7. June
JUNE
I don’t remember leaving the room.
But I’m in a hallway now. One I don’t recognize, fluorescent lights flickering like they’re mocking me. Every sign points in a different direction. The hospital can only be so big, right? If I walk fast enough, maybe my brain won’t catch up. That’s all the plan I have right now.
My sneakers squeak on polished linoleum, the sound reminding me that I’m moving at a quickened pace. My breathing is too unreliable. My vision completely tunneled.
I’ve been here before, haven’t I? There has to be a way out somewhere.
I can feel the panic surfacing in my chest like a trapped animal, claws scraping up my ribs, up my throat. Moving is the only thing standing in its way.
I’m not about to have a mental breakdown in a hospital corridor like a hysterical cliché. I’ll have it in my car, like a normal person, please and thank you.
I force a breath in. I just need to find the exit. From there, it’s just a short walk to the car. Then I can close the door, and everything will be safe. I can let it all out and let it all consume me, and I can properly think about…
Eleanor. Fast decline. Pneumonia. Aspiration. Palliative.
The words keep crashing into each other—too many to deal with.
I squeeze my arms around myself and keep walking.
Something else. I have to think about something else. I’m almost there—the exit. Let’s get to the exit.
Sophie, trying not to fall apart; Trent, holding her together; Richard, looking dead on his feet; and Meredith, asking all her insensitive questions.
I taste salt.
Oh. Tears. Great. Love that for me.
I swipe them away fast and aggressively, but then the floor tilts a little, and wow, this is actually kinda awful trying to deal with all this on my own.
Maybe I should sit down.
Maybe someone will come for me, find me, and help me out of here.
Maybe someone will hold me and tell me that it’s okay.
Maybe—
Ashton.
The name detonates inside my skull.
I stop walking. Not intentionally. My body just gives out with no warning. I grip the edge of a wall-mounted sanitizer dispenser to stay upright. It squeaks in protest under my fingers, but I cling on.
Of course, he’s the thing my brain goes to at a moment like this.
Of course, after everything he’s done. After everything he might have done.
I want him. Right now. So, so badly.
I want him to take one look at me and know exactly what to do. I want him to tell me I’m safe. That I don’t need to handle everything, fix everything, or hold everything. That I can stop pretending I’m not falling apart.
I hate that. I hate him. I hate that I want him.
God, if he were here. Pulled close, mouth pressed to my temple, voice low and warm. Home in every way I’ve ever wanted. Promising me that this time he will stay.
But he’s gone.
And I’m alone.
Desperate to the point of becoming feral, I force myself to start walking again. Stop thinking about him. Think of something else, anything else. My vision tunnels again, and I slam my shoulder into a corner.
Everything in my head is a mess of snarled wires—Meredith’s face in New York, flushed from kissing Mark; Mark kissing me, first; Eddie waiting for answers from someone who won’t give them; Trent’s stupid grin when he got his license; Sophie’s look of pity; Mom.
I let out a sound. A laugh? A sob? It echoes too loudly down the empty hall.
God, I need out.
Then, a sign. “Stairs.”
Finally. Something that looks like escape.
I shove through the door and walk down a flight, then another, gripping the railing a little too hard. The air is warmer here somehow. But I want cold air. Salt air. Water. Noise. Anything.
However, I hit another corridor instead, some place darker, quieter. It’s a perfect place to have a crisis, honestly. And my time is abruptly up.
It’s better than nothing; not my first choice, but I’ve always come second, haven’t I?
I stop in the middle of it and double over just in time for my legs to give out. Ignoring the bruising thump to the floor, I scramble to push my back against a wall and press my hands to my face.
“I can’t do this,” I choke into my palms. “I can’t—I can’t?—”
My whole body trembles. Panic shoves itself up my throat, where it thrives on making me drag in air that feels too thick.
If Ashton were here, I wouldn’t be doing this.
If Ashton were here, he’d pull me out of this hole.
If Ashton were here?—
But he isn’t.
He ruined everything.
And I fell for it.
And I still want him anyway.
“I’m so pathetic,” I whisper, laughing through my teeth like a lunatic. “God, this is amazing. Talking to myself. I’m insane.”
I’m thoroughly shaking now—my hands, my legs, my breath. My heart slams into my rib cage so hard it hurts.
I let out another harsh, choking laugh. It bounces off the concrete walls.
“Get it together,” I mutter. “Get. It. Together.”
The universe does not respond.
But footsteps do.
Slow at first, soft rubber soles on linoleum. Filling the otherwise silent corridor.
Then faster.
“June?” Meredith’s voice.
Of course it’s her. Of course she found me.
I press my palms harder, white stars erupting behind my eyelids.
I’m not ready for this conversation. For her. For anything.
The footsteps stop right beside me, but I don’t look up.
“June,” she says again, breathless, worried. “Hey, look at me.”
I don’t. Because if I do, I can’t be held responsible for my actions. And I don’t know how to come back from that. Instead, I keep my palms safely over my eyes as I hear Meredith kneel beside me.
“June,” she says softly. “Hey. Breathe. You’re okay.”
Soft hands fall upon my shoulders. For a moment, I let them soothe me, my body in such desperate need of that kind of grounding. Even though a growingly loud part of my brain protests that the person is not Ashton.
That’s the sister who used the worst moment of your life to get back with her ex.
The anger is better than the oblivion. I cling to it as if my life depended on it. Finally, gathering enough breath, enough courage, I remove my hands and look up at her. “Yeah, I’m clearly fantastic.”
Her brow is already knitted with worry. “You’re having a panic attack. You need to just breathe with me for a bit.”
“I need a drink,” I correct brightly. “Or six. Or maybe a lobotomy. You wanna take the knife out of my back and perform it yourself?”
“June.” Her voice tightens. “Come on. I’m trying to help you.”
A laugh bursts out of me. “Yeah, and we all know how that goes.”
“Look, I’m sorry if I was insensitive back there, but?—”
“You’re just looking after Mom. Caring for Mom. Selflessly sacrificing yourself to live with Richard.” I lean in conspiratorially. “Tell me, what are you getting out of it this time?”
She blinks. “What is that supposed to mean?”
“Oh, I don’t know. It’s just that the last time you swooped in to save me, you managed to get yourself a bed warmer out of it.” I grimace as a deranged thought crosses my mind. “Is that it? Are you cozying up with Richard now? What, is Mark not good enough for you anymore?”
The way she freezes up is, quite frankly, hysterical. The guilt, the shame, all of it, flashing across her pale face before she physically recoils, staggering to her feet as if she might flee. “I don’t understand what you’re… I didn’t?—”
“Oh, stop. Stop!” I snap, pushing myself up too fast. The hallway tilts again, but I anchor myself on the wall. “The game’s over, Mer. I saw you. In New York. Kissing him.”
Her mouth opens, as if she might say something.
“Don’t bother lying,” I cut her off, my voice rising with each word. “I walked in on you and Mark making out like teenagers after my delightful thirty-minute visit with my criminal husband. Truly, a banner day for all of us.”
She approaches me slowly. Cautiously. As if I’m a wild animal, she’s worried I might bolt. “June, that’s not—there’s more to that. You don’t know what you saw.”
“Oh, right. Are you going to tell me it was a friendly kiss, then? A professional service fee? Or did you get a bout of amnesia and forget that you two were divorced? Because last I checked, he was cheating on you, he’d kicked you out of his firm, and he’d done all these dreadful, horrible things to you.
” Another deranged thought hits. “Was any of that even true?”
Her flinch is brutal. “June, please,” she tries again, voice careful, gentle, infuriatingly level. “Nothing happened between Mark and me. This is a huge misunderstanding. Let’s just calm down, and I’ll explain.”
“Oh my God.” I try to shake my head, but it only makes the spinning worse. “You can’t even say it. How long has it been going on? Did you rekindle your marriage before or after you got back together with Eddie?”
Her breath catches. “June, listen to me.”
“No.” My voice is sharp enough to crack.
“You listen. Do you have any idea what he meant to me? What he did for me? Mark was the only one who knew everything. The only one I trusted to handle me at my worst. And you, both of you, were going at it behind my back the whole time. Do you have any idea how that feels? To come second to you once again.”
Her eyes flicker, confused. “June…what do you mean by everything?”
I choke on the truth before it can escape. Lips brush against mine, indulgent and unhurried. Pressing firm and bold and unapologetic. My stomach flips, heat rising in the back of my neck. But I shove it back down where it belongs.
“It doesn’t matter.” It matters too much. “It was nothing.” Was it?
I swallow hard, throat tight, vision blurring. Changing the topic.
“You don’t get to blow up Eddie’s life and then blow up mine, too.”
“You’re not making sense, June. You’re stressed, angry, and upset, and I get it. I’m not handling this well, either. Mom is dying.” Meredith’s face twists. “But please, this has nothing to do with Eddie. What happened with Mark was only about saving you. I did everything I could to save you.”
“Stop trying to turn this back on me!” I shout, and the sound echoes down the hall. “You’re lying to me! You’re lying to him! And you’ve been lying to yourself if you think ANY of this was about me.”
“June, stop.”
“No!”
Silence slams between us. It feels like a gulf. A cavern wider than any other that has ever existed between us. Deeper than fifteen years apart.
And then.
“Meredith?” The voice is small but loud in the silence.
We both turn, finding Eddie at the end of the hall. He looks like someone hit him with a truck. Eyes wide. Shoulders caved. A brown paper bag was dangling from his fingers like he had forgotten he was holding it.
“Eddie,” Meredith breathes out.
I step back instinctively. Shame curdles in my stomach.
Oh God.
How much did he hear?
He swallows slowly. His gaze shifts between us, between Meredith’s tear-bright eyes, my wrecked face. Then he’s looking nowhere at all and retreating into himself with eerie resignation.
“Oh,” he says softly, his voice breaking. “Someone told me Eleanor was here, and I thought you might need…” He lifts the bag instead.
Meredith moves first. “Eddie.”
But he flinches. “June,” he says quietly. “You okay, June?”
“I’m fine. Everything’s fine.” My voice sounds like glass. “I was just leaving.”
I step around Meredith before she can stop me.
“June, wait,” she calls after.
But I can’t. If I stay, I’ll say something even more unforgivable. Or confess something I shouldn’t. So I walk.
A door marked “Exit” is just around the next corner.