Chapter 7
Crash?
Carol works.
Like—really fucking works.
I knew nurses had long hours. Everyone says that, like it’s just part of the job description: “clock in for twelve hours, maybe cry in a supply closet, then save a life before lunch.” But seeing it? Watching her move?
It’s another level entirely.
She’s running on fumes and black coffee, darting from room to room like she’s powered by pure spite and muscle memory.
I’ve seen her deal with ten patients in under an hour.
She draws blood, checks vitals, juggles medication schedules like she’s playing a high-stakes game of roulette, and still manages to yell at an intern and answer a phone without breaking stride.
One second she’s sweet-talking a terrified old woman who thinks her heart monitor is a bomb, the next she’s snapping gloves on like she’s about to fistfight Death itself.
And on top of all that?
She’s bringing me to her home.
Me. Mystery man with a fucked-up head and a single name she made up on the fly. A guy with no ID, no past, no anchor. A human question mark in her breakroom chair, eating someone else’s tuna sandwich and trying not to look like a charity case.
I tried to argue. Honest to God. But when she looked at me with those eyes—sharp and tired and real—the words caught in my throat.
I didn’t have the strength to push back.
Not anymore. Not after the last few nights.
Not after freezing my ass off next to a dumpster and waking up to the sound of screaming that might’ve been mine.
And now?
Now I’m sitting here watching her blaze through her shift like a storm in scrubs, and I’ve had to swallow tears twice.
Not because I’m scared. Not anymore.
But because I’m fucking relieved.
Because for the first time in four days, someone actually wants me somewhere.
I don’t know what I did before. Who I was. If I was worth a damn. But right now, I know this:
Carol sees me.
And right now? That’s everything. That’s the whole fucking world.
After four hours—which actually turns into five because some guy coded and she sprinted out like a goddamn war medic—she finally bursts into the breakroom.
Her scrubs are wrinkled, her ponytail’s halfway undone, and there’s this little smear of something on her cheek that might be blood or maybe pudding—honestly, I don’t even ask.
She tosses her bag over one shoulder, glances at me, and says, simple as breathing, “C’mon. Let’s go home.”
Home.
Jesus. That one word hits like a truck. I nod, but my throat’s too fucking tight to speak. I shove down the burn behind my eyes and stand up, trailing behind her like I’m afraid she’ll change her mind if I move too slow.
We step out into the New York night and the cold sucker-punches me, biting straight through my hoodie and sweats.
She pulls her jacket tight around her chest, hunches her shoulders, and sighs deep as she unclips her hair.
A waterfall of gold tumbles down her back, catching the streetlights in a way that’s unfair and kind of cinematic.
She sighs again, breath curling out in a soft ghost. “I don’t live close,” she says, “so we gotta hit the subway.”
“Works for me,” I manage, voice low, hoarse. I’d walk to goddamn Jersey if it meant staying in her orbit for a few more hours.
She glances at me, eyes flicking over my hoodie and the obvious lack of proper winter gear, and mutters, “Remind me to buy you a real fucking coat before the frost eats your ass alive.”
I huff a laugh. “I’ll put it on the list. Right under ‘name’ and ‘past.’”
Her mouth twitches like she wants to smile but refuses to encourage my bullshit.
The streets hum with traffic, distant sirens wailing like the city’s lullaby.
Carol walks fast, sharp elbows, no-nonsense gait, cutting through people like she’s allergic to bullshit.
I stay close behind, watching her navigate the chaos like she owns it.
Like nothing phases her. Like she’s carved out her space in this city with a scalpel and a temper.
We hit the subway, and she doesn’t even ask—just taps her MetroCard twice, no ceremony, no big deal. Like it’s normal to pay fare for your stray amnesiac project.
I stand there, feeling useless, weighing the ridiculousness of trying to stop her with the fact that the last cash I had was hers. What am I gonna do—argue about her buying me a two-dollar ride with her own fifty?
The turnstile beeps, and she doesn’t wait. She’s already halfway down the stairs, shoulders hunched into her coat, hair still spilling down like it’s got its own damn attitude.
People look. I see it. Some sideways glances. Me in my dirty hoodie and cast, her in her tired scrubs and messy hair. We don’t match. Not in any obvious way. But she either doesn’t notice or doesn’t give a single fuck, and honestly, that might be my favorite thing about her.
We ride the stations in silence, the rattle of the train filling the space between us.
It’s warm, too warm, like the air’s been breathed a thousand times already and recycled through regrets and strangers.
My arm aches. She leans against the pole, eyes half-closed, and I watch her profile like a goddamn creep, soaking up the lines of her exhaustion.
Then our stop hits.
She grabs my hand to pull me off the train.
And holy shit.
I feel it—down to my bones. Her fingers wrap around mine like it’s natural, like it’s just a thing she does, and the warmth of her hand ignites something in my chest I can’t name. Nothing romantic, not exactly. Just… real. Like being tethered again, even if just for a second.
She lets go the moment we hit the sidewalk, and the cold rushes back in like it was waiting to punish me for feeling anything at all.
We walk two blocks in silence, feet echoing in puddles and grit, until she finally turns the corner and nods toward a building. Old, maybe pre-war. Faded brick. Metal gate. No buzzers. Just a good, solid deadbolt and the smell of someone cooking something heavy and garlic-laced on the second floor.
Not fancy. Not new. Definitely not gentrified.
And then we’re at her apartment door.
Fifth floor, no elevator. My arm’s throbbing by the time we get there, and Carol’s only winded because she’s been up for seventeen hours and fueled by nothing but caffeine, sarcasm, and pure spite.
She jams the key in the lock like it insulted her once, twists, and pushes the door open with a practiced shoulder shove.
Light flicks on with a soft click, and I just… stop.
Because fuck. It’s cozy. No, scratch that—it’s heaven.
It’s the kind of space that wraps around you like a thick blanket on a cold day.
Warm. Lived-in. A tiny shoe-box of an apartment, studio style—no walls, no doors, just one room trying its hardest to be five.
There’s a small bed tucked in the far corner with a comforter that looks so soft I might commit crimes for it.
A washer-dryer combo sits smugly against the kitchen wall like a trophy she probably had to sacrifice a limb to get.
The living room? Barely a joke. Just a tiny, beat-up loveseat that’s probably seen more takeout and bad TV than it has actual guests, and a TV the size of a lunch tray on a crooked IKEA stand.
But there’s art on the walls—real art, not hospital motivational crap.
A poster for Jaws. A framed print of some abstract cityscape.
Fairy lights tacked up around the window, casting a soft amber glow that makes the whole place look like a scene from a movie where people kiss in kitchens and spill wine on the floor.
“It’s not much,” she says, toeing off her shoes by the door. “But it beats the shelter.”
She says it like it’s nothing, like she’s not offering me the only soft place I’ve seen in days.
I stand in the doorway like an idiot, swallowing hard.
“Carol,” I say, my voice rough, cracked at the edges. “This is the best thing I’ve seen in my entire fucking life.”
She snorts, kicks off her other shoe, and flicks her hair out of the scrunchie like she’s shedding her whole day with it. “Then you’ve had a really shit week, Crash.”
She shrugs off her jacket and hooks it with the kind of bone-deep exhaustion that says she’s done being a nurse for the day—even if she’s still stuck taking care of one last stray.
“Go take a shower,” she says, already kicking her bag into the corner with practiced chaos. “Clean towels under the sink. I got some new razors in the drawer too, in case you wanna shave that sad little beard situation you got going.”
I blink at her, still rooted to the same goddamn floorboard like I’m not sure this isn’t a hallucination. “You sure?” I ask, voice stupid, small.
Her head snaps toward me like I just asked if water’s wet. She raises a brow, already halfway to biting sarcasm.
“Yeah,” she says, dry as hell. “No way I’m letting you sleep with the street still on you. You smell like regret and rainwater, and I don’t want that funk on my sheets.”
I finally step further in, toe off my boots by the door like she did, and glance toward the bathroom.
It’s small. Neat. Smells like lavender and whatever the hell normal life is supposed to smell like. There’s a towel folded on the sink already, like she knew I’d agree before I did.
I turn back toward her.
“Thanks, Carol.”
She doesn’t look up from whatever she’s unpacking.
“Just don’t clog the drain with street gunk,” she mutters. “Or blood. I’m not mopping anything red tonight.”
Right.
Definitely not a softie.
I shut the bathroom door behind me and lean against it for a second, chest tight with something dangerously close to emotion. Maybe gratitude. Maybe just the fact that for the first time since waking up in that sterile hospital room, I don’t feel completely fucking alone.
And all because some overworked, foul-mouthed nurse refused to look the other way.
I take a shower.
I hesitate at first, because yeah, I feel like an intruder using her stuff.
Her bathroom’s clean, not fancy, but clearly hers—pink razor on the shelf, half-used candle on the windowsill that smells like vanilla and probably soft memories, and the kind of shampoo that smells like it was made for people who still believe in good mornings.
Lemon and strawberry.
Bright and sweet.