The sound comes out choked, gagged, restricted by the hose in my mouth. I thrash, trying to pull the tube that is helping me breathe from my throat. Heavy hands land on me, trying to restrain my movements. Pain radiates down my slinged arm as I grasp a thick line, blood oozing as I rip it from a vein.
“Code gray! I have a combative patient!” the unfamiliar doctor yells as he and Dr. Anderson try to hold me down. My flailing continues, just wanting to finish what I failed to do at the river.
Why won’t they just. Let. Me. Die?
Nurses run into the room, my energy waning as I struggle against being restrained.
“Hudson, love, please calm down.” A choked sob sounds from the corner of the room, my eyes snapping to my mom and dad holding each other.
Why are they here? They don’t need to see me like this.
I fight harder, just wanting,needingthis to end.
More hands force my body into the hard mattress, urging me to calm down.
Through the cacophony of noise, a whispered “Hudson” meets my ears. My head whips in its direction, tired green eyes locked on me.
An immediate magnetism tugs at me—pulls me towards the man standing at the foot of my bed. His face is tear-stained, dark circles ringing his beautiful eyes.
“Please. Stay.”
The soft words leave his lips, and everything in me collapses.
Tears flow down my face as I keep my focus on Cullen, falling back onto the bed, defeated. A tiny prick stings my arm, my entire body rushing towards weightlessness.
I allow the drugs to pull me under, my eyes closing with a prayer that maybe this time, I won’t wake up.
Chapter five
Cullen
Iwake with a gasp, the image of Hudson’s hands clawing at the ventilator fading as the late afternoon sunlight spills through my bedroom window. It blends with the memory of him stepping off the bridge into the river, the pictures looping in my head like a broken reel.
The sunlight feels wrong, like the world forgot Hudson is still lying in an ICU bed.
Watching him wake like that gutted me. The second he reached for his breathing tube, I understood—he wasn’t glad to be alive. Like waking up was a mistake he was trying to fix.
I knew when he woke he wouldn’t magically be fixed, but I hoped for something. Relief, maybe? Regret?
Not a continuation of whatever darkness he was in before.
Rolling over, I grab my phone to check the time—5:30 p.m. I barely slept for two hours.
I spent the entire day at the hospital. The only reason I left was because they needed to run tests and wouldn’t let me stayin the room. When I hesitated, Mrs. Nora promised she wasn’t leaving the hospital and would stay in the waiting room in case Hudson needed anything.
So I came home.
It was supposed to help, but the restless energy hasn't eased. There is an electric current simmering under my skin, uncomfortable and persistent.
My hands scrub down my face, trying to soothe the feeling.
Maybe that's what happens when the person you love is awake but still feels out of reach.
Hud has been awake for two days now. Awake, but not really present. He just lies there, staring into space, the low-dose sedative keeping him calm. The only communication we’ve had is when he blinks once for yes and twice for no whenever someone asks him something.
Not that I think he’d talk even if he could.
He won’t even look at me.
