Page 86 of Vital Signs
The message was clear:I see you. I’ve got you. Keep going.
“Suction,” I barked, regaining control of my balance by sheer force of will. My forearm locked against the rail she had steadied. The tremor in my thigh intensified, muscles screaming as they tried to compensate for a joint that no longer existed.
She anticipated every move. Blade before I asked. Tube unwrapped and ready. Her voice filled the spaces between my commands, translating my clipped orders into calm instructions for the rest of the team. When my stance shifted again, her hip pressed lightly against the bed to anchor it — anchoring me by extension — a quiet partnership disguised as routine procedure.
I visualized the cords. Adjusted the angle. Ignored the sweat pooling inside the socket, the subtle slide that threatened my balance every time I leaned forward.
“Tube,” I said.
Her hand met mine for half a second — steady, warm, deliberate. Then she was gone again, counting breaths, calling out vitals, matching my pace without ever trying to take control.
The tube slid into place. Confirmation. Breath sounds equal with end-tidal hovering in the yellow.
The room exhaled.
“Again,” I said when the blood pressure stayed in the gutter, because stopping felt like admitting weakness, and I wasn’t ready for that yet. Lines placed. Fluids hung. Blood transfusing. I circled the bed with a stubbornness that bordered on reckless, pushing through the rising ache in my residual limb because the alternative was stepping back and watching someone else do my job.
Anya adjusted around me like water finding cracks in stone. She intercepted tasks that required sudden lifting. She shifted pieces of equipment closer so I didn’t have to take wide steps. She redirected a nurse who reached for my elbow, turning it into a request for medication instead. No one noticed she was protecting me because she never made it obvious.
Only when the patient stabilized — numbers creeping into survivable territory — did my body finally revolt.
The adrenaline drained and pain flooded in behind it. My leg throbbed with a deep, nauseating pulse. The tremor in my hands became impossible to hide. I stepped back from the bed because Ihad to, because staying would mean risking a real fall instead of a near one.
Anya finished giving orders before she turned toward me. Her eyes scanned my stance — the slight hitch in my balance, the way my jaw was clenched too tight — and softened just a fraction.
“Go sit,” she murmured, low enough that no one else could hear. “He’s stable.”
“He almost wasn’t,” I said with a small, bitter laugh.
“But he is.” Her shoulder brushed mine briefly — a touch disguised as passing movement — and the warmth of it grounded me more than any brace ever could.
I watched the rest of the team continue without hesitation. The machine kept running. The world didn’t end because I had faltered for half a second. That should have been comforting.
Instead it left me standing there with the sharp, humiliating knowledge that she had been compensating for me the entire time — quietly, expertly,lovingly— and that without her, my instinct to be the man I used to be might have put both of us on the floor.
The fluorescent lights buzzed overhead. Another patient alarmed down the hall. The shift moved forward as though nothing had changed.
But I could still feel the ghost of her hand at mine when she passed me the tube — steady, unshaken — proof that even when my body betrayed me, she was there, holding the linewithme instead of for me, refusing to let me disappear inside my own pride.
Chapter 50
Desmond
The drive home felt longer than it should have.
The sky was that washed-out gray that only exists at the end of a night shift — not quite morning, no longer night. A quieter, sadder type of golden hour. My hands stayed locked at ten and two on the steering wheel because relaxing them made the tremor obvious. Every bump in the road sent a dull, nauseating pulse through my residual limb. Sweat had dried inside the socket, leaving my skin raw and tight, as if it belonged to someone else.
Anya didn’t talk much. She rested her elbow against the window and watched the city wake up in slow, reluctant movements — dog walkers, delivery trucks, a couple arguing quietly on a sidewalk, as if the world hadn’t just tried to swallow us whole.
Her hand found my thigh once at a red light. I didn’t realize how hard I was gripping the wheel until her thumb brushed the back of my hand, and I loosened my fingers one by one.
By the time we pulled into my driveway, the adrenaline had completely abandoned me.
The front door closed behind us with a soft click that sounded louder than any trauma alarm. The house smelled of coffee groundsand clean laundry, and a life that still expected normalcy. I had made it three steps into the living room before my leg gave a warning tremor that traveled all the way up my spine.
“I’m fine,” I said automatically, even though she hadn’t asked.
She didn’t argue. She didn’t rush forward. She just moved into my orbit — close enough that if I tipped even a fraction, she could catch me without making it a scene.
