Page 60 of Gray Area

It becomes too much, the smoke consuming all around us, and so I drop down and try to get below it. I’m able to see a sliver of light then, and begin to drag myself and Vivian toward it. I can hear the crumbling of the structure around me, but I try to block that out and focus on getting us to safety.

“Is there someone in here?” a voice shouts from the fire escape.

“Yes!” I shout back, and cough immediately after. I don’t know if I imagined the voice, but I keep dragging myself and Vivian to where I hope the escape is. Then there are boots before me. I grab Vivian and shove her up to the figure, and he lifts her and quickly leaves. Something catches my eyes as I crawl in the direction the figure came from, and I reach out and grab it just as I am also lifted to my feet and brought out to the fire escape.

The bright blue sky instantly replaces the black smoke I was just in, and two men help me down the fire escape. When we get closer to the alley and I see Vivian already on the ground, her face covered with an oxygen mask and her chest rising and falling, I relax a bit.

I’m put down beside her and a mask is pushed to me. I attempt to smack it away, but the paramedic isn’t taking my shit. “It’s either this or you don’t stay with her,” he threatens, and I realize begrudgingly that he has the upper hand on me. So I take the mask he offers, and I turn to Vivian. I hold her face in my hand. “Vivian?” I whisper and watch with relief as her eyes flutter open and meet mine. It’s only then that I really feel the clean air in my lungs. That I am really able to breathe.

Chapter 32

VIVIAN

They take me to the hospital for evaluation, and then they tell me I need to stay for observation for a while before I can go. Declan stays right beside me, holding my hand. He’d been checked over, and because he hadn’t been inside the fire as long as I had,andbecause he is insistent on staying with me to the point of being an absolute asshole, they say he is all set. But still he stays with me. I keep shooting glances over to him.

He saved me. Again.

I am there for about fifteen minutes before Bailey comes barreling in.

“Oh my God, are you okay?” she asks, rushing to my side.

“I’m fine,” I tell her and smile as she looks me over despite my assurance . “Thanks for calling Declan,” I say to her softly. I’d asked Declan, when he had come back to me after refusingtreatment, how he had known to come for me, and he’d told me about Bailey’s phone call.

Bailey’s eyes meet mine. “I was worried you’d sleep through it.”

“She would have,” Declan agrees soberly.

Bailey turns to Declan, having seemed to just notice him in the curtained area. “Thank you, Declan, for saving my girl.”

Declan is silent as he stares at Bailey and then he stands. “I’m going to get a drink.” He turns to me. “Do you need anything?” he asks me, his tone changing to something softer as he does.

I shake my head and then he’s gone.

Bailey watches him leave and then turns to me. “Holy in love with you, Batman.”

I roll my eyes. “He is not in love with me,” I say to her, completely agitated. “I’ve known him only a few weeks,” I remind her.

“I don’t care if you’ve known him for a minute; the man literally walked through fucking fire to save you.”

I want to tell her it is only because of the guilt from the other night, but I can’t bring myself to say it. Mostly because I don’t want it to be true. Then there is a small part of me asking myself if it is even true or if I am trying to sabotage something wonderful. I change the subject.

“What are we going to do, Bailey?”

“What do you mean?” she asks, completely confused.

I widen my eyes for emphasis. “Where are we going to live?”

“Oh, we’ll find a place,” she says, her eyes shifting.

“By tonight?” I ask her. Then my stomach drops as my real life filters back into my mind. “Oh my God, I have to work in just a couple of hours,” I realize in horror, looking at the time on the hospital wall clock.

“No, you don’t. I called you in,” Bailey says.

“Bailey! I have to work!”

“You can’t work tonight,” Declan announces, coming back around the curtain.

“I have to,” I inform him, disgusted that he thinks he can tell me what to do.

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