Page 92 of Cluelessly Yours

Am I in the hospital?

I move my head to the left, and pain shoots down my side and around, right into the length of my ribs.

Ow, jeez. Okay, maybe it’s good that I’m in a hospital. That really fucking hurts.

More carefully this time, I continue my perusal of the room. My heart lodges itself in my throat when I seehimin a bed a few feet away from mine.

An onslaught of tenderness, of adoration and affection, floods into my veins.

I want to go to him. But I can’t find the strength to move a single one of my limbs.

But wait…his eyes are closed, and there’s a white bandage stretched across his head.

Is he okay?

My ribs pull again, and I wince.

Areweokay?

Footsteps fill my ears, and I slowly turn my head to the right again. A woman walks inside. Her belly is rounded with pregnancy, and it reminds me of my sister, Brooke.

The woman doesn’t look at me. She goes straight to his bed and sits down in a chair beside him. But when she looks across the room, her eyes meet mine and she startles.

“Oh!Oh!Oh my God!” She hops up from her chair and grabs something, tapping her fingers against it maniacally.

In a few seconds, a voice fills the room.

“Can I help you?”

“Uh…hello? Uh…hi…Uh…I think she’s awake,” she fumbles to answer. “The woman…the woman beside my…boyfriend is awake. Her eyes are open.”

Boyfriend?

“I’ll send the nurse in,” the voice replies, but all I can think is,boyfriend?

How could he be her boyfriend when I’m in love with him? When he’s told me he’s in love with me?

“Hu—” I try to speak, but my throat is so dry it’s like my vocal cords are stuck together. I swallow against the blockage and try again, but all that comes out is a rough, squeaky sound—one that doesn’t sound like anything at all.

The woman stares at me with longing in her eyes as she grabs his hand andsqueezes.She’sholdinghishand. Everything inside my body wants to revolt against the gesture.

With her free hand, she nervously rubs at her rounded belly, and that movement triggers a memory to break the surface of my consciousness…

We laughed and smiled and kissed as we walked toward his apartment. We stumbled down the hallway, anticipation coursing through our veins, hands greedily grabbing at each other’s clothes. We couldn’t get close enough.

Everything felt like bliss.

Everything felt perfect.

Until we reached his door, and she was there.

“I’m pregnant,” she told him.

Agony rips through every part of me as it all comes flooding back, and I let out a scream I didn’t know I was capable of. Doctors and nurses and what feels like a million people flood the room at once, and right in the middle of my cries, everything, once again, goes black.

It feels like a metaphor for my life.

Where Sammy Baker goes, disaster and chaos follow.

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