Raf pushes out of his chair. "I'll get coffee."
"You don't have to?—"
He's already gone.
I sit with Bells's hand in mine and listen to the monitor and don't think about Rex on the operating table. Don't think about nerve damage or the words the surgeon didn't say but that hung in the air between all the words he did.
Don't think about Nash.
Don't think about how I already lost one person I loved and I can't?—
The monitor beeps.
I breathe again.
Raf comes back with two paper cups of coffee that smell scorched even from here. He hands me one and I take a sip and it's the worst thing I've ever put in my mouth, including the time I accidentally drank fucking bong water.
"This is disgusting," I tell him.
"Yep." He drinks his without flinching because Raf has never met a terrible experience he couldn't power through on sheer stubbornness.
He pulls his chair closer to mine. Close enough that the armrests click together. Then he sits down and his shoulder presses against my shoulder and his knee presses against my knee, and he doesn't say anything about it.
Neither do I.
His head drops against my shoulder, heavy and warm, his dark hair tickling my throat.
I shift my arm and get it around the back of his chair. My hand settles on his far shoulder and I pull him in tighter, his temple against the curve of my neck, his coffee balanced on his thigh.
His breathing slows.
Mine too.
Bells's hand is still in my other hand. Her fingers have warmed up, at least. The monitor beeps its steady count and the oxygen hisses away.
And somewhere in this hospital, Rex is either going to survive and walk again or he's not, and I can't do a single fucking thing about any of it except sit here and hold the people I can reach.
CHAPTER 40
BELLS
Beep.
Beep.
Beep.
Okay.
That has to bethemost annoying fucking noise I've ever heard.
Beep beep beep.
My eyelids are glued shut. It takes genuine effort to pry them open, and when I do, the lights overhead stab directly into my brain through my pupils.
I close them again immediately.
"Ow," I whisper.