Closer 2

193.

Every bump in the road, every turn, every slightly hard break in the ambulance felt like a thousand knives stabbing her stomach and a tight rubber band squeezing her intestines into a ball at the same time. The waves of pain quickly became unbearable, and she was certain she was about to puke or pass out any minute.

"It's gonna be okay, we're only a few minutes away now," she heard the ambulance worker say, but it sounded like it was so far away. Everything felt blurry and out of focus. Nothing but the pain was clear to her.

Maybe she did pass out after a bit, or at least halfway so. She wasn't completely sure. She could make out some words here and there, some conversation, but none of it sounded like any good. Quite the contrary.

Massive hemorrhage in the... What was that next word? She wasn't sure. She just knew it was bad no matter where. Various people were trying to talk to her, but nothing really came through to her brain properly.

Somebody seemed to be touching her downstairs area just at the height of her pain. She couldn't understand why they would need to do that, especially because it just hurt so bad when they did.

"She's not breathing."

May knew for sure that wasn't correct, because her throat was burning with each breath from all the crying and possibly screaming she had done. She tried to take a deep breath to demonstrate, but nobody seemed to notice. At this point, though, she was sure she had at least made it to the hospital, maybe in the ER, because in the background came the sound of a baby crying.

"May, I'm gonna give you something to go to sleep, okay?"

Were they putting her down? Like a race horse with an injury, was she beyond saving? Was this it?

She didn't really have the capacity to protest, though, and no matter how hard she fought the world slowly faded to black.

...

Ray was speeding. Scared and worried tears were running down his cheeks as he almost ran a red light, coming to an abrupt stop just after the line. He knew he should drive more carefully, but something felt so very very wrong and he just needed to be there. Needed to see May. Needed make sure she was okay.

"Come on, stupid light, please," he whispered, his voice failing him as he made his plea. He felt like puking and passing out, but his adrenaline kept him there with his eyes glued to the stop light.

The light had barely turned yellow before his foot was on the gas and he was off. It was fine, nobody was around to see. Thank fuck for that.

Everything became a bit more of a blur once he practically threw his car into a parking space and ran out, only barely thinking to lock it. The parkometer sat there untouched. There wasn't any leftover worry in him for that. His May needed him.