Page 191 of Fame & Chaos

My breath catches painfully.

I replace the oxygen mask with shaking hands and caress his cheek one last time while tears pour uncontrollably down my face. “Come back to me, Caleb,” I whisper.

Then… he’s gone.

Whisked away toward surgery while I’m left standing there, covered in his blood and trying not to fall apart completely. My heart races violently inside my chest. I can’t breathe. My stomach churns so hard that bile burns the back of my throat.

His image keeps replaying in my head.

Caleb.

My Caleb.

Broken and bleeding and in pain.

My knees buckle.

Reaching blindly for the instrument tray beside me, I miss completely and crash to the floor along with the tray, metal clattering deafeningly around me.

Rachel rushes over immediately while I curl inward, sobbing into my hands.

“Oh, Indi,” she says gently, wrapping an arm around my shoulders. “What’s wrong?”

I can’t tell her the love of my life might be dying upstairs while I sit here helplessly on the emergency room floor.

The sobs only get worse until I’m gagging from how hard I’m crying. All I can think about is everything left unsaid between us. Every wasted day. Every ignored phone call. Every stubborn decision to stay away from him.

I should have listened.

Should have talked to him.

Should have found out the truth.

Because now he might die before I ever get the chance.

A violent twist hits my stomach, and I barely manage to pull my hands away before vomiting onto the emergency room floor.

“Geez, Indi,” Rachel says sympathetically while cleaning up around me. “You’ve worked yourself into a proper state.”

I feel weak. Completely hollow.

All I can picture is Caleb in a coffin.

And I never told him one last time that I love him.

“Indi!” Kenzi’s voice cuts through my breakdown moments before running footsteps approach rapidly.

I don’t even have the strength to lift my head before she’s kneeling beside me, pulling me straight into her lap.

“It’s okay,” she says quickly while I cling to her desperately. “His spleen was lacerated and close to rupturing, but they caught it in time. They’re doing a splenectomy now to stop the bleeding. They’ll remove the glass shards while he’s under.”

My mind spins so fast I can barely process the words.

Then suddenly another thought slams into me.

“His kidney!” I gasp, looking up at her frantically. “Kenz, he had a transplant. They have to check his kidney.”

Kenzi immediately brushes hair back from my face, reassuringly. “Already told the surgeon. I remembered you mentioning it before. His kidney is fine, Indi.”