They flushed out my wound and cut away a few of the shreds that were dead flesh. They left it open for an entire day while I waited. It was miserable as they brought me food, which I couldn't bring myself to eat and Henry went to the vending machine and brought back a few protein bars, but they'd shoved a few large pills down my throat that now made my stomach feel bloated and irritable so I didn't even feel hungry.

Still, at my mom's insistence to eat something I managed to nibble on one while Henry took the jello off my meal tray.

I hated the emergency room. The first time, everything felt terrible so I thought maybe it was just dramatized in my memories, but it was actually as horrible as I could remember it, and I didn’t understand why people that needed rest and recovery were just kind of shoved into this place.

There was no sleep, not just for me, but for anybody. Henry and Mom stayed the whole night while my dad came by to have dinner with us, but left to get some rest before work the next morning. He didn’t look like he’d be able to get much rest though and Mom was constantly messaging or talking with him on the phone, which wasn’t their usual behaviour.

After a second flushing of my wound, they taped it shut and put a tube in to drain any fluid. By then I had no pain whatsoever, and was appreciating the peace on my nervous system. There were knots in muscles from compensating for the injury that could finally start to unravel themselves.

While the ER was terrible, I ended up getting transferred out around one in the morning. Mom and Henry both looked completely exhausted by then. They had tried to doze off in the chairs provided but they were not comfortable looking.

They put me in an observation ward which was quieter, though a man across the hall was screaming about wanting food, while a few nurses were trying to calm him down. Still the room was cleaner, and a little more spacious feeling. Most of the monitoring equipment was removed from me so I could curl up on my side and keep an eye on the hallways and the like better, though Henry was being dutiful in his guard duties, even if he did have dark circle under his eyes.

Mom finally fell asleep a couple times here, though it was only briefly.

In the morning, when I was starting to hit my limit with lack of sleep, a nurse and doctor came in, fed me antibiotics and said I would likely be discharged in a day or two, but I absolutely had to take a strong antibiotic everyday for two weeks. It would make my stomach hurt and there was a large list of other side effects that weren’t fun sounding, but it was better than dying.

I started to doze off, in and out of a very light sleep that was disrupted by even the slightest movement on the floor.

It was later that day that Trisha came to my curtained off area.

I hadn’t seen her since a week after I’d been dropped off at the Ward house so it was a bit of a shock to have her simply walk in.

She had her usual clipboard and file folder.

“Hi, Taylor,” she greeted me warmly, and began talking to me right away. “I’m going to ask you some questions, okay?” she asked.

“Sure,” I answered.

She paused, glancing up from her paper to observe me. “...I do need your mom and brother to step into another room while we do this,” she said and looked up at them expectantly.

They both shuffled out of the space and Trisha took one of their seats.

“I heard from the police you reported you were stabbed with a knife, is that correct?”

“Yes,” I said. 

“Okay,” she took some notes down. “And the injury I see on your hand, is that from the same incident?”

“Yes,” I answered.

“Was it one of your family members that was wielding the knife?” she asked.

I stared at her. 

“I have to ask to confirm if you’re living in a safe environment or not,” she explained. “You’ve already been through more than enough so if, even though they’re your blood family, they’re not doing their best to keep you safe, then we have to take some action to remedy that.”

I sighed, appreciating the lack of pain as I did so. “I lied to them,” I explained. “They had nothing to do with it.”

“Okay,” she wrote something down. “Who was responsible then?”

“I don't know,” I lied. “He attacked me and I got stabbed but… I didn't want to worry my mom or Henry.”

“But you must've been in incredible pain,” she said.

“I took pain killers.” I looked away from her. This felt wrong and bad. This incident getting recorded made my blood curdle. Old habits die hard.

“I'm glad you're willing to talk to me at least,” she said. “I'll make sure you get some additional therapy appointments to help deal with the trauma but in the mean time I'm going to be working with the police to figure out what happened, okay?”

I was silent. I didn't want the police involved, they'd only find more about the crimes that Id done. The more they dug the more they'd hate me and the more reason they had to lock me away, probably forever.

But…

This was always going to be how it ended. I'd either die during a job or shortly after or Id get caught and end up in the polices hands, and then put into a prison where I'd get murdered by someone so I couldn't talk.

It made me wonder how so many of the contractors had lasted as long as we had. Most of us were gone by now and I was sure if I ever did return to that life, there would be more gone. And then a new batch of recruits would come in and get the crap beaten out of them by the older recruits, and then the older recruits would either get adopted into the mob or die out and the new recruits would become the new old recruits and the cycle would continue forever.

Trisha stood, making me flinch, more of my paranoia rearing it's head that she could be the one to kill me. Or otherwise she'd just hurt me.

But instead she calmly organized her papers and put her pen away.

“I’m glad you’re healing, Taylor,” she said. “We were all worried you were too far gone. The look in your eyes when I first met you was simply death.”

“Wha?” I managed.

“I wasn’t sure there was anything left of a person inside you,” she continued. “And your refusal to speak only made me more sure you wouldn’t be able to heal at all.”

“Oh,” I said.

“Keep going,” she said. “You’re doing a good job, even if there are some hiccups along the way.”

It made me feel more weird about this whole situation with her and the old me and the new me. I had changed, I knew that. But if it was for the better was yet to be clear.

I had narrowly escaped death here only because Mom forced me to come here.

Trisha left with a final goodbye and I heard her chat with Mom and Henry briefly before heading out. Her footsteps faded as Mom and Henry came back into my section, looking anxious.