Chapter Twenty
MILLIE
Sleep has come lightly the past two days.
I am aware of the weight of the blankets, of the faint hum of the ceiling fan, of the shape of the house settling around me in its usual nocturnal rhythm.
Somewhere in the distance, a car passes. Somewhere closer, the pipes sigh as the water heater cycles. I drift in and out of dreams that don’t quite form into images.
Suddenly, a loud crash comes from the kitchen.
The sound of breaking glass carries through the house with a violence that pulls me upright before I fully understand what it is.
My heart is already racing by the time my feet hit the floor.
For a second, I sit here, disoriented in the dark, listening hard enough that the silence afterward feels louder than the noise itself.
“Dad?” The word leaves my mouth before I’ve consciously chosen it, pulled up from somewhere instinctive and childlike. The house gives nothing back. No shuffle of movement or irritated response about the noise, just an eerie silence that sits uneasily under my skin.
For one sharp, ridiculous second, my mind lands on the only explanation that makes sense at this hour.
Someone is in the house.
My heart surges so hard it makes my vision pulse at the edges. I stand, the floorboards cold against the soles of my feet, and I listen with every part of me, straining for the sound of breathing that isn’t mine, for footsteps that don’t belong to me.
The crash replays in my head, glass, impact, and something heavier beneath it.
“Dad?” I say it louder now, but the sound comes out thin, beyond my control.
Still nothing.
I move into the hallway slowly, my hand brushing along the wall as though the house might be able to steady me. The light from the streetlamp leaks through the curtains in long gray stripes, turning everything unfamiliar.
Halfway down, I stop and double back, grabbing the heavy ceramic lamp from the side table without thinking.
It feels absurd, yet necessary at the same time, the weight of it grounding in my grip.
I hold it awkwardly, trying to be ready for something I’ve never been trained for, my pulse thundering so loud I’m certain it could give me away to anyone listening.
The silence stretches.
Something else pushes through the fear, quieter but more insistent. A different kind of dread. The memory of the way Dad had looked at dinner. The way his hand had lingered against his ribs.
I reach the kitchen doorway and stop so abruptly that my shoulder clips the frame.
Dad is on the floor.
For a suspended second, my brain refuses to translate what I’m seeing, as though the image is in a language I don’t understand.
The heavy ceramic lamp slips from my fingers without warning, striking the tile with a violent crack that explodes through the room.
The sound splinters the silence, ceramic shattering outward in jagged pieces that skid beneath the cabinets.
I don’t even look at it.
All of me is fixed on him.
Broken glass lies scattered around his body, catching the dim light like something decorative instead of lethal.
One of the drinking glasses from the cabinet has shattered near his hand, water spreading slowly across the tile in a thin sheet that keeps widening, creeping toward his shoulder.
He is half-curled on his side, his back pressed against the base of the kitchen island, one arm drawn tight across his chest as though he is trying to physically hold something inside himself that refuses to stay contained.
This is not how he is supposed to exist in the world.
This is not supposed to happen.
And the world lurches under me like it’s slipped its alignment.
My father does not end up on the floor.
My father does not look small.
My father does not look breakable.
For one disorienting heartbeat, I stand there, rooted to the doorway like I’ve been nailed in place, my lungs refusing to remember how breathing works. A cold, animal panic claws up the inside of my throat, sharp enough to make sound impossible.
Then something inside me fractures.
“Dad. Hey. Hey, look at me.” My voice comes out thin and unrecognizable, but my body is already moving. There’s a sharp sting under my foot, glass or something worse, but it barely registers, like it’s happening to someone else.
I’m on my knees beside him, my hands hovering uselessly above him like if I touch him, it’ll make this real, and I won’t be able to survive that.
I force myself to make contact.
His skin feels alarmingly off.
Too cool, too damp.
A sheen of sweat coats him, slick beneath my palms, the kind of cold sweat I have only ever associated with words like emergency, critical, and too goddamn late. My fingers slide slightly against his shoulder, and the sensation sends a fresh spike of terror through me, primal and blinding.
“Dad, you need to wake up. You need to wake up right now!” The words tumble over each other, urgent and pleading at the same time, because some part of me still believes this is a misunderstanding I can talk my way out of.
His chest rises, but not right, not steady.
Each breath looks like an effort.
Each second stretches into something unbearable and cruel.
I realize, dimly, that I am shaking hard enough to rattle my teeth.
His eyes open at the sound of my voice, but they do not focus. Pain moves through his face in waves he is trying, stubbornly, to contain. His mouth shapes something that never becomes a word.
“Dad, I need you to stay with me. Do you hear me? Stay with me!” My voice sounds strange to my own ears, too steady, like it belongs to someone who is not standing in her kitchen at two in the morning watching the strongest person she knows come apart.
I fumble for my phone with hands that feel disconnected from the rest of me, as if they belong to someone else who is doing a poor job of being calm. It takes three attempts to unlock the screen. My thumb keeps missing the numbers. My breath keeps getting in the way of itself.
When the call finally connects, the voice on the other end is steady, almost impossibly so.
“911. Emergency. Which service?”
“Am-bulance,” I say, and my voice cracks on the second syllable like something breaking under pressure. “I need an ambulance. Now.”
“Okay, I’m here with you. What’s the address?”
I give it to her automatically, muscle memory taking over where my brain is failing.
“And what’s your emergency?”
“My dad,” I say, the word coming out smaller than it should be. “He collapsed. He’s on the floor. He can’t get up. He’s… he’s having trouble breathing.”
“Is he conscious?”
“Yes. Yes, he’s conscious.” I press my hand against his shoulder as if confirming it for both of us. “He’s awake. He’s just… he’s not right.”
“Is he speaking to you?”
“Not really. He’s trying. He’s making sounds, but I can’t… I can’t understand him.”
“Okay. You’re doing well. Stay with me. How old is he?”
“He’s forty-nine.”
“Does he have any known medical conditions?”
“Yes.” The word tears out of me before I can brace for it. “He has pancreatic cancer. Stage four.”
There is the smallest pause on the other end. Not hesitation or shock, just acknowledgment.
“Is he currently on any medications?”
“Yes. Pain management. Chemo. I don’t… I don’t know all the names. I can get them if you need.”
“That’s okay for now. We can get that from the paramedics when they arrive. Has he hit his head?”
“I don’t think so. There’s glass… Dad dropped a glass. It broke. I don’t know if h-he…” My voice fractures again. “I don’t know what happened. I just heard a crash.”
“All right, I need you to listen carefully. Is he clutching his chest?”
“Yes.” My eyes burn as I look down at his arm, still drawn tight across himself like he’s holding something in place. “Yes, he is.”
“Is his breathing shallow or labored?”
“Yes. Both. It’s… it’s like he can’t get enough air.”
“Okay. The ambulance is on the way. They’re coming as fast as they can. I need you to stay on the line with me.”
“I’m here,” I say, though it feels like a lie. Nothing about this feels like being here, in this moment.
“Can you gently roll him onto his back?”
“I don’t want to hurt him.”
“You won’t. I’ll guide you.”
My hands shake so badly I have to force them to obey. I slide one behind Dad’s shoulders, one at his hip, and ease him over inch by inch, every movement feeling like it might shatter him.
“That’s good. You’re doing well. Is he responsive when you speak to him?”
“Dad,” I whisper, bending close. “Can you hear me?”
His eyes move. That’s all, but it’s enough.
“Yes,” I choke. “He knows I’m here.”
“Good. Keep talking to him. That helps. Is there anyone else in the house?”
“No.”
“Do you have any pets that need to be secured?”
“No.”
“All right. I want you to unlock the front door if you can do so safely. That will help paramedics reach you faster.”
“I don’t want to leave him.”
“Can you see him from the door?”
“Yes.”
“Then go now. I’ll stay on the line.”
The hallway feels endless. My legs don’t feel real as I force myself up, and my foot slips straight out from under me, the floor slick beneath it.
My hand hits the wall, catching me, the world tilting for a second that stretches too long, something sharp cutting deeper into my foot.
It registers and doesn’t, like it’s happening to someone else.
I drag myself upright, already moving again, reaching for the lock. My fingers miss it once, twice, before I get it open and turn back, running to him like distance itself is dangerous. I fumble for the phone, blood smearing across the screen as I pick it up. “I’m back.”
“You’re doing exactly what you need to do. The ambulance is very close now. Can you tell me if his lips are turning blue?”
I look. “No. Just pale. Very pale.”
“Okay. That’s helpful. Keep speaking to him. Tell him help is coming.”
“Help is coming,” I whisper to him, to myself, to the walls. “They’re coming. You’re okay. You’re okay.”
The words feel like fiction.
In the distance, finally, I hear it.