TW: Violence.

— Hannah —

Amelia was at the hospital.

I didn’t really know how to deal with that information. Vincent gave me the hospital address. I wrote it all down mechanically, the weight of that situation still hadn’t sunk in.

I ended the call and told Lydia and Nathalie what I had just learned. They both agreed to go with me to the hospital. Lydia drove. I didn’t trust myself not to run red lights or crash when I was that distraught. We gave our names to the receptionist, who had us glue stickers with the word “visitor” in front of our shirts before she allowed us in.

Amelia was in patient ward number 3. I saw her from the door, and for a moment, I hesitated. It was at that moment that the crude realness of it all finally hit me. The girl I loved was in a hospital bed, either asleep or sedated, with a catheter running from her arm. It scared me. I didn’t know what was happening, and being in the dark was the most terrifying part of it.

Lydia stepped back, holding Nathalie’s arm to stop her from coming inside the ward. She wanted me to have a moment alone with Mel. I barely noticed it. I walked into the room and made my way to the bed where Amelia rested. There were stitches on her face and arms, and possibly more under her hospital gown. She looked frail, pale, hurt. Her body rested on the bed, eerily still, and I could have mistaken her for dead if not for the subtle rise and fall of her chest.

“Oh. You’re here,” said a voice from behind me. I didn’t have to turn around to know who that was. “Thanks for coming so quickly,” said Vincent, walking around the bed to sit on a chair nearby.

“What happened?” was all I had the strength to say.

Vincent looked at me with saddened eyes. I could tell that this was also taking a toll on him. Those same eyes must have been crying, I realized.

“It was an accident,” Vin explained. “She was hit by a car. They rushed her here, and she went through surgery, but she seems to be stable now. She was moved here from the ICU just this afternoon.”

I suddenly felt faint. Surgery? ICU? Vincent probably noticed it, because he stood up and put his arms around me, guiding me to the chair to prevent me from passing out.

“When?” was my next question.

Vincent seemed hesitant to tell me. “That… night we came to your place,” he confessed.

Suddenly, I felt like a fool. I had spent those past few days thinking that Amelia was avoiding me, when in reality…

I had no more questions. I remained in silence, watching over the sleeping form of my girlfriend. I feared that, if I spoke, my voice would betray me and I would start crying. So I just sat there, waiting. Vincent left me there, either to explain the situation to Lydia and Nathalie or to give me a moment alone. When he came back, he asked me to watch over Mel, because he had to take care of work-related issues. I told him that I would, so he gathered his things and left me. Time passed. Hours, probably. I was too lost in my thoughts to really keep track of time. Eventually, I fell asleep by her bedside.

I dreamed of Mel and I in a date. A happier time, with no hospitals or Michael or concerns of any sort. I woke up to her voice softly calling my name.

“Hannah?”

I opened my eyes, and saw Amelia lying on her side, staring lovingly at me. Suddenly I was wide-awake. My eyes began to water, and I jumped into an awkward hug with Mel that accidentally pulled off the IV access from her arm. A nurse who was nearby reprehended me for it. We waited in silence until she left the ward, then laughed about it together.

“What happened?” I asked her, at last.

“It’s… a long story,” said Mel. “How did you know where to find me?”

“I called Vincent, he’s the one who told me to come here. Were you really not going to tell your girlfriend that you were hospitalized? I was worried, you know? After you stopped calling, I… thought you didn’t want anything to do with me, anymore.”

Mel hesitated. “It’s… complicated. I was in intensive care for a while, and you had your classes to attend, I didn’t want you to worry.”

I rolled my eyes, and flicked a finger on her forehead, half-expecting her to wince with pain. She did not.

“Are you daft?” I asked, annoyed. “Mel, I’m your girlfriend, I deserve to know if you’re hospitalized. So what if I’ll worry? You can’t just decide to hide things like these from me, that’s not how relationships work.”

Mel sighed. “I’m sorry.”

“You should be,” I told her. But the anger was beginning to subside, by then. I reached forward and placed a hand over hers. “So… are you going to tell me what happened?”

Mel nodded, and began to tell me the story.

— Amelia —

I had left the apartment about twenty minutes ago, and had been walking to the police station, intent on filing a bulletin retelling the events of that night. How Hannah’s abusive ex-boyfriend had broken into her apartment, drunk and unstable. How I got the call from Lydia telling me that she was in danger. How I rushed over to her apartment, only to find that I was already too late, and that he had already hit her. How I managed to take Hannah away from him, and asked my brother to get her to a hospital. How I walked back into the apartment and had to struggle for my life as Michael pushed a knife against my throat.

A police record wouldn’t be enough, of course. I had seen this happen before, with friends and family. I knew that Hannah’s protection, as well as my own, depended on us finding ways to deal with the situation without having to rely on the cops. But I also knew that failing to report the incident would cause us problems in the long run.

I was almost at the police station when it happened. The silver Volkswagen had been going the wrong-way. It came at me from behind, steering into the sidewalk and hitting me on the back almost at the same time as it collided against a street light and came to a stop. I was flung forward by the impact, hit a wall then fell to the ground.

I realized, with a shock, that I could not move at all. Apart from my eyes, the rest of my body simply did not respond to me anymore. I don’t remember the pain, though I must have felt it at some point. From where I fell, I watched as the Volkswagen door opened and Michael stumbled out from the driver’s seat. He stared at me, angry at first, then horrified. Someone shouted. He looked past me, at whoever had spoken, then turned around and ran.

I felt darkness crawl around me, pulling me into unconsciousness.

And for the second time that night, I almost died.