Page 77 of Fighting For You

"But I know nothing's going to bring him back. No matter how many people I pull out, he's still gone."

I couldn't hold it anymore. My face crumpled and the tears came hard. Nora wrapped her arms around me and pulled my head to her shoulder. She held me there. She didn't say anything. She just held me and let me break.

When I could breathe again, I kept my face against her neck and told her the rest.

"That's why when that beam came down on me two years ago, I was ready to die." I felt her body go still. "Because deep down, I've always believed the wrong brother survived."

Nora pulled away from me slowly. She leaned back enough to look at my face. Her eyes were full and her lips were pressed together and she was looking at me like she was seeing me for the first time.

"When you held me together and told me to stay with you, I⁠—"

I put my hand on her cheek.

"It made me rethink everything. Why I survived. What I was still doing here." My thumb traced her cheekbone. "You've been in my dreams for two years, Nora. Every time I close my eyes, you're there, holding me together, telling me to stay. And when I found you, the dreams stopped. For the first time since that night, they stopped."

My hand came down.

"Then Travis got hurt, and they started again."

Nora held my face. She wiped the tear off my cheek with her thumb, leaned in, and kissed me.

"I'm glad I found you," she said. "I'm glad we found each other again."

She wiped my eyes again, gentle, taking her time.

"I never met Gage. But I'm an older sibling. I know what it means to love someone so much that you'd walk into anything to keep them safe." Her voice was steady but her eyes were wet. "He would have been so proud of what you've made of yourself, Knox. And wherever he is right now, I know he's proud. Because you chose to keep living. For him."

I kissed her. It was slow and salt-streaked. I pulled her into me and held her, my arms wrapped all the way around her, her heartbeat pressed against mine. She was warm and solid and she wasn't going anywhere, and for the first time in as long as I could remember, the weight I'd been carrying felt like something I could set down.

I held her until my breathing matched hers and the tears stopped coming.

I dropped Nora off at the ER entrance the next morning. She squeezed my hand before she got out, and I watched her walk through the doors before I went to find Travis.

Carl and Jill were coming out of the main entrance as I walked up. Carl had his arm around her shoulder and she looked like she hadn't slept.

"How is he?" I said.

"He's good. Complaining about the food." Carl clapped my shoulder. "Andy and Wyatt are up there with him. Room 412. Greene and his wife are taking their turn after them."

"Thanks, Carl."

He nodded, and they walked toward the parking lot.

When a firefighter goes down in the line of duty, the crew takes shifts at the hospital. Nobody organizes it. Nobody sends a sign-up sheet around. You just show up, sit with him, and stay until the next person gets there. It goes until he walks out. That's how it works. That's how it's always worked.

I knocked on the door of Room 412 and pushed it open. Andy and Wyatt were inside, Andy in the chair by the window and Wyatt leaning against the wall. Travis was propped up in the bed. Left arm in a cast, burns on his neck and jaw dressed in white gauze. He looked rough. His eyes were tired and his voice was hoarse, but when he saw me, he grinned.

"Sullivan. Get in here."

Andy stood. "We're going to grab coffee for everyone. You want anything?"

"I'm good."

Wyatt put a hand on my shoulder as he passed.

The door closed. I stood at the foot of the bed. I'd rehearsed what I was going to say the whole drive over, and now that I was standing here looking at the cast, the gauze, the IV line, none of it felt like enough.

"Travis, I'm sorry."