The nurse led us down a hallway that smelled like antiseptic and broken promises.
Room 314. The number was bolted to the door like an accusation. She pushed it open without knocking. Stepped aside to let us through.
I couldn't move. His mother went in first. Her footsteps echoed on linoleum that had been cleaned a thousand times and would never feel clean. I stood in the doorway with my heart trying to escape through my throat.
Then I saw him.
Chase was sitting up in bed, right arm in a sling. Cuts across his face—one over his eyebrow, another along his jaw. Dark purple bruising spreading from his temple down his neck. Hospital gown hanging off his shoulder. Blue wristband with his name printed in block letters.
Alive. He was alive!
My knees almost gave out. I grabbed the doorframe to keep from collapsing. The relief hit so hard it felt like violence. Like every cell in my body just remembered how to function after holding its breath for three days.
His mother moved toward the bed but he didn't look at her. Just stared at the IV in his left hand like it was the most interesting thing in the world.
"Chase, honey. You scared me."
Nothing.
"The doctors said you were lucky. A few more feet and—"
"Mom." His voice was rough. Scraped raw. "I'm fine."
"You're not fine. You went through a guardrail."
"I'm fine."
She turned back to me. Eyes desperate. Pleading. Like I had some magic ability to reach him when she couldn't.
She crossed the room. Hugged me again. Tight and desperate. Her whole body shaking against mine.
"Thank god you're here," she whispered. "He won't talk to me."
I hugged her back because I didn't know what else to do. Over her shoulder, I watched Chase. He still wouldn't look up. Just kept staring at that IV like it held answers.
His mother pulled away. Wiped her eyes. "I'm going to get coffee. Give you two a minute."
She left before I could protest. The door clicked shut. Suddenly it was just us and the machines beeping their steady rhythm and all the words we should've said three days ago.
I approached the bed slowly. Each step felt impossible. Like walking through concrete.
"Chase?"
He looked up.
Expression unreadable. Not angry. Not relieved. Just... empty. Like someone unplugged all the parts that made him him and left the shell behind.
The cuts on his face were worse up close. Butterfly stitches holding skin together. A bandage on his forehead covering god knows what. His pupils were slightly dilated. Pain medication probably.
"You shouldn't have come."
The words landed like he knew they would. Like he'd been practicing how to hurt me most efficiently.
They were familiar. Echoed something from five years ago. Different context and same devastation.
"Your mom called me," I said. Voice barely working. "She said you kept saying my name."
"I was concussed."
"She said I should come."
"She was wrong."
I pulled the plastic chair closer to the bed. Sat down before my legs gave out completely. "What happened?"
"Car accident. They explained it already."
"That's not what I'm asking."
He finally looked at me. His eyes were bloodshot and exhausted. Haunted by something I couldn't see.
"I lost control."
"Of the car or everything else?"
His jaw clenched. Even that small movement made him wince. "Does it matter?"
"Yes."
"Why? So you can feel guilty? Add it to your list of things that are somehow your fault?"
The accusation stung. "That's not fair."
"Nothing about this is fair." His voice cracked. "You think I wanted to end up here? You think I wanted my mom to call you? To have you show up looking at me like I'm some project you need to fix?"
"I don't think you're a project."
"Then why are you here?"
The question hung between us. Heavy. Loaded with five years of history and three days of silence and all the ways we kept hurting each other while trying not to.
"Because when your mom called and said you might—" My throat closed. "Because I couldn't not come."
"That's not a reason."
"It's the only one I have."
He turned away. Stared at the window where early morning light was starting to seep through the blinds. "I was driving to clear my head. That's all. Took the curve too fast. Hit gravel. Lost control."
"You were going to the overpass."
"How do you—" He stopped. "Doesn't matter."
"It matters to me."
"It shouldn't."
I leaned forward. Rested my elbows on my knees. Studied the pattern in the floor tiles because looking at him hurt too much. "Your mom said you kept saying my name."
"I don't remember that."
"She said it was the first thing you said when they pulled you out."
"Zoey." His voice was sharp. Warning. "Don't do this."
"Do what?"
"Make this about us. About some grand romantic gesture or sign from the universe or whatever narrative you're building."
"I'm not building anything. I'm just trying to understand—"
"Understand what? That I fucked up? That I was angry and driving too fast and made a stupid mistake? Congratulations. You understand."
"That's not what this was."
"You don't know what this was."
"Then tell me."
He looked at me finally. Eyes hard. Defensive. Scared underneath all the anger. "I was coming to find you. To apologize. To tell you I was wrong about the fundraiser. That I should've—" He stopped. Breathed. "But I took the curve too fast and now I'm here and you're here and it doesn't change anything."
My chest felt like it was caving in. "Chase—"
"You shouldn't have come," he said again. Quieter this time. More defeated than angry. "You're leaving in four weeks. This—" He gestured at himself. At the hospital room. At the wreckage of whatever we had been building. "This doesn't change that."
"Maybe it should."
"It won't."
The machines kept beeping. The fluorescent lights kept humming. And we kept sitting in the ruins of something that could've been everything if we weren't both so good at self-destruction.
"I'm sorry," I whispered. "For the fundraiser. For everything."
"Me too."
But sorry didn't fix broken bones or broken trust or the four weeks stretching ahead like a countdown to inevitable.
His mother returned with coffee. The moment shattered. We went back to being two people in a hospital room pretending the space between us wasn't filled with everything we couldn't say.