“Lenny!” I scream, and I hear her whimper before I see her, staggering to stand, holding her arm as blood oozes down to her wrist.
“I-I’m he-here,” she sobs.
“Sebastian!” I yell, and his arm pops up from behind the basins, giving me a wave.
“I can’t stand, but I’m okay,” he calls, and my eyes dart everywhere.
“Darla!”
“Y-yes,” Darla whimpers, popping her head out from the front counter. Or at least, what remains of it.
Fuck.
Fuck!
FUCK!
The gun tumbles from my fingers, clattering to the floor as air seizes in my lungs.
I can’t breathe.
I can’t breathe.
I CAN’T BREATHE!
The loud approaching sirens start to fade as I clutch my chest, clawing at my pinafore, trying to get the zipper down like that will somehow help me breathe.
Bonnie appears before me, her lips moving, her eyes frantic, but no matter what I do, I can’t get air into my lungs.
Someone else appears before me, a paramedic, then a police officer, but still, I can’t fucking breathe.
Suddenly, I’m jostled around, Bonnie, the paramedic and police officer vanishing, and in their place… is him.
Asher.
Warm hands cup my face. Whisky eyes pierce my vision. Soft lips press to my ear.
“Breathe, Lily.”
I choke on a rush of oxygen, a cough escaping one after the other as air slowly begins to trickle back in.
Asher pulls me to his chest, and I wrap my arms around him, needing him more than ever to keep me afloat.
I’m not able to stay in his embrace for long. The scene looks like a war zone, quickly filling with paramedics and police, trying to figure out what happened.
Asher doesn’t leave me. He stays by my side, his arm around my shoulder, giving me comfort. To the outside world, it lookslike nothing more than a friend offering support, but if it didn’t… if it looked like more… in this moment, I wouldn’t care.
Seb and Lenny get rushed off to the hospital with non-life-threatening bullet wounds, followed by Bonnie and Darla, who are getting treated for shock.
The paramedics want me to go to the hospital as well, but I decline, and after four intense hours of interviews, plus a slap on the wrist that will likely get followed up on for having an unregistered firearm, the officers let me leave. Asher drives me home in my car, getting Steve from his work to pick up his motorbike that he left parked across from my salon.
Apparently, they could hear the gunfire from the auto repair shop, and Asher jumped on his bike to see what was going on.
I’m so glad he did. I’m fairly certain I would’ve died if he didn’t show up when he did. I just couldn’t get my lungs to work, but his presence… his voice… it brought me back.
Once we are home, I tell Asher I need a moment, and I go to my bathroom, tearing my clothes off as I turn the water on in the shower.
It’s scalding hot, just what I need right now, and I step under the stream, my cheek stinging from the cut, but I welcome the pain. I deserve the pain.
