Not in the room.
In me.
You are not allowed to die.
Destiny.
The memory hit harder than the pain.
Her voice in the dark. Her hand in my hair. Her mouth near my knuckles. Her words spilling over me while I lay trapped somewhere between life and whatever waited after it.
I never stopped loving you.
I love you.
Stay.
My heart lurched against the monitor.
The machine answered with a faster beep.
Georgia stood so quickly her chair scraped the floor.
“Dylan? Baby?”
Baby.
Georgia’s word.
Georgia’s voice.
Georgia’s hand.
Georgia’s ring.
I forced my eyes open.
The room swam.
Georgia leaned over me, blonde hair pulled back messily, face pale and swollen from crying. She looked like she had slept in the chair if she had slept at all. Her cardigan hung off one shoulder. Her eyes were red. The ring I had given her flashed on her finger where she gripped my hand.
My ring.
My promise.
The life I had chosen because I had told myself choosing clean meant becoming clean.
I tried to speak.
Nothing came out but a rough scrape.
Georgia grabbed the cup with the little sponge swabs from the tray and touched one gently to my cracked lips. “Don’t try to talk. They took the tube out a little while ago. Your throat’s going to hurt.”
Tube.
Hospital.
Shot.
