Page 55 of Beneath His Robes

The doors of the car slammed shut with a finality I didn’t want to acknowledge, and I felt the cold air hit me. The snow falling around us made me think of that fucking forest, and I growled, shaking my head to rid myself of the memories.

The hospital was everything I hated—sterile, indifferent to the pain of the people inside. I wanted to scream. I wanted to break something the way he broke Miranda. I wanted to scream at her, at Jack, at the world for letting this happen yet again to my stupid fucking mother.

But I just kept walking, feet moving on autopilot toward the hospital’s entrance.

Elias didn’t say anything, but I could feel him there. I could feel his hesitation as if he wasn’t sure whether he was welcome or not. But unwilling to ask.

I didn’t care.

Not right now.

Right now, I had to focus on her. The world was falling apart around me, yet, as always, I was the only one who could somehow hold it together.

The air inside the hospital was cold and sterile, and the smell of antiseptic and old people wafted through the air. I could hear the soft beeping of machines and the murmur of hushed voices. It felt like everything was a world apart from the chaos I’d left behind. I didn’t belong here.

“Can I help you?” The nurse at the front desk looked at me with that practiced smile like she had seen every desperate face walking through those doors. It didn’t faze her. I was in no mood to pretend I gave a shit, either.

“Miranda Saint Clare” I said, my voice barely above a whisper, like saying it any louder might shatter what little resolve I had left. “She was brought here for a heroin overdose and domestic assault.”

She tapped away at the computer, not even bothering to make eye contact, but I felt the weight of her gaze, even if she couldn’t see me. She didn’t have to—she could probably tell just by the way I was standing. My hands were shaking, my breath shallow.

“Room 304,” she said, finally looking up at me with an expression that was unreadable. “She’s in critical care. Are you her son? You look familiar.”

I nodded, not trusting myself to say anything else.

“Take a seat. Someone will be with you shortly.”

I didn’t sit. I couldn’t. I needed to move. I needed to get to her and get this fucking shit over with.

I didn’t even glance at Elias as I turned away from the desk and started down the hallway in long strides. My steps echoed in the empty space, and for a moment, I let myself believe that I could outrun the noise in my head, the actions of what had led to this.

Heroin, and beaten…I wanted to scream. I wanted to rage at the world that had taken my mom and turned her into something unrecognizable. She always struggled, but she had gotten better. She worked on getting off this hard shit. I saw her go to the meetings for years.

Why now?

Why give in to her dangerous temptation?

She was my fucking mom. She had raised me in the only way she knew how, and she had been the only person who’d come close to loving me, and now she was just another stupid-ass addict. Another statistic. Another body in this wasteland of forgotten.

I wasn’t going to let her die, not like this. She was not giving up after everything.

The door to her room loomed ahead of me. I reached for the handle, but my hand hovered, trembling.

I didn’t want to open that door.

I didn’t want to see her like this.

I didn’t want to see the bruises on her face, the track marks on her arms, the way her body seemed so frail, so distant from the woman who had once told me that no matter what, we would be okay. The woman who promised she would stop that shit for me.

But I couldn’t run away. Not this time.

I turned the knob and stepped inside.

My mom was lying in the bed, a mess of wires and machines surrounding her. The faint beeping of a heart monitor was the only sound in the room. Her face was white, her pale skin thin and bruised, all the colors of the fucking rainbow embedded on her skin, her body covered in marks from someone else’s violence.

Her eyes were closed, her breath ragged and shallow. The nurse had told me that she had overdosed, but it didn’t make sense. My mom wasn’t a junkie anymore. She had just…gotten caught up in something, and its name was Jack.

I walked up to the side of her bed and sat down in the chair beside her. My hands reached out, but I stopped myself, unsure if I could touch her without shattering.

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