Every Stolen Breath

by Kimberly Gabriel

Ryan’s hands twist. “I’ll find them.” We sit in silence, traced by the light thrum of the air conditioning. Ryan understands the position this puts him in. He knows the implications of what he’s committing to, probably better than I do. It’s nothing I could ever ask of him, of anyone really, knowing what the Swarm is capable of. After what they did to Adam, what they wanted to do to me. But I can’t sit back and let them keep getting away with any of it.

  Neither can he.

  “Get some sleep,” he says, leaning back in the chair where the light no longer hits his face.

  “What are you going to do?” I ask.

  “I won’t leave you again.” His voice is low, aching. “I’ll be here.”

  I want to smile, but my lips won’t move that way. Not with Adam’s life hanging in the balance. Instead, I sink into the down engulfing me. I can feel the sedatives overpowering me.

  “Ryan,” I say. His face is like the kid in his family picture, vulnerable, hopeful. I glance at my walls plastered with pictures of Hana, checking one more time for insects. “Start with Amy London.”

  He nods.

  The heaviness wins, and I give into it.

  CHAPTER 24

  Ryan pulls over in front of Northwestern Memorial Hospital, steps away from the revolving door. Light bursts from the lobby. “When you’re done, don’t come outside. Wait for me. I’ll see you.”

  Shouldn’t be hard. The entire first floor is made of glass. A shot cracks as a bullet pierces the wall. Veiny cracks shoot through the panel like lightning, shattering the structure, until it bursts and a thick avalanche of diamond shards crashes to the pavement. The clinking is deafening. Suffocating. It reverberates inside my chest.

  I squeeze my eyes, pinch the bridge of my nose, and focus on the hum of Ryan’s car, the heat from his air vents skimming my neck, and I remind myself it isn’t real.

  Ryan wraps his hand around my wrist. “I can take you home.”

  His grip steadies me. It slows my racing heart. “I’ll be fine,” I say, trying to convince us both.

  I step out of the car, sprint across the ten feet of empty sidewalk, and slam into the spinning door. I don’t breathe until I’m inside.

  Hurrying through the halls of Northwestern leading to the ICU, my boots click-clack on the linoleum floor. Everything reeks of bleach, as though trying to mask the underlying odor of people suffering, dying. The putrid florescent lighting tints everything and everyone pale green.

  I clutch the foil base of the plant I bought at the gift shop and the name tag I refuse to put on. Because it’s 8:15—fifteen minutes before visiting hours end—the hall is near empty. I pass a man consoling his wife, who wipes at her red-rimmed eyes. A doctor buried in his phone. I keep my head down, hoping no one recognizes me.

  My chest is compressed, like I’m wearing a corset crushing my ribs. I hate hospitals. This hospital especially. My sister died here. My dad. Dopney. And even though Adam is still alive, I don’t trust it. Everything bad in my life happens here. There must be hundreds of hospitals in Chicago, hospitals much closer to Adam’s attack. But like Fate mocking me or torturing me, they brought him here.

  I turn the corner to the nurses’ station that guards the ICU like a fortress. I’m ready to argue that Adam is practically family, that I must see him.

  Instead I find Katie in the waiting room, a stack of sketchbooks open on her lap, a row of colored pencils—definitely not the Crayola kind—fanned across the table beside her. Her dark hair frames her face like curtains. My steps hitch when she doesn’t see me right away.

  Katie’s thin brows are knit as I sit next to her and stare at her drawings. They’re of Adam. Each one captures a different side of him—his deviant smirk, his softer, genuine smile, the intensity in his eyes and his brow when he’s unlocking something the rest of us wouldn’t understand. One sketch depicts him that day in the lunchroom just after the Navy Pier attack. He’s throwing his hand out and saying, “Your pettiness never fails to disappoint.” That one’s too painful, and I avert my eyes.

  When Katie looks up, her concentrated expression doesn’t change. She scans my face, the red-flowered plant in my lap. She cradles a sketchbook against her chest and leans back in her chair. She doesn’t ask me how I am. If I was hurt. She doesn’t throw her arms around me and commiserate with how awful the last forty-eight hours have been.

  “How is he?”

  Katie’s face is deadpan when she answers. “Not good.”

  My chest squeezes tighter until I’m sure my lungs will collapse. I nod my head and grit my teeth, trying to hold it in. “Has he woken up?”

  Katie shakes her head. The movement is tiny. Controlled. “He made it through surgery. He has stitches on his face and head. Fractured ribs, cheekbone. Broken leg. But it’s the internal bleeding they’re worried about.”

  The near-empty waiting room feels claustrophobic. Sweat breaks out along my forehead.

  When I came here with my mom after my dad’s attack, the press wanted a statement from us. They wouldn’t leave us alone. The hospital staff had to set up blockades in the hallways. They hid us in a room in the ICU, where we waited to hear whether my dad would win his fight. Doctors operated for so many hours I lost track. My mom fielded calls from our relatives as the afternoon turned into night, and the outcome became grimmer. When the doctor came to tell us my dad was dead, his scrubs were speckled with my father’s blood.

  I put the plant on the table beside me and pull off the bag slung across my body, as if that will help. “Why did it have to be this hospital?”

  Katie slams the sketchbook against the stack in her lap, rattling the colored pencils beside her. “Because his dad works here.” Her voice shakes. “His dad is the plastic surgeon who’s been piecing Adam back together.”

  I look toward the rooms like his dad is about to walk out of one of them. I don’t remember if I knew his dad worked here. My eyes flicker back to Katie.

  “You didn’t think about that, did you?”

  “It hasn’t been easy . . .” I begin, but Katie silences me.

  “You’ve been so wrapped up in your own world and your mission to do whatever it is you’re trying to do that you haven’t really thought about anything or anyone else.”

  I’ve never seen Katie angry before. I can’t swallow. Or talk. Or think about Adam lying in his hospital bed, clinging to life because of me. I squeeze my gut. I’m probably the last person anyone wants to see around here. “Will you text me when there’s an update?”

  She blames me for everything. And she should.

  I indicate the flowers I picked up from the gift shop. “And give him those?”

  Katie looks from the plant to me. “It’s a poinsettia,” she says, like there’s something obvious I’m missing. “He’s Jewish.”

  I fight to hold back the tears pooling along my lids. I get it, I should have thought of that. I should’ve known not to get involved, let my friends get involved. A gnawing ache in the pit of my stomach threatens to chew me from the inside out. I nod. “Please text me as soon as you hear anything new.” I’m desperate for this, to stay connected. I have to know how he’s doing—good or bad.

  Looking down, Katie smooths the crumbled pages of her sketchbook, where she’s captured each detail of Adam’s face. He would love these sketches, the sheer number of them.

  Katie squares the stack on her lap. “I will.”

  “Thank you,” I whisper, knowing I don’t deserve it.

  I turn away, ready to run down the halls, out the exit.

  “Lia,” Katie says. I look over my shoulder as she tucks hair behind her ear. “Be safe.”

  I grip the straps of my bag and scurry off.

  Everything bad in my life happens here.

  Rounding the corner, I’m about to run when I see two men, down the intersecting corridor, standing outside an open door. Dr. Marshall—I will not call him Steve—nods as Mayor Henking talks.

  I duck behind the wall and press myself against it li
ke I might collapse without its support. Why is he here? How is this possible? Has he come to kill Adam himself? I curse the quivering in my knees. My legs need to stay strong so I can run to the ICU. Throw my body over Adam’s if I have to.

  I force myself to peek around the corner. The back of Mayor Henking’s dark head doesn’t move. He wears an expensive suit, tailored, likely afforded by murdering people throughout the city. “It’s a strong proposal, Steve.”

  Dr. Marshall tucks his hands into his white coat, which he wears over a white shirt, blue tie. “I hope you seriously consider it. The NICU expansion would do a lot of good.”

  Mayor Henking flips through a portfolio and drops his voice. “For the black and Mexican crack babies who will end up in my jails in fifteen years?” He tucks the leather folder beneath his arm.

  At first, I’m not sure I heard him right, his tone so low and smooth, but Dr. Marshall doesn’t respond right away, like he’s been caught off guard. It’s his hesitation that confirms I heard the mayor’s racist comment correctly. A wave of anger rolls through me. As if I need another reason to hate this man.

  “We’re a Level Three NICU. Preemies are flown in from all over the Midwest,” Dr. Marshall says. “The Jim Henking NICU would expand our capacity, so we wouldn’t have to turn away any babies who need the treatment.”

  “The Jim Henking NICU. That does have a nice ring to it.” The mayor extends his hand. They shake. “I’ll discuss it with my team.” The mayor turns, takes a step in my direction.

  I shrink behind the wall until I can’t see them. I pray they didn’t see me.

  “It’ll be hard to compete with the Henking Hotel,” the mayor says. “Have you seen the plans for it? Taller than the Trump building. Right on Lake Michigan. Just stunning. It would change our whole skyline.”

  I can’t tell if the mayor is getting louder or if they’re walking toward me. I scan the hallway, looking for a room to hide in, a stairway to duck into.

  “And that fountain,” says Dr. Marshall, his voice flattened.

  There are no restrooms, no doorways. Just a long, empty corridor of eggshell white. Not even a plant to hide behind.

  Mayor Henking laughs. “If you want to add a fountain featuring a thirty-foot statue of me to your NICU project, give me a call.”

  “Henking Hotel would be quite a legacy,” Dr. Marshall says.

  They’re closing in.

  “Chicago was headed toward bankruptcy before I turned it around. Now I’m funding projects like these. I’ve done a great deal for this city, and I want that remembered. I think I’ve earned that.”

  A great deal? Like creating the Swarm? Using it to murder people? Blackmailing kids to participate? He can’t be serious.

  There’s clapping on the back and chuckling, the mayor saying, “By the time we’re through with our improvement plans, no one will be calling us the Second City anymore,” in his schmaltzy way, but I’m only half listening. My shoulder blades press against the wall, like I can knock a hole into it and escape, when suddenly their noise cuts.

  They see me before I see them.

  My blood drains, leaving in its place a dizzying rush.

  “Lia,” Dr. Marshall says. “Everything okay?”

  They must notice the alarm scrawled across my face. I nod. “I’m visiting a friend.”

  Both men stare at me, tower over me. I can’t look at the mayor. Dr. Marshall pulls his hand out of his white coat and gestures toward me. “Lia is one of our NICU success stories.”

  The movement makes me flinch, and Dr. Marshall drops his hand.

  The mayor nods. “That’s right. You had a twin who didn’t make it, right?”

  He might as well pull out a knife and stab me in the lungs. At least air would be able to get to them. They look at me expectantly, waiting for me to say something. Instead I picture a stupid, gaudy fountain featuring a thirty-foot statue of the mayor and wonder whether they’re joking. It didn’t sound like it.

  “It’s an unfortunate but common story,” Dr. Marshall says to the mayor. He turns to me. “I got to know your parents very well during the months you were here.” His face scrunches as he talks, taking on a concerned expression like he’s noticing I’m not registering what’s happening—the spastic, PTSD girl.

  “Can I help you get somewhere?” he asks.

  “I heard you were involved in another incident,” the mayor interrupts. There’s a slight change in his voice. No longer cordial. It’s fake. Empty. Hypocritical. Politician. “I’m very sorry to hear it, Lia.”

  His polished smile. His gleaming, white teeth. His groomed eyebrows, which look like they’ve been tweezed and combed. He ordered the hit on Adam and me.

  “The commissioner said your attackers just ran off.” There is something deliberate and taunting about the way he is looking at me. “I’ve read many police reports. That almost never happens. What a lucky girl you are.” The crow’s-feet in the corners of his eyes make him look congenial despite his dark undertone. “That must be some guardian angel looking after you.”

  My eyes flit to his. He’s referencing Ryan. I know he is. He’s challenging my account of what happened. Because he knows Ryan was there. Lip Spikes and his friends were supposed to kill Adam and me. Someone told the mayor what happened, had to explain why I wasn’t dead.

  The blood coursing through my veins turns to lava. I glare at the mayor with more hatred than I’ve ever felt. This is the man responsible for the horror controlling the city. He ordered my dad’s murder. Adam’s attack. Meanwhile he’s deciding on how to commemorate his legacy?

  I want to say something that will hurt him. Something that will reduce him to shreds. Something that will make him feel an ounce of the loss and guilt and pain I have felt for the last two years.

  The hallway lights flicker and dim. My knees flinch, anticipating an ambush, while no one else seems concerned.

  Dr. Marshall points to the ceiling. “Visiting hours are over.” He must sense the tension. He claps the mayor’s back and steers him away from me. “Never underestimate a survivor, Jim.” He winks at me. “Have a good night, Lia.”

  The mayor nods. “Take care of yourself.”

  As Dr. Marshall and the man who ruined my life walk away, my fists clench until my nails crease my palms. I turn toward the exit, where Ryan waits to drive me home, when something catches my eye.

  Katie. She staggers toward me down the long corridor, bracing herself against the wall like she might fall over. Her silky hair sways with each jerky step.

  My legs twitch. Their first instinct is to turn. Run.

  Katie’s crying and her lips are parted, and I know down to my core I don’t want to hear whatever she’s coming to say. I want to escape and hide and curl into a ball in some deep, dark corner where nothing is changed.

  But my limbs are confiscated. They’re not my own. They grow light and hollow and empty. And by the time Katie reaches me and hugs me, she’s the one holding me up.

  She sobs into my ear.

  I cling to the uncertainty of what she’s come to tell me. Hold on to a few more seconds in a world where Adam still exists.

  We clutch each other. Her nails dig into my back.

  By the time she says it, I’ve already conceded.

  Adam is dead.

  CHAPTER 25

  No matter how many hours I sleep, it’s not enough. Heaviness seeps into my veins, saturating me, dragging me down to the murky bottom of Lake Michigan.

  It’s insatiable.

  I lie in bed wrapped in my comforter like a corpse beneath the sheets, drifting in and out of wakefulness, only half aware of fleeting moments as days pass.

  Detective Irving stops by. I drift off to the muffled back and forth between his gruff rumbling and my mom’s steady replies, unsure whether he came to talk to me or my mom. Either way, he’s two deaths too late.

  We get a new security system. Drills rizz and alarms screech as they install it. Somehow, Ryan still sneaks in every night. He re
fills my water glass and whispers I’m sorrys when he thinks I’m sleeping.

  But it’s not his fault.

  I should’ve stopped Adam. Never involved him. Adam would be alive, on the other side of Chicago, hacking Internet trolls and exposing their hypocrisy if it weren’t for me.

  My mom doesn’t force me out of bed. She doesn’t urge me to see Dr. What’s-His-Name. She brings my meals and lets me grieve. She wipes my arms and legs with a washcloth and talks about the sponge baths she gave me in the NICU. After Annie died. After Annie’s lungs collapsed and doctors couldn’t revive her. It only reminds me of what I’ve always suspected: somehow I killed her too.

  With every sleep, nightmares haunt me. The attacks on Dopney. My dad. Adam. I smell their blood. Hear their bones crack. The Swarm closes in while I stand too paralyzed to save them.

  One morning, I’m dreaming of something pleasant—Adam’s laugh, his wit, his perfect face. We’re sitting together on the CTA, watching something on Adam’s phone when he leans over and whispers in my ear, “You’ll never save the city with all that guilt weighing you down.”

  I jerk up, flinging the blankets, sure I heard him. His voice is too real, too lifelike. I scrutinize each corner and hiding place, searching for him. He’s here. Hiding from me. Teasing me. My ear still prickles with the sound of his voice, and for several minutes, I’m insistent it wasn’t a dream. But no matter how hard I try to convince myself, my room is empty except for my bag, my hat, my scarf, and my phone, beckoning me. Screaming at me to get up.

  I grab my cell. October 10. The next attack is ten days away.

  As usual, Adam’s right.

  I access my social media sites and post three pictures on each—one of my dad, one of Dopney, and one of Adam—to ensure they aren’t forgotten. People should see them, remember them, be haunted by them if that’s what it takes to demand justice. I shouldn’t be the only one.

  Forcing myself out of bed, I shower. Dress. I follow a checklist of daily routines until I’ve built enough momentum to open the front door and leave my house with a relentless determination to finish what I started. The only difference is that it’s no longer about saving the city. This is about destroying the people who robbed me of my dad and my best friend.