Letters She Wrote | Outer Banks

𝐱𝐱𝐱. 𝐚𝐟𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐬𝐡𝐨𝐜𝐤𝐬

[ xxx. aftershocks ]

➸➸➸

WILLA DEVERAUX AWOKE TO the soft dusting of calloused fingertips on her smooth cheek.

Ow, was the first thought that entered her head.  The second was, What the fuck?

Her skull was pounding and aching, like a jackhammer searing into the crevices of her brain, and her dulled eyes were crusted as she slowly peeled them open to a room lost in semi-darkness.  Through a bleary, watery gaze, her attention fell first to a soft blue blanket beneath her head and then to an open hand encased in fresh plaster lying upon it.  The stiffened fingers were outstretched and moving, just barely brushing Willa's flushed skin, but she did not pull away in fear, for the next sight that befell her dizzied vision was none other than a breathing, living John B. Routledge.

A quiet exhale of relieved breath escaped her chapped lips, and she slowly lifted her head off the side of the narrow hospital bed as she sat up straighter in her chair.  Her arms were tingling as she unfolded them, but her hands immediately went to his outstretched one and she clutched his hand tightly. 

Despite the obvious drugs that still held John B.'s brain down, that still tried to pull him back into his own slumber, he was already smiling at her.

"Hi, John B.," Willa whispered in gentle greeting.  Her voice felt hoarse, and she could taste the bitterness of her own breath.  She was almost certain she could still taste the whiskey and bile on the tip of her tongue, and the repercussion of that thought send a wave of new nausea through her all over again.

"Where . . ." John B. tried to turn his head to look around, but his movements were sluggish.  Slowly, he slumped back against the gray pillows and his eyes turned half-lidded.  "Where am I?"

"St. Olives," She answered.  It was the biggest hospital on the island where only the most urgent of matters went.

"How did we get here?"

At that Willa paused, and she looked back down to John B.'s swollen hand enclosed between her two bruised palms.  She wondered if he could even feel her touch through the waning sedation.  "Uh . . ." She hesitated in her response, and it was the endless beeping of machines that filled the void of silence between them.  "I don't really remember," She admitted with a dry chuckle.  "I kind of blacked out . . . after you fell."

Willa barely remembered making it into the hospital at all.  Most of it had gone by in a blur of tears and vomit. 

After she had collapsed on the sand beneath the Hawk's Nest, JJ had carried her back to the Twinkie to ensure that she did not accidentally secure her own ride in the ambulance that Kiara had managed to flag down.  From then she had been forced to attempt sobering up which was not easy for a girl that was beyond the brink of a blackout.  With her heavy head hanging out the open door and her limp body sprawled out in the back of the van, JJ had held the remnants of her knotted braid back and had forced her to chug water even though it had been nearly impossible for her to keep it down.  All the while she had been in hysterics the whole time, still believing John B. to be dead.  Kiara had tried to soothe her then, but it had taken Pope's soft and steady voice to fully call her back from the edge.