Page 50 of What Comes After

Now, he was dead, my best friend and the guy I’d loved nearly all my life had relayed that news to me, and I didn’t know how to feel.

I should have been upset. I should have been distraught.

On some level, I guess I did feel as though I was in a bit of turmoil. But it wasn’t for the reason it should have been.

My boyfriend died.

My boyfriend died, and I barely survived trying to protect him.

I looked away from Theo, my eyes dropping to my lap, and started quietly sobbing. Seconds passed before I felt the bed depress with Theo’s weight as his arms came around me.

And though I didn’t know exactly how much time had passed, I knew I stayed wrapped in Theo’s arms for a long time, crying my eyes out.

I cried for so long, exhaustion finally took over.

By some miracle—maybe it was my body trying to protect my brain and heart—I eventually drifted off.

ELEVEN

Devyn

It was a strange feeling, being in a wheelchair and feeling relieved.

Today, sitting in a wheelchair meant that it was finally happening.

I was finally able to leave and go home.

After spending more time in the hospital than the doctor had initially anticipated I’d need once I woke up, he’d cleared me. It had been just over two weeks that I’d been in the hospital before I’d gotten the green light to go.

Of course, my departure from the hospital did not mean that everything was fine, and I could go about my business like nothing ever happened. If anything, I was going to be acutely aware of everything I’d gone through for quite some time, weeks at a minimum.

The doctor had given me some very strict orders to follow once I was home.

First and foremost, with the exception of a few of the cuts and bruises I’d gotten, there was nothing else on my body that had fully healed yet.

Recovering completely from the surgery I’d needed to stop the bleeding from my ruptured spleen was going to take several more weeks. I had the cracked and bruised ribs, which were expected to fully heal right around the same time as the spleen. The concussion was a matter of another week or two.

Overall, this was going to be an exercise in patience.

The worst part about it was that it all required limited physical activity and lots of rest, both physical and mental.

While that was, to some degree, all relatively self-explanatory and expected, it didn’t mean that it was ideal.

This whole situation was already a disaster of epic proportions, and I wasn’t sure how I was going to follow through with the doctor’s orders.

How was I supposed to do what I needed to do to rest and recuperate from the injuries I’d suffered when I needed to work? My need to do that wasn’t even really about my clients, either. I could have easily called them up and told them I’d needed an emergency surgery—which was the truth—and most of them would have understood I needed the time to recuperate.

Sadly, understanding didn’t pay the bills, and for someone who had plenty of those without a lot of extra money, I was going to be screwed.

There was no other way to put it. I was going to have to take some time to figure out which bills were most important and pay what I could. Maybe I’d be able to call the companies involved, explain the situation, and find some relief that way.

But none of that was my top priority right now. For today, I was merely looking forward to being out of the hospital and back in my own bed.

While the hospital staff had been wonderful and taken such good care of me, it just wasn’t an ideal environment for a multitude of reasons. The biggest of those was all related to one man.

Theo.

From what I’d learned, he’d been with me since the day after the attack in the theater parking lot. Theo had been by my side, day and night.

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