Page 61 of Avalanche
She’s a Filipina woman with sharp eyes and energy that seems to extend beyond her short stature. Probably my mum’s age, or a little older. Which explains why I feel like her question is an attack more than a request.
I straighten and pocket my phone.
“I’m…”
I’m about to say ‘I’m fine, I don’t need anything’. But the way she is looking at me, it reminds me of when I’d come home from months away training overseas and my mom would lift up the hem of my shirt and poke at my ribs and ask me whether I was incapable of feeding myself.
“A coffee would be great.” I give her a forced smile, but it feels like the corners of my lips are a mask. “Thanks.”
She gives me a deadpan look. “I’ll bring you some breakfast.”
I huff as Seth’s door swings shut behind her, then shake my head, but all traces of amusement fall away when I look back at Seth.
He’s in the exact same place he was an hour ago—eyes swollen shut, dry lips parted, his chest rising and falling. Those godforsaken tubes everywhere—in his nostrils, in his arm. I force myself to stare at it all, to see it all, to take it all in. To be here for him, even if I don’t want to. Even if I’m hating every moment of this.
Because that’s what someone did for me once. And I owe my life to them for it.
Tentatively, I drag my chair across the linoleum floor, feeling suddenly self-conscious at the scraping sound it makes, loud in a silence only punctuated by faint beeps and Seth’s raspy breathing. I grit my teeth, forcing myself to move past the discomfort, reaching out until my fingertips are brushing his.
“I’m here, mate.”
My hand slips under his, squeezing it gently, conscious of the IV line stuck in the back of his hand.
I don’t think I’ve ever held his hand. Don’t think we’ve ever touched, except for casual touches—passing each other in the hall, maybe a clap on the shoulder?
I clear my throat. “I know you’d probably rather have Lily or Antoine here instead of me. But they’re just in the waiting room down the hall. The other guys are too.”
I’m rambling, but it doesn’t matter. It’s not like he’s listening, after all. But I’ve heard somewhere that even if an unconscious person can’t really understand you, they can hear you. That if you speak to them, they’ll know they’re not alone.
“They offered to come in here instead of me,” I tell him, my gaze trailing from the back of his hand to the brace around his neck. “But the truth is, I’m the best person for this job. Lily would be in tears right now. Antoine wouldn’t be much better. They love you, both of them. You know that, right? I’ve seen the way they look at you, when the three of you are all curled up reading those smutty books in French.”
I chuckle to myself, unexpected warmth spreading across my chest at the memory. I’ve never felt jealous of Seth. Not exactly. Not like with Matty. But I’d be lying if I said I haven’t felt left out sometimes.
Now, I’d give anything to see the three of them like that again. To see Seth awake and smiling again.
“Eddie’s fucking useless at this sort of thing,” I continue. “He’d get distracted, would probably piss off all the doctors and nurses. And Matty…”
I swallow, thinking of Matty’s face when he picked Seth up from the snow. The way he cradled him against his chest. How he looked so strong and so fragile all at once, like a stone statue set to crack.
“I couldn’t ask this of Matty.”
I bite the inside of my cheek, rub my thumb absently over Seth’s knuckles. These same knuckles were swollen for weeks after he punched Tom. They’re healed now, of course, but I can’t look at them without remembering that. The violence that lives inside of him.
I think that was the first time I really felt like I saw him. Like maybe the core of him wasn’t really that different to the rest of us, after all.
He’s just better at hiding it.
“You’re going to get through this,” I tell him. Maybe it’s a lie, but someone told it to me once and I’d believed it. “You’re going to wake up. You’re going to heal. You’re going to-”
I almost say ‘you’re going to walk again’ but that brace around his neck glares white in the florescent lights, an unwelcome reminder, and I frown at the memory of the surgeon’s words.
We’ll have a better idea of outcomes once he wakes up.
Whatever the fuck that’s supposed to mean. A fancy way of saying they’re just hoping for the best and pissing into the wind like the rest of us.
“You’re a fighter,” I say instead. “You act like a softy, and maybe you are, but you’re a fighter too. I’ve seen you. You would have tore the world down for Lily that day. You would have taken Matty down too, if it had come to it.”
I’d never been so grateful for Seth as I had that night, when I’d thought Matty was about to lay into Antoine. I would have tried to step in, sure. What kind of boyfriend would I be otherwise? Even if Antoine had completely thrown me off balance with his announcement, which was basically a proposal to Lily.
