Tired. It was the only thought that consciously formed in Meg's mind.
Her feet shuffled along the dark street, her eyes unfocused.
"Megan! What's wrong?"
She jerked and froze, like she'd been zapped with a bolt of lightning. There was Chase, in the car that had pulled up beside her, the car she'd hardly noticed.
"I'm fine." She started walking again. Chase jumped from the car with a curse.
"You're not fine. What the hell happened?" He blocked her path, gestured to pocket of her hoodie, where she'd tucked her hand.
She followed his gaze, saw the dark wet stain and inhaled sharply. Gently, he tugged her hand from the pocket. The towel she'd wrapped around it was drenched.
"Get in the car," he ordered, his mouth pressed in a tight line. When she didn't move, he pushed her toward the open door.
"The seats," she protested.
"Get in the damn car, Megan." He opened the back door, shoved her in, slammed the front door, and then climbed in the back seat with her.
"Megan. Tell us what happened." Dave Gallagher demanded and pulled back into traffic with a squeal of tires.
"Megan?" Chase snapped his fingers when she didn't reply to his dad. "Talk to me. What happened?" He stripped out of his own hoodie, then his t-shirt, and wrapped the shirt around her hand.
She blinked and then her eyes traveled down his naked chest. Chase quickly pulled the hoodie over his head. "Um, I was slicing an apple and the knife slipped."
"When?" Dave asked.
"Uh, I don't — when I got home from school."
"Shit, Megan, that was four hours ago. Why didn't you call us immediately?" Dave increased speed.
"I — I didn't think it was that bad. I thought… I figured it would stop bleeding."
Chase increased the pressure on her hand and she hissed in a breath.
"Sorry, sorry. I know it hurts."
"It didn't. Not until now," she murmured, her words slurring.
They arrived at the emergency room entrance minutes later. Chase tugged her out but as soon as she put one foot on the ground, she wobbled, and her vision grayed. She felt Chase scoop her up under the knees and carry her through the ER entrance.
"I need help here!"
Was that his voice? It shook and sounded almost shrill.
Suddenly, a wheelchair held her. Chase was talking to someone, his voice still weird. "Her hand is pouring blood. She says the knife slipped while she was cutting up an apple but that was hours ago… maybe three o'clock. She didn't think it was that bad, so she started working on a painting." They unwrapped her hand, poked at the gaping sides of the wound.
"Get the vascular on-call down here," the nurse said to his colleague. "What's your name?" a white blob asked her.
"Megan. Megan Farrell."
"You her boyfriend?" The white blob asked and before Meg could think of a response, Chase replied.
"Yeah. Her mother's working, she doesn't know."
"We'll call her. Put her in Seven!"
They pushed her chair into a large room with lots of curtains.
"Megan. My name's John. We're gonna take care of you. Can you climb up here for me?"
She started to stand but wondered where here was. She didn't see anything. Leaning heavily on the arms of the chair that felt like it was now spinning in one-eighties, she reached out a hand, felt a bed to her right and all but collapsed onto it.
"Megan, can you tell me your full name?"
Meg blinked and frowned. "Megan Elise Farrell."
"Good. How old are you?"
"Seventeen."
"Good, good. Tell me what day it is, Megan."
"Um… Monday?"
"That's good."
Meg felt a warm heavy blanket cover her.
"She's a little shocky. Start an IV."
They stuck a monitor on one of her fingers and she could hear cabinets and drawers opening and closing, the sound of metal meeting metal, footsteps rushing in.
"I called her mother."
"No! I'm fine. She doesn't need to come." Meg tried to sit up, but hands gently restrained her. A minute later, she felt a pinch in her good hand, then tape was wrapped around it.
"You are not fine, Megan. You've lost a decent amount of blood and your body is starting to go into shock. If you hadn't gotten here when you did, we'd be transfusing. As it is, this is gonna need at least a dozen stitches, maybe more."
Someone — Chase? — gripped her arm and squeezed.
"I left a voice mail," Dave said.
"Thanks, Dad."
"Never been so happy my kid's a peeping Tom —"
"Jesus, Dad, not now!"
Chase's voice sounded like him again. And her vision started to dial back in until another white-robed medic prodded and poked and tugged at her wound. Oh, God! The pain crossed her eyes and burned a track all the way to her brain and she reached blindly for Chase's hand. He took it, squeezed his support and with his other hand, he smoothed her hair and she shut her eyes, grateful for his presence.
Another spike of pain had her eyes flying open. The doctor was flushing out the wound with some syringe full of fluid that burned. Her eyes met Chase's and she flashed a smile – that smile, the one just for him.
It was second, maybe third grade when they'd first met. Chase and his family had just moved to the house behind Meg's. He seemed pretty shy but during recess on his first day of school, he ran for the slide, had reached the top step when Peter Sidell pushed him off. He wasn't hurt, but he came up ready to fight. So Meg ran up and pounded Peter the second his light-up sneakers touched the rubber mat. He ran off crying while Chase just stared at her, kind of the way he does now. So she gave him a cookie.
Maybe that's what did it. That's when they'd both fallen with a splat.
Something stabbed her, tearing her right out of those day dreams. Jesus, the doctor was injecting something right into the gash itself. "Talk to me, Megan," Chase demanded. "What painting are you working on now? Oils? Water colors?"
"Acrylics." She pushed the word through gritted teeth.
"Acrylics. I'm not very good with acrylics. They dry so fast."
"That's why I like them," she said. "I can change stuff if I don't like how it comes out the first time." Her voice rose and fell with the pain.
"What about water colors? Are they hard?"
"Yeah. I like tube color better than pan paints. But I never get the same color mixed twice."
"I guess that's the point," Chase said.
Her eyes met his, surprised. "I never thought of that. That's a good point." She considered that for a few minutes — how each artist mixes and layers her colors. And then the pain flared again.
"What about working flat? You can't use an easel with water colors, right?"
Again, she looked surprised. "How do you know so much about this? I didn't even know you liked art until this weekend."
Chase shrugged. "You like it. So I've been, uh, studying."
"Why? Would you bother?"
He didn't answer. She closed her eyes until the tugging on her hand stopped.
"That's it, all done." The doctor announced and she saw Chase's eyes shut in relief. "Thirteen stitches, some inside, some out. We'll get a sterile dressing on it and you'll be good to go." The doctor left and Meg lifted her hand to examine her wound. A line of stiff black threads followed the angry red trail in the webbing between her left thumb and index finger. Slowly, Meg flexed her hand.
"Easy, Megan. You'll tear," Chase's dad reminded her.
"Relax. You're right-handed. You can still paint. For everything else, I'll help you and so will Bailey." Chase promised.
To her profound embarrassment, she burst into tears.
"Jesus, Megan! It's okay. We'll take care of you."
"Bailey won't!" Meg shook her head. "It's her fault this even happened."
"What are you talking about?"
Meg shot a glance at Dave Gallagher
"Um. I'm going to step outside and try calling your mom again." Dave jerked his chin toward the corridor.
Chase nodded gratefully. When his dad left, Meg couldn't stop herself from venting.
"The underwear. She told everybody I wet my pants in first grade. Posted it on freakin' Facebook! Chase, it was horrible. Every class, even in the hallways, people kept throwing their underwear at me."
"Hey, rock stars live for that shit." He offered with a grin and she knew it was a lame shot at making her laugh.
She rolled her eyes. "I'm not a rock star!"
His smile faded. "So Bailey's mad at you, huh?"
Meg shrugged, then winced in pain. "I'm tired, Chase. Just so tired. Every time she meets a new guy, she pulls away from me. She never hears me when I tell her how great she is. But she listens to them. A guy she never met said I told him she threw up all over our teacher. I never told him that. I wouldn't do that. But she believes him."
When Chase didn't say anything, Meg let her head fall back against the gurney and shut her eyes.
"I'm sorry for spacing out on you," she said quietly.
Chase huffed out a breath. "I don't know why you didn't call us. You could have passed out on the street, been snatched up, run over, or just bled to death."
He took her good hand in his and Meg felt him shake. She shifted over. "Sit. You look worse than I do."
He moved without hesitating. Meg felt warm with him beside her.
"I'm sorry about what I said on Saturday. It wasn't fair. I know you're only trying to protect Bailey."
She fidgeted. Looked down at her stitched up hand. Looked back into magic eyes. "Forget it."
"How's your head. Are you dizzy?"
"No, not anymore. Just tired." Her stomach let out a low rumble and she laughed weakly. "And hungry."
Chase jumped up. "I'll find a vending machine. M&Ms?" They were her favorite.
She breathed deeply, shut her eyes. Chase had found her. She didn't know how he knew that she'd needed help, but was so happy he'd came. He was right; she wouldn't have made it. She hadn't realized how close she was to passing out until he'd settled her into the back seat of the car. She could hardly hold her head up… the IV in her hand was doing a lot to clear the fuzz from her brain… the drugs the doctor had pumped into her wound had killed the burn…what was Mr. Gallagher talking about before with that Peeping Tom stuff…maybe Chase watched her the way she watched him…she'd have to remember to close the blinds…
She felt soft lips brush her forehead and jerked, blinking into Chase's eyes. "What?"
He shook his head. "You fell asleep. Here. Have some sugar." He spread out his haul and she moved straight for the M&Ms. He smiled when she tore the package open with her teeth, tilted half of it into her open mouth. That did surprise him.
"Oh. Sorry. Want some?"
"Yeah, if you're sure I won't lose a finger if I try." He laughed when she shot him a glare and held out his hand. They popped M&Ms and Dave rejoined them.
"I finally got hold of your mother. They want to keep you here overnight-"
"No!"
Dave raised his hands. "Easy, easy. She said the same thing so the doctor agreed to release you into my care."
Chase made a strange strangling sound and Meg blinked at both of them. "What does that mean?"
"It means you're coming home with us for the night. No arguments," he added when her mouth opened to protest.
Meg shut her mouth and remained quiet while the doctor removed her IV, provided some instructions for caring for her wound and sent them on their way. Chase held her elbow while she walked to the car. She wanted to wrestle away but knew she was too weak to walk a straight line by herself. She climbed into the backseat and stretched herself out before he could join her and let herself drift on the meds the hospital pumped into her veins.