45. Chase
45
Chase
“ A re you fucking kidding me right now, Chase? I’m in the middle of a damn meeting. What were you thinking? What are you, incompetent? You are an adult now. How dare you get them to call me, today of all days? You are supposed to quietly leave and never…” His voice went on, but my ears were numb. The harshness of my father’s voice just drove into my head why I’d done what I did, and I heard the words, but I couldn’t understand them. They just didn’t make sense. All I could think was, I thought the plan was foolproof . I thought… I thought I wouldn’t be alive right now to endure the beratement.
“Sorry, sir,” I whispered, my voice hoarse.
“I ignored the first few call attempts from the hospital, but this is getting too much. Make sure you tell them you are an adult and therefore no longer on my insurance plan.” With that, he hung up. I had told them so many times not to bother my father. Should I even call him that anymore? I had to get out of here. The curtains felt like they were starting to close in on me, smothering me.
I let out a long, steady breath, exhausted and disappointed with myself. I messed up… I messed up big time. My chest ached, and I could feel a tightness in my lungs.
“Here, Pongo, here boy,” a familiar voice was calling down the hallway, followed by a whistle.
“Sir, I thought you said it was your little brother?” someone said.
“Uh, it is. Pongo is his nickname. Pongo!” Lachlan said again. The curtain was ripped open, and Lachlan grinned at me, sending me a wink, which had my brows pulling down in confusion. I blinked my eyes a couple of times to be sure of what I was seeing.
“Sir! You cannot move the curtains, these people are sick!” The nurse huffed.
“Yeah, well, so is my brother!” Lachlan spun and shouted. “And not one of you has found him— There he is! Twenty-six, twenty-six, twenty-six! Pongo, pongo, pongo. Yip, yip, yip.” And like that, Lachlan took off running with a very angry nurse hot on his heels.
What. The. Fuck.
Not two minutes went by before Nolan came by, pushing a stretcher, nodding and waving at random people walking by. He was so confident that no one blinked twice at him. My eyes weren’t on him for very long, though. They fell on the sweetest sight of an auburn-haired girl. Bailey was crouched down, walking beside the stretcher, hiding as she quickly ducked into the curtained room I was in. Nolan kept walking forward, acting like he worked here.
Bailey’s amber eyes met mine, her smile fading as her eyes skimmed over my face, and instantly, shame fell upon me. “I’m sorry,” I whispered, lowering my eyes like the coward I was.
Before I could process what was happening, she’d jumped up onto the bed, mindful of the IV in my arm and wires on my chest. She laid her head on my chest and draped her arm around me, and I fought to keep the tears at bay. She likely already thought I was a loser; crying in front of her would only seal the deal.
“Don’t you ever be sorry. Ever. I am the one who is sorry. I’m sorry you felt so much pain that it came to this. I wish I had known sooner.” Feeling her warmth melt into me was something I had dreamed about in my final moments. It felt wrong enjoying it after what I had done. I pushed Bailey away, but she smacked my hand lightly. “Stop it.”
“I don’t want you feeling guilty over me, Bailey. I messed up, bad.”
“I don’t feel bad for you, Chase. I don’t feel guilty. I wish I had known. I wish we were close enough that you could’ve told me. So, now”—she wiggled down, wrapped her arms around my sore chest, and held on tight—“I’m going to make sure we are close enough so you will tell me. This isn’t your fault. This isn’t my fault. This is just something we have to do to make sure we get to keep you. I want to keep you, Chase.” She looked up at me with those large amber eyes, and I was done for. “Please let me keep you.”
I took deep breaths to control my emotions. I was a six-foot-tall football player with a muscular build. I couldn’t get overwhelmed like this. I couldn’t let the mess that was building inside me spill out. But Bailey was my kryptonite, she was my safety when I knew I should be hers. She’d just asked if she could keep me, like I was some dog, and I was ready to sit down and beg.
Nolan came by again, pushing the same damn stretcher and flashing his smile at everyone who looked at him. “Going to need coffee after tonight, am I right?” he said to a nurse passing by, and the nurse actually agreed with him.
This time, it was Lachlan who was crouched behind the stretcher. He popped up and hopped on the other side of the bed, lying next to me. “Move over, I need more room. Fuck, you’re cold, we need more blankets in here.” Nolan walked by again, carrying a pile of towels. “Nurse!” Lachlan called out.
“Oh, sorry, ma’am, I’m a porter.”
“Fuck me,” I whispered, running my hand down my face. Nolan was so professional and serious, I could actually believe he worked here.
“Can we get some of those warm blankets? The big fuzzy ones,” Lachlan continued.
“Big fuzzy wuzzy blanket coming up.” Nolan stepped away.
“Okay, how did Nolan find a pair of scrubs?” I asked.
“They keep spares in the locker rooms,” Bailey answered sleepily as she buried her face in my bare chest, as if all this chaos wasn’t happening around us.
Nolan was back a moment later, pulling Ethan with him. Ethan didn’t even bother to hide. “One fuzzy wuzzy blanket.” They both stepped into the room, Nolan closing the curtain behind him.
Ethan looked more somber than the others. “You good, man?” he asked, holding his fist out to me. I bumped it with mine.
“Yeah, a bit of a cough, but I’m okay,” I reassured him.
“For real, though? Because that was scary as hell. Nolan and Bailey were doing CPR on you, and you were blue.”
“And cold,” Lachlan added, taking the blanket and spreading it over me. It did feel nice, especially when Bailey put her hands under it and kept them on my chest.
A middle-aged man with a white jacket and clipboard came walking in. He paused and did a double take at Lachlan and Bailey, then looked over at Ethan and Nolan. “Aren’t you the porter?” the doctor as Nolan.
“We’re family,” Lachlan said immediately, and fuck if that didn’t hit me right in the feels.
The doctor sighed, like he didn’t have time for this shit, and turned on a light on the wall, hanging up my chest X-ray. “I really think you should be admitted and watched for tonight, but physically, you will be okay. Your ribs are bruised, and you stopped breathing once that we know of, according to the nine-one-one call. You had a near-drowning experience,” the doctor stated bluntly. “There’s no simple way to put it—you are very lucky. See this here.” He pointed to what I could only assume were my lungs. “This is water in the alveoli sacs. Judging by the amount, we believe it will absorb fine into your lungs, however, we are going to put you on some antibiotics to prevent infection. Your throat will be sore for a while, since we did need to intubate briefly in the ambulance. Don’t be afraid if there is some bleeding, but if you continue to bleed or get sick, come right back. You will feel sore and tired, however if you feel short of breath, or if it becomes more difficult to breathe, also come back in.”
“I play football,” was all I could manage to say. The doctor was talking so fast, I wasn’t sure if I’d absorbed any of it.
The doctor shook his head at me. “Don’t do it. I don’t recommend putting any extra strain on your lungs. That includes more exercise than normal daily functions. Now, there is another matter to talk about.” The doctor leaned against the bed. “Boys, Bailey, time to leave.”
Bailey gripped my hand and gave it a squeeze.
Lachlan patted my shoulder before standing up. “We’ll be right outside.”
I nodded.
Ethan stayed for a moment, his eyes only on me before I nodded to him, as if giving him permission to leave.
Once the room emptied out, the doctor sat on the chair next to the bed. “There are two ways we can do this. If you have good home support, I can make an outpatient appointment with a therapist and mental health doctor. I highly recommend this. If there is no home support, we do have a room available in the hospital. I do want to prescribe an antidepressant. Have you ever heard of SSRIs?”
“Yes.” My voice croaked. I got the volume down, though, since I didn’t want the others knowing. “I’ve been on them before.”
The doctor nodded. “I saw that in your chart.” His eyes met mine. “You’ve been battling this for quite some time.”
I looked down at my hands, nodding slowly. It wasn’t my first attempt; I had hoped it was my last.
“I’m going to prescribe the same one as before, with a little increase in the dose. This should help while we get an appointment booked, all right? So, what do you think? Home or hospital?”
“The McCormicks have said I can go to their place. Maybe it will be good.”
The doctor nodded. “I know the McCormicks, and they’re good people. Still, I want you back here immediately if you find you’re not good, okay? This is not your fault—it’s a sickness, and that’s what we treat here, okay?”
“Okay.”
The doctor nodded and handed me discharge papers and a prescription for meds. My clothes were still wet, but Nolan brought over some clothes Ethan had given him for me. Once he stepped out of the curtain, though, a nurse said, “There he is!” and pointed him out to security.
“Shit. See you outside,” Nolan said before running, two security guards chasing him.
Walking out of the hospital, I understood exactly what the doctor meant. It was like I was drowning all over again. I hated feeling weak in front of them, but I had to stop now and then to try and catch my breath. I could feel bubbles and crackles in my chest with each exhale, leftovers from the water I had breathed in.
“Maybe we should get a wheelchair,” Ethan said. I shot him a dirty look, and he grinned.
Bailey sighed and put her arm around my waist, shifting my weight, so I was leaning on her. I tried to pull away, but the little devil dug her fingers into my hip until I relented.
Bailey forced me into the passenger seat, then ran around to the driver's side. “My parents are at the house, getting things ready for you,” she said.
“We have to pick Nolan up,” Ethan said. “He got kicked off the property.”
Lachlan laughed as Bailey shook her head. Sure enough, Nolan was standing on the other side of the road, waiting for us.
“All right, plan is, we go to Chase’s house, grab his stuff, and head back to my place. You guys are staying the night too.”
“Yes,” Ethan and Lachlan said in unison, and by the sounds of it, they weren’t taking her up on an offer; they were confirming a plan already in place. Bailey wasn’t asking, she was telling.
“Hey, you guys can drop me off at my place,” Nolan said. “I know there's…history and you need to work some things out.”
“No,” Ethan said.
“Agreed.” Lachlan nodded. “You’re family too.”
“We will probably just be hanging around,” Bailey said. “Unless you wanted to do something?” she asked me.
Already tired enough to fall asleep, I shook my head. “Maybe a movie marathon?”
Bailey smiled. “Lord of the Rings?”
I hadn’t seen any of the Lord of the Rings movies in so long. I nodded.
“We have to start with The Hobbit , though,” Lachlan said.
“They are two completely separate movie series,” Nolan argued, and so ensued the nerdy banter. Lachlan was right—Nolan was one of us.
When Bailey pulled up to my place, I moved to get out, but she stopped me. “Chase, you could barely make it out of the hospital. You’re not going to be able to do those stairs.”
“I’ll go,” Lachlan said. He jumped out of the truck, and I opened my door and caught his arm.
“Hey,” I said, bringing him in closer to me. “My bag is on my bed. I don’t need much, but…” I mentally cursed myself. “I wanted to warn you there's a noose in my closet.” I hoped I was speaking low enough that no one else could hear me.
Lachlan held no contempt in his eyes. He just nodded his understanding.
“And…in my bathroom, there are a couple prescription bottles. It’s, um, antidepressants.”
“In the bathroom behind the mirror or on the counter?” He was being serious.
I could feel my shoulders relax at his lack of judgment. “In the cupboard, to the left when you go in. It will save me from having to fill this prescription right away.”
He nodded. “Got it. Be right back.”
I sank back into the seat and closed my eyes. Lachlan hadn’t questioned me. He didn’t make any jokes about the medication, no remarks about the noose. My father would have laughed at me. My own blood would have told me to quit playing around and finish the job. Maybe it was him that had been the problem this whole time.