Two beds, side by side. On the right, Michael. His arm was splinted, his face scratched, sleeping the sleep of the medicated. Even unconscious, he looked weak.
On the left, less than six feet away, was Jessica.
She had a bandage near her hairline. She was staring at the ceiling, lost in her own world, until she heard us enter. She turned her head slowly.
Her eyes met mine.
The recognition was instant. Panic contorted her features, stripping away the yoga-teacher serenity I knew so well. Her mouth opened, but no sound came out. She looked like a fish gasping on a dock.
There was no remorse in her eyes. Only the terror of a predator caught in a trap.
I didn’t scream. I didn’t cry. I walked into the room, my steps heavy and deliberate. I stopped at the foot of Michael’s bed, but I didn’t look at him. My gaze was fixed on her.
“He wasn’t alone,” I said.
My voice was low, but it resonated in the sterile silence. I repeated the officer’s words, throwing them back at her.
Jessica flinched as if I had slapped her. She pulled the sheet up, trying to hide.
“Laura, I…” she whispered, her voice broken.
“No!” I cut her off. “Don’t you dare say my name.”
The only sound was the rhythmic beep-beep-beep of Michael’s heart monitor. A mechanical metronome counting down the seconds of my old life.
I looked at my husband. The face I kissed every morning now looked like a stranger’s mask. I reached out, my hand hovering inches from his cheek, then pulled back. I had lost the right to touch him. Or rather, he had lost the privilege of my touch.
I stepped back. My back ached. The baby kicked—a hard, angry thump against my ribs. I placed a hand on my belly. Just us now, I thought.
I turned to leave, but stopped at the door. There was one more piece on the board.
I took out my phone. My hands trembled, but my resolve was steel. I searched for a contact I had only used once.
David Ramirez. Jessica’s husband.
The quiet civil engineer. The man who always stood in her shadow. The honest man who was about to have his world detonated.
I hesitated. Was I really going to destroy another human being?
I looked back at the two beds. Side by side. Intimate. Shared fate.
The truth needed to be complete.
I walked down the hall to a quiet corner and dialed. It rang three times.
“Hello?”
David’s voice was tired, unsuspecting.
“David,” I said, keeping my voice clinical. “This is Laura from 1102.”
“Laura? Is everything okay? Is it the baby?”
The genuine concern in his voice twisted the knife in my heart.
“You need to come to Mercy General,” I said. “Now. It’s about Jessica.”
The silence on the other end was deafening. He didn’t ask what happened. He didn’t ask if she was hurt.
“I’m on my way,” he said. His voice had turned to stone.
He knew. Somewhere deep down, he knew.
I sat back down in the plastic chair to wait. I was the messenger of the apocalypse, and the show wasn’t over yet.
Twenty-five minutes later, David Ramirez appeared at the end of the hallway. He walked with a stiff, contained urgency. His eyes scanned the room, locked onto me, and he approached.
He didn’t say a word. He just looked at me, his eyes dark with a storm held in check.
“Where?” he rasped.
I nodded toward the green curtain.
We walked together, unlikely allies in a war we didn’t know we were fighting. I followed him in.
Michael was stirring, groaning as the sedation wore off. Jessica was sitting up, legs over the side of the bed. When she saw David, her face collapsed.
“David,” she sobbed. A dry, ugly sound.
David stopped five feet from her. He looked at her, then at Michael. The connection solidified.
“Jessica,” he said, his voice cracking. “What is this?”
“It was a mistake!” she cried. “It’s not what you think!”
