Page 350 of Boots, Bucket Lists & Bad Ideas
Not to scroll.
Just to hold.
“Hart Wilde.” It’s the first thing Levi’s said since we loaded in the car.
He was in the car. I think.
A woman in scrubs looks up from her monitor.
He takes a visible breath. “My brother just came in the ambulance. We weren’t far behind. His name’s—” His voice falters.
For a second, it’s like he forgets what to say.
“His name is Hart Wilde,” I say.
The woman’s expression softens as she types quickly.
“We have him. They’re taking him back now.”
“Can we see him?” I ask.
“No. He’s being evaluated. We’ll update you when the doctor has something.” She gives him a polite smile.
A practiced smile. The kind you give when you’ve done this too many times.
Levi manages a thank you, low and tense.
The waiting room is a blur of overhead lights, low murmurs, vending machine hums, and that awful clean hospital smell soaks into my skin.
His parents and brothers sit nearby, faces drained and distant. Bronx, Wyatt, and Hope are here too, but I can’t stay with them.
I need space.
Not because I don’t care, but because if I stay too close, I might crumble.
So I step away.
I walk.
Down the hallway.
Back again.
Just outside the waiting room. Close enough to listen, but far enough not to feel the blame in every breath they take.
I did this.
I dig my fingers into my temples, pressing down on a headache that won’t ease.
I try not to think about what Hart looked like lying unconscious. So pale. So limp. And the medics shouting things I didn’t understand.
But the image won’t let go. It presses behind my eyes every time I close them. I see him fall again. That crack. The way his limbs bent.
I walk the length of the hallway again, arms folded tight across my chest. The floor tiles blur—beige, beige, beige—under my boots. I turn at the end, sharp and automatic, and start back the other way.
My footsteps echo.
My pulse does too.
