.
“You need a cuppa?”
“No. Thank you, Katie,” I answered, pulling my stethoscope so each side hung equally.
“It’s Kirsten.”
