37. Sienna
Sienna
T he room smells like antiseptic and blood.
Machines hum softly in the corner beside Jonah’s bed, steady mechanical rhythms filling the silence his voice should be filling instead.
He looks wrong lying there.
Too still.
Too pale.
Too quiet.
Lines run from his arms into IV bags hanging beside the bed while monitors track every fragile beat of his heart across glowing screens.
I hate every second of it.
I step closer slowly.
Like moving too fast might break whatever thin thread is still holding him here.
“You’re not allowed to do that again.”
My voice shakes immediately.
I let it.
“That was absolutely not part of the plan.”
No response.
Of course not.
The machines answer for him instead.
Steady beeping.
Slow oxygen hiss.
I stop beside the bed and stare at him for a long second before finally reaching for his hand.
I hesitate halfway there.
Fear.
Then my fingers close around his anyway.
Warm.
Still warm.
Relief twists painfully through my chest.
Good.
“You don’t get to leave me like that,” I whisper.
The words crack apart halfway through.
“You don’t get to make me care about you and then just…”
My throat closes hard.
I force the rest out anyway.
“…walk away from it.”
The room stays quiet around me.
Heavy.
Honest.
I stare down at our hands together while tears blur the edges of my vision again.
“I don’t know how to do this.”
The confession comes softer now.
Smaller.
“I don’t know how to feel like this and still think clearly.”
A tear slips free and lands against the blanket covering his chest.
I don’t wipe it away.
“I was better before.”
The words taste bitter now.
“Colder. Smarter.”
Safe.
“Untouchable.”
The monitor beside him keeps beeping steadily.
Alive.
Another long silence passes before I finally whisper the truth I’ve been trying not to say out loud since the bunker.
“But I don’t want to be that person anymore.”
God.
There it is.
Raw enough it hurts.
Because loving someone means they can destroy you simply by leaving.
And somehow—
I want him anyway.
My fingers tighten around his hand.
“So you don’t get to die,” I whisper fiercely.
“Because I am not surviving this just to become that version of me again.”
Silence answers me.
Then—
A twitch.
Tiny.
Barely there.
But his fingers move against mine.
My breath catches violently.
“Jonah?”
I lean forward instantly.
Watching.
Waiting.
Nothing else happens.
But it’s enough.
Enough to crack hope back open inside my chest.
Dangerous.
Terrifying.
Alive.