Page 64 of A Series of Rooms
Even now, Jonah knew the rules. Be good. Lie. Don’t tell anyone your real name.
“Leo,” he tried to say.
“His name is Jonah Prince.”
“Are you his father?”
My father doesn’t care about me,Jonah tried to tell them, but there was something over his mouth and nose, trapping all of his words.
“No, I— No, I’m not his father.”
“I’m going to ask you to wait out here, sir.”
“Please, just. . . Please, don’t let him die.”
“We’re going to do everything we can.”
This time, when the current dragged him under, Jonah wondered if it would take.
CHAPTER 29
Jonah
A harsh flood of daylight rang through his skull the moment he tried to open his eyes. Jonah retreated into the darkness behind his eyelids but the pain remained; a steady throb that brought the rest of his senses into focus one at a time.
The surface beneath him was soft. A bed. The air smelled clean and cold. And the pain...
He hurt everywhere. His face, his head, his ribs, his stomach. When he swallowed, his throat burned like it had been cracked open and laid out under the hot sun. Jonah raised a hand to touch his neck, but there was a tug of resistance. He opened his eyes again to find a narrow tube protruding from a vein below his knuckles, secured in place with tape. Jonah followed the line up a silver pole, to a hanging bag of clear liquid.
He was in the hospital.
Jonah blinked. A half-second flash of a memory, so hazy it could have been his imagination, was goneas soon as it came: a wood-beam ceiling and a face, looking down at him while the water tried to pull him under.
The pain in his head spiked. Jonah pressed the heels of his palms against his temples, trying to alleviate the pressure, but it only sent the pain deeper. A broken noise slipped free from his throat, and when he opened his eyes again, he wasn’t alone.
A woman peeked into the doorway of his room—a police officer, with a black button-up top and a gun holstered at her belt. Jonah pressed himself into the mattress.
She turned away and murmured something into the radio at her shoulder. Jonah’s heart was pounding out of his chest, palms sweating as he clutched his fists around the hospital sheet pooled at his waist.
When Marcus appeared beside her seconds later, his heart nearly gave out altogether.
He stepped into the room as the uniformed officer ducked out, leaving the two of them alone. Marcus approached slowly.
Desperate words, a plea, a defense—something—bubbled in Jonah’s throat. “I didn’t...I didn't tell them... anything. I didn’t—”
Marcus raised his hands, and Jonah flinched. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Marcus take a step back.
“I know,” Marcus said softly. “I’m going to get a nurse and let them know you’re awake, okay? I’ll be right back, just... try to take it easy.”
Jonah only raised his head when he heard the sounds of retreat. He watched Marcus’s back as he turned through the doorway, returning seconds later with a young woman in lavender scrubs. She greeted him in a warm voice and asked if it was okay that she examined him. Unsure of what other choice he had, he nodded.
The whole time she worked on him—shining a small flashlight in his eyes, pressing on the veins in his wrist with cold fingers—Jonah’s gaze lingered on Marcus, who stood just outside the doorway. If the nurse sensed the tension in the room, she gave no indication as she finished up her examination and snapped her rubber gloves into the trash bin.
“How are you feeling, Jonah?” she asked. “How’s your pain level, one-to-ten?”
Jonah, not Leo. He shot a nervous glance at Marcus, who didn’t react at all.
“Four,” he lied. The look on her face told him he wasn’t as convincing as he’d hoped.
