Page 5 of Always You (Guardian Hall #1)

Chapter Five

JAZZ

As soon as they left my mouth, I immediately regretted the words, a raw slice of vulnerability I hadn’t intended to expose. It felt as if I’d opened a door I couldn’t close again, revealing too much when I was already struggling to keep it together. And there was Alex, standing between me and the door, making me feel cornered, although he wasn’t trying to.

I put out a hand, feeling suddenly dizzy. It was as if all the exhaustion I’d been ignoring hit me at once, along with a wave of panic. “I just…” I couldn’t finish, couldn’t find the words to explain the mix of fear and fatigue washing over me.

Seeing the worry on Alex’s face didn’t help. Physically, he hadn’t changed, not in twenty years, but his dark eyes were filled with pity.

Pity, for fuck’s sake.

I was a grown man. I’d fought for my country. I’d killed people to keep him safe—what right did he have to pity me? I blinked. Was it pity or compassion? Fuck. Seeing him made everything more real, more immediate, and I was terrified, but not of him. I was scared of breaking down, of losing whatever control I had left over myself.

Everything felt too intense, too much. The panic I thought I had managed to bury deep down began to surface, fast and unforgiving. With a shaky hand extended, trying to get him to move, I was ill and close to collapse. I held up my palm toward Alex, a silent plea for space, for a moment to collect myself, and the pity or compassion became concern. I needed to catch my breath.

I wasn’t able to articulate the maelstrom of fear, exhaustion, and terror threatening to engulf me. I was terrified, not of Alex, but of what was happening inside me, of all the broken pieces of my heart that scraped and tore and left me bleeding out.

The dizziness intensified, a disorienting spin that made the room tilt. I was aware of how close I was to crumbling, to falling apart right in front of him. It was a vulnerability I had never allowed myself to show, a crack in the armor I had taken care to construct around myself.

“I need to go,” I think I said, and hugging the wall, I made my way past Alex.

He stepped back and held up his hands to tell me he wasn’t stopping me from leaving. Only he was talking to me. I couldn’t hear what he was saying over the rushing in my head. Then another man was there, smaller, in a white coat. A doctor? I focused on the way light hit the stethoscope around his neck, and I inched closer to the door.

“… Jazz…” He was talking as well.

It was too much; it was chaos.

“Leave me alone.”

“… breathe… in… out…”

The light glinted on the metal again, a flash of brightness I stared at. I closed my eyes and listened to the doctor.

“… breathe…”

The doctor touched my arm.

The door was right there.

I clutched my bag.

“… can I just help you before you leave…”

I stopped shuffling, shook off his hand, and breathed.

I was breathing. In. Out. In. Out. Slow, measured breaths. Silence.

“Okay, Jazz, can I just check you over? Help you? Get you some meds if you need them, yeah? And your hands, they’re bleeding. Will you let me help you?” He stepped back from me. I couldn’t see Alex, and with each step he took further into Guardian Hall, I was drawn to follow him, as easy as if he’d tied a rope to my hand and was tugging me along.

As we reached what I assumed was a medical room, my gaze flickered over various elements, each piece distracting me from the tight knot of anxiety in my chest. The room was bright and airy, not like the sterile, clinical environments I’d come to associate with medical facilities.

To one side, a sleek, modern examination table sat under a large, adjustable lamp, its light dimmed to a soft glow. Nearby, a rolling stool and a small workstation held medical supplies—bandages, gloves, a blood pressure cuff—this was a real doctor, and maybe that was what I needed.

Or I could run.

The room also featured a comfortable-looking recliner beside a low table stacked with health magazines and a small, vibrant plant, adding a touch of life and color. This unexpected hominess in a medical setting eased the tension in my shoulders.

Also, open space was just steps away, contrasting with the enclosed feeling tightening around me.

Knowing there was an immediate path back to that open air, seeing those doors helped stabilize the dizziness and fear. The courtyard, with my clothes still out there, somehow represented a thread of something real.

“Do you want me to open the outside door, Jazz?” Doc asked, standing away from me as I leaned against the wall.

No. It’s freezing out there. It’s snowing. Why would you open a door?

“It’s okay,” I think I said. I reached blindly for the door I’d come in through, closing it shut against the world.

Against Alex.

The doc leaned back against the table.

“My name is Dr. Marcus Stirling,” he began. “Please call me Marcus, or Doc, or whatever you feel comfortable with.”

I wasn’t comfortable about any of this, but Doc’s voice was steady, a calm anchor to the here and now.

“Doc,” I murmured and glanced at the door, flicking the lock, then worrying I’d crossed a line—maybe the doctor didn’t want to be locked in here with some stranger off the street. He straightened and smiled at me—a sweet, unassuming smile.

“Can you maybe take off some of your layers so I can listen to your heart?” he asked, his tone professional yet infused with a gentle concern that made the request seem less daunting.

I hesitated for a moment. I was taking clothes with me, and as I removed the first layer of my defenses—my coat—I shoved it under my backpack and turned the chair so no one could take it without my noticing. Then, I stuffed each subsequent layer into my bag.

I needed these things to stop me from dying.

In this medical room, the request didn’t seem as invasive as it was when I’d been asked to strip in the hospital, with only a thin curtain separating me from the ER’s chaos. If anything, all the physical barriers against the cold outside felt suffocating as heat prickled my skin.

The room was warm, starkly contrasting the chill that had seeped into my bones over the past weeks. With each item of clothing removed, I felt more exposed, but it gave me the time and space I needed to comply with his request. Once I was in a simple T-shirt on top of thermal underwear, still in the jeans I’d taken, and with my boots tied in case I needed to leave, Doc gestured for me to sit on the edge of the examination table.

“Okay?” he asked, and showed me the stethoscope, probably trying to reassure me he was here to help.

I knew that.

It was my fight-or-flight impulse that didn’t understand, and I struggled to control both of my demons. I nodded, and the doctor moved in with a brief touch of the instrument against my T-shirt as he listened to my heart.

The doc listened, a frown on his face. After a moment, he straightened and removed the earpieces. “I hear some crackles, but they’re not too awful,” he said, offering a small, reassuring smile. “I was told you were in the hospital. Jazz? I need to know why.”

I stared at him, my focus slipping.

“Jazz? Jazz?”

I needed to answer, but I couldn’t find the words.

“Soldier! Why?”

“Virus. Coughing. Sir,” I snapped, alert.

The doctor squeezed my shoulder. “Good. What I hear is probably a residual effect of your viral infection. Your lungs are still clearing up. So, I’m going to…”

I went somewhere else when he did his checks, my heart, my lungs, frowning at me, feeling for reflexes, checking my hands—I went to a safe place in my head, before war, before running from Alex, way back to when I was a kid, and my life was Ninja turtles.

Leonardo. Michelangelo. Donatello. Raphael.

“Can you turn for me?”

Splinter. Shredder. April. Bebop. Rocksteady.

“Can I see your hands? Are you okay with me touching you?”

Casey. My favorite. I loved Casey. I wanted to be Casey.

“Okay, we’ll need to bandage these. I have…”

Karai. Krang.

“Jazz? Can you tell me your date of birth?”

I think I told him. I knew I’d be forty soon. I knew I was half done with this life, or maybe more than halfway through. Some nights, I was ready to be done with it altogether.

“… advocate for you. Do you have anyone…”

Leonardo. Michelangelo. Donatello. Raphael.

He helped me put my layers back on with so much kindness I could’ve wept and then patted my shoulder before he stood back.

He scribbled something on a notepad, then glanced up. “I’m going to give you an expectorant to help clear any mucus from your lungs and make breathing easier. Also, some ibuprofen should help with any inflammation and discomfort you might be feeling.” He added those to a small bag.

“I think I have money. I can’t… nothing makes sense… how will I pay for those?—?”—”

“It’s covered,” Doc interrupted. “Now, as for your hand.” His attention shifted to my right hand, which I hadn’t realized looked as bad as it felt until I was staring down at it. “There’s redness and slight swelling around some cuts that haven’t healed properly. How did you do this?”

Shame flooded me, and I shook my head—how could I tell him I’d been searching for food and had been cut by a piece of glass?

“Okay, it’s okay,” he reassured. “This looks like it’s becoming infected. It’s important to keep this clean to avoid any further complications. If you leave, can you do that for me?”

“Yeah,” I said with a hacking cough.

He walked over to a cabinet and pulled out a small bottle. “This is an antiseptic wash. Use it twice a day on the affected area and cover it with a clean dressing after each wash,” he instructed, handing me the bottle. “Keeping the wound clean is crucial to prevent infection from spreading.”

I nodded, taking the bottle from him. The idea of having to take care of a wound properly was daunting, considering the state I’d let myself get into, but the doc wasn’t asking me to try, he was telling me I had no choice.

“You will look after it, soldier.”

“Yes, sir.”

“If you notice any increase in redness, swelling, or if it starts to produce pus, come back immediately. We might need to prescribe antibiotics if it gets worse. Are you listening to me?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You have a room here,” he finished. “I want that cough gone. As your doctor, I want you to be safe and heal. Will you stay here with us and heal before you leave again?”

I stared at him. How could I stay? I didn’t fit in this space.

Anyway, Alex was here, and he wouldn’t want me to stay.

“Soldier? I need you to tell me.”

“Sir—”

“I’ll help you.”

“Not Alex.”

He paused, and I couldn’t read his expression until he nodded and smiled again. “ I’ll help you. You can trust me.”

“I don’t need…” What was I saying? I wasn’t making sense. I needed help, but could I imagine staying here? “I want…”

“Let me help you,” Doc murmured.

And somehow, we were back in the room I’d been given, my discarded clothes and backpack still outside the door. I locked Doc out, checked the other door, pulled the drapes, and, still dressed in everything but my coat, I curled on my side on the bed.

I slept.

But the lie I’d told Alex—that I didn’t feel a thing for him—followed me into my nightmares.