Chapter 37
There was darkness.And there was a woman.
She spoke to him. A rambling dialogue interspersed with the occasional huff of irritation or snort of quiet laughter.
The melody of her voice rising and falling unsettled him as much as it soothed him. It held him in the darkness, and it beckoned him toward the light. It was the voice of a siren, dragging him to the rocks. Beautiful and otherworldly, bathed in soft light, the ocean bubbling and roiling around her. She was a fantasy and a dream, both utterly intoxicating and utterly impossible.
Sometimes she cried. Those were the worst times. He could hear the desolation of her grief. The misery that gripped her. But he couldn’t see her or touch her. And she didn’t hear him when he called.
He swam through the darkness for a time, floating in the currents that tugged at him and tried to drag him down. But he never sank. Something gripped him. Held him. And ever so slowly, he drifted toward the surface.
There was pain there. Sharp and bright. And there was… Ellie.
God. There was Ellie. And she was in danger.
He flew into consciousness, choking on the tubes in his throat, fighting to escape the needle taped to his arm. Machines blared alarms, and bright lights burned his vision. Someone pushed him back, but he bucked against them. He had to get to her.
Someone tugged the tube, pulling the tape off his cheek and then drawing it out, and he gagged as it scraped his throat, choking and swallowing hard. Panic shoved his heart rate up until it thundered in his ears as he flailed for purchase.
“Ellie!” he rasped. Fuck. His muscles were so weak. The astringent smell of hospital disinfectant assaulted him. But then she was there, pushing through the nurses, grabbing his hand and forcing herself closer. And he could hear her precious voice over all the noise, or perhaps despite it. Perhaps he would have heard her all the way from hell.
“Josh! Josh, I’m here.” Her hand grasped his and her beloved, tear-streaked face was beside him, and then she was cradling him, her arms around him as she rocked him.
“I heard you.” His voice grated over his raw throat, but he had to tell her. “I heard you, and I came back.”
She wrapped herself tighter around him. “I love you. God. I love you so much. I thought I’d lost you.”
“I love you, too,” he croaked. “I was lost, but you found me. I’ll always come back to you, Ellie.” He swallowed against the ache in his throat. He almost didn’t want to ask, but he had to know. “Nissy?”
“She’ll be fine.” Ellie pulled out her phone and showed him a video from the vet: Nissy with a bandaged chest, lying in a basket, paw dangling, her favorite toys around her, looking into the camera with amber eyes.
And somehow, that was what broke him. He sobbed helplessly, clinging to Ellie as they wept and then laughed and then wept again. And then she called for Donna and Liam, and everyone was there. He was surrounded by love. They were surrounded by love.
She was real and he was real. She loved him and he loved her. And nothing else in the world mattered.