Page 89 of All The Ways to Miss You

Through my burning eyes, I can make out the image of an officer. I stumble to stand and ramble in a panic as she nears.

“My girlfriend. These are her things. Can you help me find her? I need to see her. I need to tell her. Steph. I have a ring. I love her.”

“Sir, come with me. I can help you.” She places a hand on my arm and guides me.

My mind is a broken record playing one thing over and over. Cait. Cait. Cait. She’ll help me find Cait, and that’s all that matters.

There’s a point when my brain shuts off. Everything blurs. My mind has taken all it can. Maybe it’s shock. Maybe it’s exhaustion.

I find myself in a waiting room at a hospital, a crunching Mylar blanket around my back and a half-filled bottle of orange juice on the table next to me. I don’t even remember how I got here. On the wall-mounted TV, the network reports breaking news.

Mass shooting. Twelve people confirmed dead, and an unknown number injured. The shooter committed suicide.

I’m sitting in a chair, staring at the floor, unable to hold myself up with the weight of the world crushing me. I slump further, folding myself over my knees, my head heavy and waterlogged from tears.

I cover my ears. I don’t want to hear. I don’t what to know. I claw my fingers through my hair and pull, wanting to rip it all out.

“Evan.”

My eyes wince from the flickering fluorescent lighting above. Linden’s shape appears in front of me. I reach out to make sure it’s really him and paw at his arm. He leans down and hugs me so tightly, I wish it would wake me from this nightmare.

Cait’s in surgery. Three gunshot wounds. Critical condition.

“She’s going to live,” I tell him. If I believe it, if I put positive thoughts out to the universe like she would, it will come true. It has to. I can’t lose her. I crumple again.

Linden gives me a grim look. He knows the truth. He knows it’s bad. “She will. She’s strong,” he tells me, but the way his brows knit makes me unsure he believes.

“She’s going to live.” My voice is stern, certain. I set my jaw and clench my crusty, blood-covered hands. I’m ready to punch him if he says anything different.

“I’m sorry.” He sighs and refocuses.

“Steph. She . . .” My voice breaks, and my face flushes with the stinging heat of tears. They feel like kerosene now. I’ve produced so many, they’ve morphed into something toxic, potent and deadly.

Memories of watching Steph’s life slip from my hands replays in my tortured mind. Her eyes were focused on me one minute, and then in the next, her mouthed dropped open in awe, and then her attention reached beyond my shoulder until her eyes glazed over and settled on something far away, like she was seeing something the rest of us couldn’t.

I squeeze my face so tight, I feel the blood vessels pulse on my hairline.

Linden deflates, dropping his head in his palms as he mourns her. Steph lived on the same street when we were younger. She was Linden’s first kiss. She’s been my best friend since age five. The Three Musketeers, my dad called us. And now there are only two of us.

Linden places an arm around my shoulder, and we cry for our friend and Cait.

“I told you to take care of her,” a woman says.

Through swollen eyes, I glance across the waiting room. It’s been a few years, but Cait’s mom looks the same. A tall and narrow man with drawn features stands at her side. With his gray hair and stormy eyes, he needs no introduction, nor does he offer me his hand. Cait’s dad. I’ve seen him on TV but never met him in person. He skewers me with his intimidating gaze.

Unable to bear it, I glance away. I failed her. If I’d stayed with Cait instead of working, we would have been looking at buying her little house and dreaming of our future. If I’d stayed with her like I should have, this never would have happened.

Linden rises to greet them. They talk, though I’ve already zoned out.

I lean my head back against the wall and stare through the TV. The president is speaking on gun control. After the speech is done, experts debate the issue.

Fuck them. Fuck everyone for not dealing with this sooner. For not coming to some agreement that fixes this, whatever it is. How many times does this have to happen? Do something, one way or another. Make a decision that protects us. No word wars will make Cait well or give us back Steph or any of the people who died today or every time before this tragedy.

I close my eyes, seeking images of Cait. I find her smile, her laugh, and the way we teased each other. I want to find comfort in them, but remembering them breaks me more.

How could I ever live in a world where Cait doesn’t exist? Where we don’t exist?

Sometime later, Linden’s words bring me back. “She’s out of surgery.”