Chapter 36: The Return
The results are out and they both got in but only I didn't get a notification.
“So what is it?” I asked.
“Guess what,” Jennie said, her eyes sparkling with excitement.
“I passed!” Jennie shouted in joy, bouncing on her heels like she couldn’t contain it.
“Same here,” Raymond said calmly, though a faint smile tugged at the corner of his lips.
“Wow, congratulations guys.” I hugged both of them, trying to share in their joy even though a knot twisted in my stomach.
“Don’t worry. You wrote yours yesterday. Just relax; I’m sure you'll pass,” Jennie reassured me, her hand squeezing my arm gently.
I just nodded, forcing a smile.
\---
Six Days Later
The morning was soft and quiet, the kind of fragile silence that comes before a storm. My phone buzzed on the nightstand, dragging me out of restless dreams. For a moment I just stared at it, my heart already racing. When I finally reached for it, my hands trembled so badly I nearly dropped it.
Valmont General Hospital, Application Results.
I swallowed, clicked it open, and let out the breath I’d been holding.
> Congratulations. You have been accepted.
The words blurred as tears filled my eyes. I laughed, shaky and breathless, pressing the phone against my chest. After everything, after the accident, after the sleepless nights, after all the doubts… I made it.
I swung my legs out of bed, wincing at the dull ache in my left one. The cast was gone, but the skin beneath still felt tender, fragile. The physical therapist’s voice echoed in my head. Don’t push it. Walk, but slowly. Heal, but with care.
When I looked in the mirror, I almost didn’t recognize myself. My hair, brushed neatly over my shoulders, caught the faint morning light. My uniform was crisp black scrubs, still stiff from the package. The stethoscope around my neck felt heavier than I expected, as though it carried the weight of responsibility I was only beginning to understand.
Today was the first step.
\---
Few day later
By the time I left the apartment, the cool morning breeze kissed my face, carrying the faint smell of car exhaust and wet concrete. Raymond leaned against his car, arms crossed casually over his chest. He wore deep blue scrubs, the neckline slightly loose against his broad shoulders. His ID badge clipped at an angle, already smudged, as though he’d been fidgeting with it.
“Good morning, Doctor Raymond,” I teased, forcing my voice into a playful lilt.
“Good morning, little nurse,” he replied without missing a beat, a grin flashing across his face.
I rolled my eyes and tugged my bag higher on my shoulder. “Original as always.”
When I slid into the passenger seat, the leather was cold, and the faint scent of coffee lingered in the air. Raymond started the engine, and the soft hum filled the silence between us.
His movements were steady, but I noticed the way his right arm still stiffened when he gripped the wheel. The memory of his wounds flashed in my mind, the bruises, the shallow cuts, the way he’d scowled but let me patch him up anyway. Pride warmed me. I had kept him standing.
\---
The Rhythm of Weeks
Life settled into patterns I didn’t know I craved. The hospital buzzed like a living creature, machines beeping, wheels clattering against tile, voices overlapping in hurried conversations. I moved among it all, finding my place.
Jennie was always quick to make me laugh. She’d steal candy from the nurse’s station and slip it into my pockets with a wink, whispering, “You’ll need this more than me.” Raymond hovered like a shadow, never far, his protectiveness so constant I almost forgot it wasn’t normal.
And Lorenzo…
Days stretched into weeks, and his memory began to fade. The image of him standing by the frozen lake, the weight of his hand in mine, the intensity of his eyes, it all dulled, like colors bleeding out of an old photograph. Peace had returned, fragile and precious.
For the first time in months, I could breathe.
I told myself it would last.
\---
The Hospital Afternoon
The sun had dipped just low enough to cast long shadows across the polished floors. The fluorescent lights hummed faintly above, painting everything in a sterile white glow. The air smelled of antiseptic and faint hints of coffee from the staff lounge.
I adjusted my ponytail, tugging a loose strand of hair back behind my ear. My stethoscope bounced lightly against my chest as I walked beside Raymond down the hall. My shoes squeaked softly against the tile, the sound almost rhythmic with my heartbeat.
“Hey, don’t overdo it with your leg,” Raymond murmured, his voice low but steady.
“I’m fine,” I replied, though the dull ache in my calf disagreed. I straightened my back, refusing to limp.
We pushed into a patient’s room. The steady beep-beep of a heart monitor filled the silence. An older woman lay peacefully on the bed, her chest rising and falling in a shallow rhythm. I busied myself checking her vitals, the plastic of the blood pressure cuff cool against my fingers, the faint hiss of air releasing oddly soothing.
It felt safe. Normal.
Then the world shifted.
\---
The sound came first, the rapid squeak of stretcher wheels against tile, echoing down the hall like an approaching storm. Voices followed, urgent, clipped.
The door swung open with a sharp bang, startling me so badly I nearly dropped the clipboard in my hand.
A stretcher burst into the ward, flanked by two men in dark suits. Their presence was wrong, too sharp, too controlled. They didn’t move like orderlies or guards. They moved like soldiers.
And on the stretcher…
My breath caught.
A man.
His hair was damp, sticking to his forehead, strands darkened with sweat. His shirt was torn at the side, crimson staining the fabric in uneven blotches. His skin was pale, his jaw tight, but even through the haze of pain, his presence filled the room.
The metallic tang of blood hit me, sharp and undeniable. It mixed with the sterile antiseptic, clashing in the air, turning my stomach.
“Gunshot wound!” one of the nurses barked. “Get him into an emergency now!”
Everything blurred. The squeal of wheels, the shouted orders, the metallic clatter of trays being pulled close, it all became a storm around me.
But I couldn’t move.
Because his eyes.
Even as they rolled the stretcher past, even through the pain, his head turned, and his gaze locked with mine.
Blue, piercing, searing.
Recognition slammed into me. His eyes widened a fraction, enough to tell me he knew. And in that moment, the hospital, the noise, Raymond’s presence, all of it fell away.
It was just him. Just us.
The same invisible thread that I thought had been severed months ago tugged violently, pulling me back into his orbit.
My chest tightened, my throat closing as I tried to breathe.
Shock
“Isla?” Raymond’s voice cut through the haze, sharp with confusion. He grabbed my elbow steadying me when I swayed. “Isn't that the guy that saved us?”
I couldn’t answer. My lips parted, but no sound came. My heart thundered so loudly I swore he could hear it.
The stretcher disappeared into the emergency room. The heavy doors swung shut with a metallic clang, echoing down the corridor like a final warning.
But it wasn’t final. I knew it.
The silence that followed was unbearable. Nurses hurried past us, whispering urgently, papers shuffled, monitors beeped. Life went on, but I stood frozen, the world tilting dangerously beneath my feet.
Because Lorenzo De Luca, the man I had tried so hard to forget, had just walked back into my life, carried in on a stretcher, bleeding but alive.
And fate had made sure I was here to see it.
The hallway felt too quiet after the stretcher doors swung shut, as though the entire hospital held its breath. The faint hum of fluorescent lights filled the silence, punctuated by distant footsteps and the soft beep of monitors echoing from patient rooms.
I stood rooted in place, my palms damp, my breath uneven. Lorenzo’s face, pale, yet still unyielding, burned in my mind. My pulse hadn’t slowed since his eyes locked on mine.
Then I heard it.
A whisper, carried too clearly in the stillness.
“Isn’t that the new owner of this hospital? What happened to him?” a nurse murmured to another, her voice half awe, half fear.
The words slammed into me like a blow.
My lips parted, but nothing came. “What?” I finally managed, the word slipping out raw and uneven.