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“Well,” she says, hesitating. “Where to begin?” She takes a deep breath and closes her eyes. “You almost died,” she tells me, but that doesn’t surprise me. I do seem to remember a bright, warm light. And Charlie! Shit, where is Charlie?
“She’s fine,” Meredith says suddenly, and I realize I asked that aloud. “She’s better than fine. I found the perfect family for her. Or, they found me.”
She doesn’t elaborate, and I don’t ask her to. My body relaxes, and I feel the dopamine fill my body. Charlie is safe and with people who love her. That’s all I could hope for.
“You saved her,” she says with pride. “She told me all about your daring rescue and how you got her out the window. You’re her hero.”
“She’s mine,” I laugh, and a funny look crosses her face. “Okay, what?” I ask, annoyed. “What am I missing?”
“You almost died,” she repeats, hollower this time. “Damien shot you, and you lost a lot of blood. You were going to die right there in that driveway, but she… she saved you, Graveyard. I still can’t wrap my head around it, but she brought you back.”
“Fuck,” I breathe, astounded. “I can’t wait to hear that story. What else happened?”
“Gator rushed you to the hospital,” she tells me. “Charlie brought you back from the brink of death, but you’d already lost a lot of blood. Again, I don’t understand it all, but whatever she did couldn’t heal you. It just… bought you more time. You had to have a few blood transfusions, and there were a few times—”
She breaks off, and I see that she’s crying, looking down at her hands. She takes a deep breath and shakes her head, composing herself.
“Anyway, it’s been a long week,” she finishes. “You almost died, but you didn’t. Now you’re awake, and I think that’s a good sign. But you’re the doctor. You tell me.”
I smirk. “My official diagnosis is I’m out of the woods,” I say, trying for my best doctor tone. It sounds silly through the barrage of painkillers and the haziness of my brain, but she laughs anyway. God, I love her laugh. I don’t think I’ve heard it since I met her. It’s a sweet, tinkling sound that fills up my entire brain. It makes me happy.
“Wait,” I say, snapping back to attention. “How can you be here right now?”
She smiles shyly, her body more relaxed than I’ve seen it.
“That’s down to Pocus and Seer,” she says, blushing. “I have no idea what they did, and I hope I never find out. But when they were done with him, Damien came forward and confessed everything. He’s rotting in a prison cell for life. No bail. And I’m free.”
“I told you,” I say with a coy smile. “You doubted me, but I told you that we would get you out of jail.”
She blushes deeper and smiles brightly at me. “You told me. Pocus told me. Everyone told me.” She sighs. “But I’ve never had any reason to believe that people keep their promises before. And I never thought I’d see a day when I wasn’t running from Damien.”
“And the kids?” I ask, remembering the wall in the closet, covered with pictures.
“They’re still out there,” she says with a sad sigh. “I can’t rescue them all, but now that I don’t have to hide them anymore, I’ve been thinking of ways I can help them get their lives back.”
“Oh, really?” I ask curiously. “Do tell.”
“It’s like I said before, Graveyard,” she says with a sly smile. “I have some very affluent friends. I’m thinking about opening a community center, specifically for them. Especially the kids coming out of the gangs. They’ll need somewhere to go with resources. Legal and otherwise.”
“You’re not building an army of gifted kids are you?” I joke, and her face darkens. If I weren’t in a hospital bed, she’d probably smack me.
“That’s the least funny joke I’ve ever heard,” she says tightly. “They’ll need a lot of therapy because of that. Some of them were already loyal to Damien. They can’t see how much he manipulated and exploited them.”
“I thought you didn’t trust therapists,” I say, remembering her panic at Charlie going to a facility.
“I never said that!” she exclaims, looking flustered. “I don’t trust therapists who try to institutionalize kids when they’re different. But I’ll fully vet everyone who works in the center. We’ll probably need doctors to offer pro bono medical care as well.”
“Too bad you don’t know any doctors,” I say with a sad sigh.
She smirks. “I wasn’t asking you,” she says, getting more flustered. “Right now your only job is to get better. You’ve suffered a lot.”
“I told you.” I smile. “I’m out of the woods. I’ll be back to work in a week tops.”
Just then, I cough. It hurts so bad that I feel like I’m splitting in two. Fuck Damien for shooting me in the chest.
“Maybe two,” I say weakly, trying to act braver than I feel.
With her sitting next to me and looking at me so tenderly, I suddenly resent this hospital bed. I resent all the time I’ve wasted when I should have told her how I felt about her. Maybe she couldn’t hear it then. But maybe she will hear me now.
