Page 1 of Capacity
CHAPTER 1
The running water in the bathroom lulled my fuzzy brain into a trance. I glanced down at my white cotton t-shirt then at my smooth forearms and wrists. I wondered if the blood would stain my white shirt.
Of course it will, Lumi.
I nodded absently at the voice of despair in my head, agreeing with it as I plucked a small fillet knife from the vanity. My eyes were tired and swollen from a night of tears and inconsolable grief. Exhaustion tugged at my skin, gnawed on my bones, and set fire to my brain.
Still, I padded into the bathroom. Steam thickened the air around me and turned the tiled floor slick. A humorless laugh fell from my lips in black and dusty scraps as I caught myself on the wall. As if falling would be my worst fate.
The fucking irony.
I held on tight to the knife as I eased into the water. Heat scalded my skin. I winced but didn’t cry out. I was done crying. Scalding hot water was nothing in the face of the black hole swirling in the pit of me.
I didn’t waste time once I was settled in the tub. Hot and heavy water leeched up my shirt until I was soaked. I didn’t care. Nothing would matter in a few minutes if I did everything correctly. I was too meticulous to make mistakes so I knew I’d do everything flawlessly.
With my fingers balled into a tight fist, I shoved my arm out in front of myself and pushed the tip of the fillet knife into my vein moving toward the crease of my arm. I used enough pressure to slice the vein. I felt the fire spreading through my bones as my life force poured from the deep gash.
I had to move fast or I’d lose feeling in my hand before I could cut my other wrist. With shaky fingers, I repeated the process on my left wrist. I pushed out a sigh when crimson melted into the hot water. Threads of red skated on the surface before turning the tub into a morbid, cloud of scarlet.
The blooddidstain my white shirt. It turned a deceitfully happy pink. It was the last thing I remembered seeing before darkness ate at the edges of my vision. I didn’t try to hold on because there was no reason.
I’d already been dead for more than a year. I was doing nothing but finalizing the way I felt. I was making the inside match the outside.
I was tired of the nonstop ache in my chest. I was tired of the nightmares and the empty feeling where my heart used to be. I was tired of sobbing to the point of exhaustion at night only to get an hour or two of sleep. I was tired of the pain.
Nobody tells you grief is a sting that worsens over time. They don’t tell you that you’ll be able to stay afloat while everyone is checking on you and bringing food. You’ll be able to sleep a little and eat a little. You’ll feel like you’re moving on…
Then the bottom falls out and you’re finally alone.
When I realized I was supposed to continue walking the earth without my heart—without my son—that’s when the real grief set in. It was heavy and jagged. It showed no mercy on my battered spirit.
Well, grief was going to win tonight. I was going to stop fighting because without my baby boy, my world was black. He was the vibrant color. He was the sunshine.
I would join him soon because that’s how it should have been.
…
Hazy light bled through my closed eyes. It wasn’t warm and golden like sunlight. It was harsh and artificial. My eyes weren’t even open and I knew those damn hospital lights anywhere.
I wasn’t dead.
Or maybe if I was, God chose this hospital as my personal hell. Adequate payback for my suicide, I suppose.
The longer I laid listening to the nurses move in and out of the room, the more I realized that I wasn’t dead. I was alive and back in the hospital I used to work at.
I opened my eyes and the harsh light grew brighter, making me squint. I swept my fuzzy gaze around the sterile room until I landed on a pair of familiar chocolate brown eyes. “I knew you wouldn’t slip into a coma.” Cora Atkins walked to my bedside and shook her head slowly. “The nurses said not to get my hopes up that you’d wake up because you’d lost so much blood. You had to have two transfusions.” She held up her pointer and middle fingers for emphasis.
It felt like I’d had two damn transfusions. I was so weak I couldn’t lift my arms or flex my fingers. My head throbbed to a slow, relentless beat that amplified every ache running along my arms. I looked down to see them wrapped in fresh white gauze from my wrist to my elbow.
“What happened?” I finally managed to rasp out a couple of words from my desert of a throat.
Cora leveled me with a look that held very little sympathy. “You know what happened, Lumi. You tried to kill yourself.” Her tone was an odd mixture of anger and hurt.
“I know that, Coco. Why didn’t itwork?” I asked. A lone tear skated down my cheek and splashed on the blue and white hospital gown I was dressed in.
Her dark brows pulled together in the center of her forehead and her chocolate eyes turned onyx. There was no mistaking the concern vibrating from her. It was so potent that anyone else would’ve mistaken it for anger. I knew Cora though. I’d known her since we were freshmen in college. She was harsh and tough. She didn’t make excuses for anyone, not even herself and she damn sure wasn’t going to make them for me.
“It didn’t work because you didn’t anticipate having a best friend like me.” Her eyes flitted over my face then fear washed her features clean of anger for a moment. I watched her smooth brown skin and long dark lashes. I studied the way her lips fell into a frown that dampened her usually vivid features.
