The light turned green, but Landon did not see. A car swerved around them, impulsively. Then, another. Someone wailed on a horn. They were holding hands when the truck struck them.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Landon dropped to his knees by the bed and grabbed her hand. He needed to be as close as she would let him; he had to know if she’d meant what she’d said. “You remember?” he asked.
Rose slowly lifted a hand to her forehead. “Hurts,” she said. “Oh, God, it hurts.”
“You lost a lot of blood.” He hated how many times in his life he’d said those words. It was a cruel joke, lacking entirely in humor.
Rose opened one eye, then quickly shut it. “Bright,” she said. It wasn’t. The lights were low, probably deliberately. The room was calm, dark, and quiet.
“You don’t need to open your eyes.”
“I want to,” she said. The words were coming out more clearly now. “I want to see you.”
“You know who I am?” he asked, terrified her recognition had been some sort of fluke, and almost as terrified that it had not been.
“Yes,” she said. “I know you. But I…” She winced. “I don’t understand.” She squeezed her eyes shut tighter, as though if she could just shut them tight enough, she could make him disappear. “What are you doing here, Landon?”
There it was again. His name. She remembered his name.
“I can explain.” How much did she know? Where should he begin?
“I told you, didn’t I?” she asked.
“Told me what?” Had his heart ever beat so quickly? Rose. His Rose. She was here. She was back. They had time.
“Not to follow me.”
That old hurt rattled behind his ribs. “No,” he said. “You didn’t. You didn’t tell me anything.”
“Exactly.”
Landon ran hands through his hair and rubbed his eyes, burning from the lack of sleep and the horrors of the morning. “What was I supposed to do, Rose?” he asked, as earnestly as he’d ever asked a question. “You’re the love of my life.”
“And you were the love of mine.” Hope. God, it felt so good to hope. It felt so good to hear those words straight from the source; words he thought had been banished to the realm of memory forever. Rose opened both eyes. Her voice skipped like rocks they’d once tossed across the water of their little lake, catching on an ache far too big for words. “But so was she.”
Chapter Thirty
Waiting rooms are for people still hoping for good news. The ones who’ve already surrendered to despair tend to float elsewhere. They don’t sit in the waiting room, because there is a part of them that no longer believes there’s anything left to wait for.
People in waiting rooms still imagine worst-case scenarios, of course. It’s human nature. But mostly, they bargain, plead, and pray. They clutch rosaries, crosses, and stars. They whisper promises into the air. They envision futures that haven’t yet been taken from them. Futures that still feel possible, if only the news is good.
Rose and Landon waited. Landon’s own head was bruised and bleeding, Rose’s arms and legs speckled with cuts, but they refused to be seen. They were too busy waiting for good news.Rosewas too busy waiting for good news. She was too busy bargaining with God. She was praying, the words a whimper but the intentions behind them crystal clear:I would give my life, I would give my life, let her live, please, let her live.She was thinking of Cordelia as she had been that morning, the hearts on her footie pajamas, the giggles and gurgles. She was imagining the first dayof preschool, first day of kindergarten, first day of high school, all of the firsts she would experience again through her beloved daughter’s eyes.
The doctor was compassionate, and brief. There was nothing for them to wait for.
Chapter Thirty-One
“I know,” Landon said. “I know.”
“You don’t.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Wake, sleep, wake, sleep, dream, wake, hold your eyes open with your fingertips, you need to stay awake. Every day was a punishment. Sleep should have offered some relief, but it was worse. Unfathomably worse. In her dreams, Cordelia was alive, thriving, growing stronger by the day. And then she would wake, and Cordelia was gone.
The first time it happened, she threw up all over the white duvet she’d laid beside the empty crib. The second time, her stomach was too empty to produce anything but bile—thick, green mucus staining the comforter she’d only halfheartedly tried to clean. The third time, she couldn’t breathe. Later, a doctor would call it a panic attack. One emergency room visit, two Xanax, and a morphine drip later, her heart was still racing. It felt like the blood was trying to escape just as it had once before; as if it, too, wanted to end the torture.