She glanced toward Fiona and said, “The key to Caleb’s place is in Whitney’s bag. I’ll give you the address. Will you go there and grab a few of her things, enough for a day or two? I’ll get the rest of her stuff when I can leave her long enough to go there myself.”

“Of course.” Fiona got off the bed, finding my bag on the table beside us and the keys that were inside. “Just text me his address, and I’ll meet you at your place.” Her hand went to my leg, running her fingers over my knee. “I’ll see you in a few minutes. I love you.”

“Love you,” I groaned.

Once Fiona left, Emily took out her phone and typed something onto the screen before quickly slipping her cell back into her pocket. She then held my face against her chest, gently swinging us. “My Whitney,” she sang, brushing the hair off my cheek.

The only noise in the room was the sound of us moving over the mattress. There was no window to look through, only a fluorescent light overhead, making everything a sickly color. Even Emily’s perfume couldn’t drown out the scent I remembered coming off of Caleb’s skin.

“I can’t stop seeing it,” I told her. “Smelling that sour scent. Hearing the stillness in his chest.” I swallowed as another wave of nausea passed. “I keep reliving every moment of walking into that room, where he was lying on the table.”

“It will dim over time.”

She was wrong. Those images were forever. The same way I could recall what David had looked like when his light-blue lips fluttered, spit stringing between them as he took his last breath. And all of the patients who had coded on me, who I had tried to revive over the years.

They were permanently etched in my brain.

And today would be too.

“Emily …”

“I’m right here.”

I closed my eyes, feeling the emotion crowd my chest. “Do you remember when you came into the shower the morning of the marathon and you told me the hospital was calling?”

She caressed the back of my hair. “Of course.”

“You gave me all this shit about it being my first day off all week and how we’d made these plans to go to the bar and then go out and watch the race. How I shouldn’t answer the phone because we knew my supervisor was calling to ask me to come into work.”

“God, that seems like it was yesterday.”

“I wish I hadn’t listened to you.” I pulled away, staring into her eyes. “I wish I had answered the phone and gone in.” A wail burst through my lips, clawing at me, like a tiger ripping across flesh. “Then, I wouldn’t have met Caleb, and he would still be alive right now.”

Part Three

They say everything happens for a reason.