Page 7 of Bookish Girl’s Emergency Contact Is a Lycan King

“I’m awake,” I inform the ceiling. “Just so you know. I’m awake and I remember things. Mostly. I remember most things. Some things. The important things.”

The ceiling doesn’t respond, which is fair.

“Oh, good, you’re awake.”

A nurse appears at the edge of my vision, kind eyes, sensible ponytail, scrubs with cartoon cats on them that probably make children feel better about being here. She’s holding a clipboard and a pen that looks like it’s been through at least three apocalypses.

“How are you feeling?” she asks, checking something on the monitor next to my bed. Her name tag says DEBRA, which feels like a trustworthy name. A name that knows how to handle paperwork and difficult patients and people who hallucinate angels in car wrecks.

“Like I got hit by a car.”

“Well, you did, so that tracks.” She smiles, and it’s the kind of smile that’s seen a lot of trauma and decided to stay kind anyway. “Good news is, you got lucky. Mild concussion, some bruising, the stitches… but nothing broken, nothing internal. You’ll be sore for a few days, but you should make a full recovery.”

Lucky.

That’s one word for it. It’s not the word I would have chosen. My picks were more along the lines of traumatized or still shaking or definitely never getting in a car again. Still, I appreciate the optimism.

“I’m going to need you to fill out some paperwork,” Debra continues, handing me the clipboard. “Standard stuff. Insurance information, medical history, emergency contact. We need someone to come take you home.”

Emergency contact.

Millie.

Thank God for Millie Vance. My best friend since college, the only person in the world who knows exactly how bad my driving anxiety is and has never once made me feel weird about it. Millie, who will absolutely give me shit about this for the rest of my life (I can’t believe you finally decided to drive somewhere and immediately got hit by a car, that’s so on brand for you), but who will also bring me soup and sit with me and make sure I don’t spiral into a panic attack about getting behind the wheel again.

If I ever get behind the wheel again. Which I won’t. Probably. Definitely. I’m definitely never driving again.

One crisis at a time. Fill out the form. Call Millie. Go home. Panic about the future later.

I take the clipboard. My hands are shaking, I can see them trembling as I grip the pen, and my vision keeps doing this annoying thing where it swims at the edges like I’m looking at everything through water that won’t quite settle.

Name. Easy. You know your name.

I write FABLE LARKIN in careful letters, pressing hard because the pen is almost out of ink and it keeps skipping on the paper. The lines come out jagged and uneven, a seismograph recording a small earthquake.

Date of birth. Also easy. You know when you were born.

I write the numbers. Squint at them. They look right. Probably.

Address.

I write the address of Fable Tales, the bookstore and the apartment above it, my whole life in one crooked little building on Main Street. The pen drags and catches, and I have to trace over some of the letters twice to make them legible.

Emergency contact.

Millie Vance.

I write her name in the box, neat and clear, and then I move to the phone number.

This is where it goes wrong.

The thing about ADHD is that it doesn’t wait for convenient moments to malfunction. It doesn’t say hey, you’re concussed and scared and trying to fill out important paperwork, so I’ll go easy on you. It says actually, this seems like a great time to spin all the numbers in your head, a slot machine with no jackpot.

I’ve had Millie’s number memorized since freshman year. I’ve dialed it a thousand times, when I was sad, when I was anxious, when I was just bored and wanted to hear someone laugh at my terrible jokes. I could recite it in my sleep.

Except your brain is soup right now, isn’t it?

I stare at the little boxes on the form. Ten digits. How hard can it be?