The nurse points at me. “And you’re not going anywhere.”
“My husband thinks I’m dead.”
She pauses. “Then we call him.”
“He’s not answering,” Viktor says.
“Then we call the police.”
That almost makes me laugh. It comes out broken. “The police won’t stop him.”
The nurse looks between us, and I can see the moment she understands this is not a normal marriage, not a normal family, not a normal night. Her face changes, fear slipping in around the edges of her professionalism.
“What will happen if you don’t go?” she asks.
Viktor answers for me. “People will die.”
I look down at my stomach. “And if I do go?”
The nurse’s expression softens despite herself. “You could reopen the wound. You could faint. You could put yourself and the pregnancy under stress you don’t need.”
I close my eyes, and I see the truth so clearly.
I open my eyes. “Help me.”
The nurse looks like she wants to refuse.
She looks at Viktor. Then at my stomach. Then back at me.
“This is a terrible idea,” she says.
“I know.”
“If you start bleeding, you come back immediately.”
“Yes, ma’am.”
She mutters something under her breath and moves to the IV. Her hands are quick and careful as she removes it, tapes thespot, checks the bandage at my side, and helps me sit upright properly.
The pain is bad.
Not unbearable. But bad enough that my vision blurs for a second.
Viktor sees it. “We can still send someone else.”
“No.”
“Anya.”
“He needs to see me.”
Neither of them argues with that.
Ten minutes later, I’m in a wheelchair with a hospital coat over my gown, a blanket over my lap, and a scarf wrapped around my hair. I look like a patient being taken for tests. I feel like a body held together by bandages, fear, and one decision.
Viktor pushes the chair toward the door.
The nurse walks ahead with a clipboard.
