Page 85 of All Your Tomorrows
I continued writing.Is hurt behind café. Call 911.
“Shit!” Izzy wrapped herself in a towel and grabbed her phone from the sink. I didn’t wait. I raced back to the café with one thought in mind. Get Nora to the hospital.
I ran through the alley and dropped to the ground beside her right where I’d left her, lowering my ear to her chest again and listening for her heartbeat. It was faint. So damn faint. “Hurry up!” I screamed to the ambulance that couldn’t hear me. I kissed her forehead. “Stay with me.Pleasestay with me.” I lifted her into my arms so her head didn’t touch the pavement. “I’m here, Nora. I’m right here. Help’s coming.” As soon as I said it, sirens sounded in the distance. “Do you hear that? They’re coming for you. They’re gonna get you the help you need.” I looked around. What the hell happened to her?
The sirens neared and flashing red lights illuminated the alley.
“Nora?!” Izzy called, running out of the alley and into the lot. “Jesus Christ!” she screamed upon seeing her. “The ambulance is here, Kyler. You’re gonna have to lay her down so they aren’t seeing her levitating like I am right now.”
I lay her down as Izzy dropped beside her. “Nora? What the hell happened? Wake up, honey.” Her eyes moved over her body before her ear dropped to her chest and her hand found her wrist, checking her vitals. “Help is here. They’re gonna get you whatever you need.”
There was the sound of footsteps and then two EMTs rounded the building with a stretcher.
“What happened?” they asked Izzy.
“I don’t know. I just found her like this. I’m a nurse. She has bradycardia. You need to get her on an IV to increase her blood pressure.”
One EMT felt for a pulse. “She’s right,” he said to his partner. “She’s fading.”
“What’s that mean she’s fading?” I demanded, though I knew no one could hear me.
The other EMT knelt beside her, checking her neck. “No sign of asphyxiation,” he said.
His partner spoke into a walkie attached to his shoulder. “One female. Unresponsive. Send police. Could be an attack.”
An attack? Jesus Christ. Jesus fucking Christ.
“Nora, please wake up,” Izzy begged.
“Okay, you’re going to need to back up,” one of the EMTs said to Izzy. “We’ve got to transport her to the hospital.”
Izzy moved back, crossing her arms and crying as they positioned themselves at Nora’s feet and head before counting down and lifting her onto the stretcher.
“Are you coming in the ambulance?” one of the EMTs asked her.
“Yes,” Izzy and I answered.
They wheeled the stretcher through the alley to the ambulance out front. They pulled open the back door and slid the stretcher in before one of them climbed inside allowing Izzy (and me) in with them. The other closed us inside and hurried around to the driver’s seat.
We pulled away with a lurch and the siren sounded. Within minutes, the EMT had Nora hooked up to oxygen, an IV, and was monitoring her heartbeat. Izzy kept Nora’s hand clasped in hers, her finger from her other hand monitoring her pulse even though the monitor showed her slowed pulse on the screen.
I crouched at Nora’s other side, just needing to touch her. “You’re gonna be okay,” I said, having no idea if that was even the truth. “You’ve got this.” After everything she’d done for me, everything we’d been through, how could she not be okay? I was supposed to go first. Hell, I was halfway there.
“Come on, Nora,” Izzy whispered. “You need to be okay.Ineed you. And, Kyler needs you.”
I glanced up, not expecting her to mention me.
“He helped me find you,” she said. “If he hadn’t, who knows what…” she began to sob.
“You need to be strong for your friend,” the EMT said.
Izzy pushed away her tears and nodded.
The ambulance lurched, and we stopped. I whirled around, realizing we’d arrived at the hospital.
The other EMT pulled open the back door. “You can get out,” he said to Izzy who climbed out.
I waited until they pulled Nora’s stretcher out and then climbed out, following alongside as a group of doctors met us at the sliding doors, getting information from the EMTs.