Page 110 of Loving the Legend

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Please God, not him. You’ve taken so much from me.

Ishan’s lips are moving, but my thoughts drown him out.

Five things to hear…

The beeping does a stuttering thing, and my legs give out. I kneel and bracket my head between my arms, rocking in place.

My phone buzzes, and I drop it as I cup my hands over my mouth and wheeze, trying to unblock my throat.

Five things….

Beeping. Beeping…

I squeeze my eyes shut.

Five things…

Three graves…I’ll visit three graves every year if he doesn’t make it.

Five things I see.

Tubes, fucking tubes, machines, Adam’s dying.

If fire takes him, water takes me.

I swear it, God.

I press on my chest bone and suck in air.

Somewhere in the recesses of my memory I hear Adam, “Ty, breathe!”

I suck in another breath, pushing past the ache. Then another, then another, until the ghastly thing lodged in my chest doesn’t hurt so much.

A thumb slides under my chin. I peel my eyes open and meet Ishan's gaze as he kneels in frontof me.

“He’s alive,” he says, nodding around a sad smile and wet eyes. He looks wrung out.

“He’s alive,” he repeats with a mix of desperation and hope.

“H-he’s alive,” I whisper, more for him than me.

“Baby—”

My eyebrows bunch as I track the familiar voice to my phone in Ishan’s hand.

“He was calling…I thought he could help,” Ishan says, handing it to me.

“Baby, talk to me.”

“S-Sid?”

“Yes, I’m here. Are you okay?”

I take him off of speakerphone.

“Sid,” I sob into the phone quietly, too choked again to speak.

“I’m so sorry this is happening. Ishan said Adam’s going to pull through, baby,” he says gently.

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