Page 94 of Stay Scared

“Stop lifting it.”

“It has to clear my shoulder.”

“Then let me move the vest around you.”

A small emergency fixture glows above a workbench. Shelves hold corroded tools and old electrical parts. A folding table blocks the rear wall, and a first-aid cabinet hangs beside a breaker box. At least this room was meant for maintenance rather than participants. That gives us supplies. It also gives us nowhere else to go.

Cade lowers himself onto the table’s edge.

I ease the vest from his good shoulder and work it around his torso rather than dragging it across the wound. Torn fabric has stuck near the cut, and his hand clamps around the metal edge beside his thigh.

“You can swear.”

His mouth tightens. “Trying not to make every bad thing in the room everybody else’s problem for once.”

My hands pause for half a second. Cade catches it.

I pull the vest free and drop it beside him.

“Try surviving first. Personal growth can wait.”

That almost earns a smile.

I lift the torn edge of his shirt. The cut is long and ugly, with one section near his ribs still bleeding enough to matter.

“You need stitches.”

“After Mark.”

“You need enough blood inside you to reach Mark.”

I cross to the first-aid cabinet and find surprisingly fresh supplies: trauma dressing, gauze, antiseptic packets. The timer reaches 07:12 by the time I return.

Seven minutes trapped in here. Seven minutes Mark spends tied to a chair.

I tear open the antiseptic.

“This is going to hurt.”

Cade watches me. “You’ve wanted to say that to me for years.”

“Do not make this enjoyable.”

The humor leaves his face when he looks at my wrist.

“I’m sorry about the hallway.”

I pause with the dressing in my hand.

“For getting cut?”

“For grabbing you after you told me to let go.”

The photograph comes back anyway. His hand around my wrist. My back against the wall. His fear making him bigger, closer, harder to get around.

I press folded gauze against the worst part of the wound. Cade’s fingers crush the table edge.

“You stopped when I tapped,” I say. “You should have stopped when I told you.”