Page 31 of Mine To Hunt

“Mads…” I whisper weakly. My voice barely comes out.

She pulls back slightly, her face pale and streaked with tears.

“I… I didn’t mean to scare you.” The words sound small even to my own ears. I swallow, my throat burning. “I just… I didn’t know what else to do.”

Maddie freezes. Then her expression twists. “Scare me?” She repeats hoarsely. Her voice cracks open with disbelief.

“Ree, you almost died.” The words fall into the room like stones.

She grips the edge of the hospital mattress like she needs something solid to hold onto.

“What were you thinking?” She chokes out. “Taking those pills…”

Her shoulders shake. “I thought… I thought I’d lost you.” Her voice grows louder, raw and shaking. “If I’d been even a few minutes later, you wouldn’t be here.”

Her fingers tighten around my arm. “You’d be gone, Ree. How could you do that to me?”

The shout slices through the quiet hospital room, full of hurt and anger that make my chest ache deeper than the IV needle in my arm. Tears spill hot down my cheeks. Because she’s right.

I almost left her with this wreckage. Added my silence to the long list of betrayals already piling up around us.

Maddie lifts her head slowly. Her eyes are swollen now, furious and wrecked. She wipes her nose with the back of her hand and straightens, but she still doesn’t let go of me. Like loosening her grip might make me disappear.

“The paramedics said one more… maybe two more pills.” She continues, her voice trembling now. “And it would’ve been irreversible.”

She swallows hard. “I rode in that ambulance screaming at them to hurry. Replaying every stupid fight we’ve ever had.”

A shaky breath escapes her. “Every time I should’ve pushed harder. Every moment I thought you were‘handling it.’”

Tears slide down her cheeks, but she doesn’t bother wiping them away this time.

“That video,” she says suddenly, anger flashing through her voice again, “that’s not you. That’s his crime. His sickness.”

She shakes her head fiercely. “And yeah… it broke you. But it does not get to take you.”

She leans forward until her forehead presses gently against mine, her breath uneven against my skin.

“You don’t get to check out on us.” She whispers. “Not on me. Not on yourself.”

Her grip tightens again, desperate and grounding. “Promise me.” She says quietly. “Right now. We fight this together.”

Before I can respond, the door swings open with a soft whoosh, and a doctor steps in, his white coat crisp and stethoscope dangling from his neck like a badge of calm authority.

He looks to be in his mid-forties, with salt-and-pepper hair neatly combed and a name tag reading "Dr. Elias Thorne." He glances at the chart in his hand, then at us, his expression professional but kind, the kind of steady that doesn't flinch at raw emotion.

“Miss Whitlock.” The voice comes from the doorway.

I glance up as a tall man in a white coat steps into the room, nodding politely as he approaches the bed. He pulls a stool closer with a soft scrape against the tile and sits down beside me.

“Good to see you awake and alert.” He offers a small professional smile. “I’m Dr. Thorne. I handled your intake last night.”

He studies my face for a moment, assessing. “How are you feeling? Any nausea, dizziness, confusion?”

I shift slightly against the pillows, the movement sending a wave of fatigue through my body. My muscles feel heavy, like they’refilled with sand. My head swims faintly. But his voice cuts through the fog like a thin lifeline.

“Tired.” I admit. My voice scrapes painfully against my throat, but it feels a little stronger than it did earlier. “My throat hurts. Everything else… feels numb, I guess. What did I take?” I ask quietly. “How bad was it?”

Dr. Thorne flips open the chart resting on the foot of the bed, scanning the notes with the practiced ease of someone who’s done this a thousand times.