Page 64 of Best Kept Secret

"I'll be there," I barked and ended the call. "How fast can you get me to Memorial Health in Savannah?" I asked the pilot.

"Let's find out," the pilot said. Soon after, the helicopter blades roared to life above me.

I pressed my fists into my eyes because what I really wanted to do was bawl.

Mira.

My Mira could die. I'd failed her spectacularly. And now I didn't even know if I'd ever get the chance to make it right.

Chapter 27

Mira

Iregretted taking the Ambien. It was a supremely stupid thing to do. After everything I'd survived, I'd let Beau drive me to this? I'd let my parents push me into something I hadn't even done while going through hell in their house? Still, part of me knew it wouldn't have been the worst thing if the beat cop who found me—car door unlocked—hadn't gotten there in time to feel the faint flutter of my pulse.

Needless to say, I was conflicted.

The only consolation was that I didn't feel any pain—physically or emotionally. There was nothing, not even thestrange churning in my stomach I'd felt in the ICU, which the doctor had said was from having my stomach pumped.

I'd also been told that it had been touch and go for a while—my heart had stopped after I stopped breathing, and they had to perform CPR, and put me on a ventilator to bring me back.

I'd woken up in a hospital room, the faint beeping of machines the only sign I was still alive. For the first day, they kept me in the ICU, monitoring my vitals. I was too groggy to feel anything but the cold of the sheets and the itch of the IV in my arm.

By the second night, they moved me to the psych ward. The room was bare—no sharp edges, no cords, no privacy. The lights were always on, at least dimly, and I could hear the nurse's shoes squeaking down the hall every fifteen minutes, checking on me. I tried not to think about why I was there. Tried not to think about much of anything at all.

They told me I had to be under observation for seventy-two hours. Apparently, those were the rules. And to make it worse, a therapist would come by to talk to me.

The white walls of my room felt sterile, almost too clean. The smell of antiseptic lingered in the air, while the constant beeping of machines, and the clatter of gurneys and wheelchairs outside my door were my only companions. I lay back, staring at the ceiling, visually tracing the faint outlines of the tiles, one after another, a quiet mental exercise to pass the time.

My body felt heavy, but my mind? My mind was empty. Not numb. Just hollow, like there was nothing left inside of me for me to feel.

The seventy-two-hour watch felt unnecessary, pointless. There were nurses who came in every now and then. A woman with round, concerned eyes asked me if I wanted visitors during the scheduled visiting hours—no,thank you, I had answered. I didn't care who wanted to see me. It didn't matter who it was. Iwasnotinterested. I was fine here. I wasn't hurting anymore. I wasn'tanything.

I sat up when there was a knock on my door.

I finally said, "Come in," when the knock became persistent.

I knew it was my therapist. I didn't want to see them, either.

A woman walked in, and introduced herself to me.

Dr. Monica Ryan was the therapist assigned to me. I continued to sit on the bed while she sat across from me in a plastic chair. Her glasses were perched on the edge of her nose, her eyes watched me like she was searching for a crack.

Sorry, darlin', I'm all out of cracks.

"How are you feeling today, Mira?" she asked, her voice soft, the kind of voice therapists probably used when they thought they were speaking to a crazy person. I was, after all, in the psych ward, so it was obvious that I was nuts, though that probably wasn't a technical term doctors used.

"I feel fine." It wasn't a lie. Fine was the best word I had. I wasn't hurt. I wasn't broken. I was just here.Existing.

Dr. Ryan crossed one leg over the other, studying me. I could see her trying to dissect the layers beneath my calm. The problem was, there were no layers left to cut through. Everything had burned out.

"Do you want to tell me what's going on with your life?

I chuckled humorlessly. "Apparently, I took too much of the Ambien prescribed for my sister, and ended up in the ER, and then the ICU, and now here."

Her face remained calm, somber. "You want to tell me why you took the Ambien?"

I didn't have an answer, at least not a clear one. "It seemed like the right thing to do at the time."

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