A Firefighter in Her Stocking

She squeezed his hand a little tighter than normal. “Open your eyes for me, Jude.”

He squeezed back again.

Sarah pulled her hand away so she could do a quick neuro check to see if he reacted to stimuli.

Pulling out a sharp point from her scrub pocket, she pressed it against his fingertip. Jude grimaced. Sarah smiled. She’d not gotten any response when she’d checked him prior to his imaging tests.

She ran through severa

l other neuro tests, getting reactions to each one, then moved on to the one she’d been saving for last. Mainly because looking into his eyes earlier and seeing nothing but a blank stare had almost sent her into sobs.

She pushed his eyelids open, stared into the most beautiful blue eyes she’d ever gazed into and shone her light. As before, they responded appropriately to light, but he wasn’t seeing her.

Or maybe he was because his stare wasn’t blank. Not like before.

Jude saw her.

Some might think it was her imagination or wishful thinking but she knew better. Jude was seeing her.

She leaned closer, her face about six inches above his. “It’s time for you to wake up, Jude Davenport. Do you hear me? Wake up.”

* * *

Jude heard Sarah. Loud and clear. She was telling him to wake up.

Which didn’t make sense because he was awake.

“Wake up, Jude,” she insisted, louder.

His throat hurt. So did his head. And his body. He hurt all over.

“You know, tonight has been a really sucky one for me. First, you act like a total jerk at Charles and Grace’s party. Then we argue and you break my heart. As if that isn’t enough, you have the nerve to show up in my emergency room unconscious and I have to be nice to you. That’s really not fair when I just want to not like you.”

They’d argued.

Sarah had told him goodbye.

She wanted to not like him.

His heart hurt to go along with everything else.

He and Sarah had argued. He had to tell her he was sorry—tell her he hadn’t meant to break her heart.

“And your crew are all worried and refusing to leave. You sure you aren’t just playing possum to get attention?”

Jude tried to say her name, thought he might have, but she didn’t respond if he had. Great. He’d try again, but couldn’t because of his throat.

He reached up, pulled at the tubes.

“Stop that,” Sarah ordered. “I worked hard to get that in place.”

Sarah had done that to him?

His hand fell away.

And his eyes opened.

She was right there in front of him. Mere inches from his face. Sarah.