Page 12 of Heart Sick

Have I been wrong this entire time and heaven does, in fact, exist?

But when I hear a voice, I realize hell exists on earth, a place I still inhabit. “Ms. Huxley, can you hear me? I’m an ER doctor. You took a lot of pills. Can you remember?”

Surely life isn’t this cruel?

Opening my eyes slowly, I see that it, in fact, is.

I’m in a hospital ER with a cannula stuck in my arm, pumping me full of drugs to clear out the others I took. But I don’t want that.

“No!” I tug at the tube, desperate to pull it out.

Nurses dive on top of me to stop me. “Ms. Huxley! Please. We are trying to help.”

“I don’t want your help!” I reply, eyeing the nurse angrily. I feel terrible because it isn’t her fault. “I thought taking the endless pills I did made that very clear.”

“Your friend Joy found you. If she hadn’t…”

If she hadn’t, I would be in a better place. But here I am, once again burdened with this pain. It was gone for a moment, when I embraced death. I want it back.

“I don’t want to be here!” I thrash wildly, desperate to break free.

“We need to sedate her.”

Before I can object, the nurse injects a clear fluid into my IV and the darkness drags me under…for a little while at least.

I feel like I’ve been run over—twice. But I will my eyes to open.

When I realize I am still in the hospital, I sigh and sink into the pillows. I try to move, but peer down and see I am restrained to the bed by my wrists and ankles with tan leather straps.

“What the hell? Nurse!”

I would push the call button, but can’t, seeing as I’m restrained.

“Ms. Huxley, you’re awake. Are you feeling better?”

The young nurse enters, her scrubs are a lovely pale yellow. My stomach suddenly drops. “Am I in the fucking psych ward?”

“Just for observation,” she replies, her soothing monotone no doubt learned to keep “crazy people” like me calm. “You took a lot of pills. Why would you do that?”

I open and close my mouth before a maniacal laugh spills from me. “I think it’s fairly obvious.”

When she blinks once, I realize she needs me to draw a diagram.

“Because I was trying to kill myself,” I whisper sarcastically.

She shakes her head, writing something in my chart. I crane my neck in hopes of catching what she wrote, but when a doctor hobbles into the room, it’s clear it doesn’t matter. I am stuck in here.

“Ms. Huxley—”

“Luna,” I correct over the top of him.

He nods once. “Luna. Do you know why you’re here?”

Has the world gone mad? Why are they talking to me like I’m the crazy one?

When I don’t reply, he continues. “You’re very lucky to be alive.”

A cackle gets caught in my throat and tears leak from the corners of my eyes. “Lucky? In case you missed the memo, I don’t want to be alive. Hence, the pills. You’re wasting a hospital bed, Doctor. Let me go, and give it to someone who needs it.”

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