Page 2 of Raise Up, Heart
Emily doesn’t notice, and you close your eyes, because this is always so sweet now, such a joy to let your body feel this beautiful bliss—
Tight, hot, gripping, and a guttural male groan.
—“Oh, God,” you cry, covering your face with your hands, trying to block whatever memory has ripped into your mind.
“Oh, God, Alex!” Emily echoes, speeding up her movements. “Oh, it’s so good, baby. So good,” she croons, and you have to fight to keep from shoving her off and away.
You focus on your cock sliding wetly in and out and send a desperate prayer up to the heavens because you are suddenly terrified that you simply won’t be able to pull this off.
That she’ll sense…that she’ll know….
Her body clenches at you and you jerk under her, hoping that she doesn’t notice that the condom is empty, hoping that when she pulls off, she thinks you’ve come, too.
You slide away fast, kissing her mouth, kissing her hair, saying, “I need to clean up. I’m tired.” Then you want to bite your own tongue because now she’s going to worry that you’ve strained Damon’s heart. “It’s okay. I just…I need to get some rest. It was good, Emily,” you say. “You’re so good, so beautiful in every way.”
You throw the condom away, and your cock wilts in your hand. You run the water. Splash it on your face, and stare at yourself in the mirror. The red scar down the center of your chest is violent and still new. You run your finger over the seam, thinking of being cracked open, the bloody, red and white mess of it all. You shudder when you think of them ripping open Damon’s body to harvest his heart for you.
“Alex?” Emily asks from the doorway. Her nightgown is white and sheer, her gentle outline visible beneath it, and you want to go to her, to wrap your arms around her. You want to tell her all the odd things you’ve felt lately, all the memories you can’t explain. But you don’t. Because her grief for her friend—your cousin—and her fear for you is still too fresh. And this is all too confusing.
And, perhaps, if you’re lucky, it will simply go away.
If you’re lucky.
It escalates whenyou see Cole Hart at the hospital. You’re there for a check-up. You’re still on leave until you’re more fully healed, and though you’ve felt up to returning to your job as a nurse practitioner in a family practice for a week or more now, Emily won’t hear of it.
Cole is there for some sort of business, he’s dressed in nice clothes and he has a bundle of files in his hands, paperwork of some kind, and he looks lost. You watch as he stops in the middle of the hallway, his eyes going distant and strange.
You know, you understand, and you’ve felt it too—Dr. Damon Black should be here, and you want him to be. You expect that at any point, around any corner, the nurses will be scurrying away from his commanding voice. Damon had been the kind of doctor who came at his job with all the sheer force of his will.
You are just about to call out to Cole, to greet him, when his lips twist with grief, and he brings the back of his hand to his mouth, holding back tears. It isn’t fair that he lost Damon. They didn’t have enough time together. It isn’t fair that you’re alive when Damon is gone. Cole sobs softly and you freeze.
Pain, breathless violent, soul-rending pain.
The world goes black around you, and you taste blood in your mouth.
“Oh, God, Alex! Are you—? Someone! We need help!”
It’s Cole. His hands are on you, and you grab hold of them, holding them to your chest, as you stare up at him, feeling as wild-eyed as he looks. He’s in a panic now, his tears are still wet on his face and his breathing comes unnaturally fast.
His lips are red and open, and he’s saying something to you, and you want him to keep talking.
“Alex, what’s wrong? Is it his heart?”
The clatter of feet on the hospital floor, and the soft thud of knees and legs hit the ground beside you, as Cole is pulled back,away. And you’re stuck being checked by a man who introduces himself as Dr. Jones and three nurses, all of them touching you at once. Cole stands to the side of the hospital bed you’ve somehow landed in, his arms crossed over his chest, with his eyes wrecked and vulnerable.
“How’s my heart?” you whisper, as the monitors beep away.
Across the room, Cole flinches.
Your heart? Or is it Damon’s heart?
Honestly, you no longer know.
Emily holds anice pack to your lip and runs her fingers through your hair soothingly. The hospital has summoned her despite your assurances that it’s unnecessary, that you’re fine, and it was just a strange, sudden blackout.
Even as you say the words, you know that they aren’t convincing: a recent heart transplant patient falling on his face, busting his lip, with only a report of a strange, intense pain to explain it, is not apt to be sent along home without a battery of tests being run. You know that, and you accept it. Any resistance has left you for good, drummed out of you by Damon’s heart and replaced with a deep, painful shame.
You also know that it’s more than that. You sit in the hospital gown, your hands crossed in your lap, and Emily hovers by your side. You try not to think of how Cole had stood beside your bed ten minutes ago, messy blond hair aglow and eyes red with tears. You try not to remember how hecommandedyou to get well, saying, “It’s his heart. It’s all that’s left of him. Do this for me. Please.”
