I Was the Unwanted Fifth in Their Life and Death Pact novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Get Out

The four come to her ward. In front of the nurses Abigail shows the cast, returns the ring and orders them out. A police officer arrives with the hit-and-run report and the name of the man who stayed.

They came on Friday afternoon, an hour after I got back from my second surgery.

I was in a ward room by then, with a curtain, a window and a nurse's whiteboard that said my name wrong.

I heard them in the hall before I saw them.

"Maybe she's asleep," Heidi said. "I don't want to make a fuss."

Then the door opened and all four walked in.

Derrick carried flowers from the hospital gift shop.

Dane stood with his arms crossed and his city water department jacket still on.

Brody hung back by the door and looked at the floor.

Heidi came last, in a pink coat, holding a container of soup in both hands. Her left wrist was still in the black brace.

"Abigail," she said, and her eyes filled. "I'm so sorry you're upset with us."

Nobody said sorry you're hurt.

I looked at Derrick.

"Take the flowers out."

"Abby." He set them on the tray table anyway. "You removed us from Lifeline. Heidi cried all night."

"What happened to her wrist?"

It was the only thing that came out of my mouth, and I still don't know why.

"I fell on the stairs at home," Heidi said, and held the brace against her chest. "It's nothing."

Dane stepped forward.

"Abigail, enough. You pressed that alert four times in an hour. Four. What were we supposed to think?"

"That somebody was hurt."

"You do this when you feel left out."

"Dane."

"You did it when I forgot your birthday."

"I did not."

"You called me crying at two in the morning."

"Because it was the anniversary of Mom's funeral, Dane."

He opened his mouth and closed it.

A nurse had stopped in the doorway with a blood pressure cuff.

I threw back the blanket, and the plaster lay there from my hip to my toes, gray and heavy.

"This is my leg," I said. "Look at it."

Nobody moved.

"They took out my spleen. I have three broken ribs. A car hit me on Tuesday night at eleven thirty-six, and I was trapped inside it until after midnight."

Derrick's face changed.

He looked at the cast, then at my taped ribs, then at the IV in my arm.

"Abigail, why didn't you tell us it was real?"

"I pressed the button four times."

"You didn't call. You didn't text."

"I couldn't hold my phone steady, Derrick. I could barely see it."

"You've done it before."

"I have never once done it before."

The nurse in the doorway cleared her throat.

"She's telling the truth," she said. "I told her on Thursday that her family had asked us to stop calling. We have the notes."

Brody looked up.

"Who called the hospital?" he said, very quietly.

Nobody answered him.

Heidi took one small step back and put her good hand to her mouth.

"I only wanted her to be okay," she said, to nobody in particular.

I reached for my left hand.

The ring was in the dish beside the water cup, where I had put it before the first surgery.

It was a small square diamond Derrick had chosen because I'd said big ones snagged on gloves.

I held it out.

"Take it."

"Abigail, don't be dramatic."

"Take it, Derrick."

He didn't.

So I dropped it into the soup.

It clinked against the container and sank.

Heidi gasped and covered her mouth with her good hand.

"Get out," I said. "All of you."

"She's upset," Derrick told the nurse. "She's on pain medication."

"She's not on anything that changes what I just heard," the nurse said, and pressed the call button on the wall.

Dane was still staring at the cast.

"Abby," he said. "I didn't know."

"You didn't ask."

Security came in a minute later, a heavy man in a gray uniform who asked them politely to leave.

Brody went first.

Derrick went second and looked back at me twice.

Dane stopped in the doorway, said nothing, and left.

Heidi was the last.

She turned in the doorway with her eyes red and her mouth trembling, and for a second I almost said, It's okay, don't cry.

That was how well she had trained us.

"I'm sorry I caused a fuss," she whispered.

Then the door swung shut behind her.

I sat in the quiet with soup on my sheets and my heart pounding against the tape.

Someone knocked.

A police officer in a rain-spotted jacket leaned in, notebook in hand.

"Miss Hartnell? I'm here about the hit-and-run on Tuesday night."

He checked his notes.

"The man who stayed with you until the ambulance came is down the hall right now. He says he's your surgeon."

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