What Should Have Killed Me
The buzz of Hazel's phone in her palm was almost a comfort, a tiny vibration
pulling her out of her thoughts as she stepped into the cool night air beside Jenna.
Her thumb hovered over the screen for a long moment before she typed the message.
Hazel:
I'm staying at Jenna's tonight. Just need a break.
She didn't wait for Aiden to respond.
She slid the phone into her coat pocket, forcing a casual smile for Jenna as they
walked down the quiet street, shoes clicking softly on the sidewalk.
The bar they'd just left hummed behind them, but the chaos of earlier had dulled
into silence now.
"I don't think I've ever seen you this drunk," Jenna teased gently.
Hazel let out a dry laugh. "I don't think I've ever been this drunk."
Jenna unlocked the door to her apartment and flipped on the hallway light.
"You'll be fine. You just need sleep. We'll talk in the morning, okay?"
Hazel nodded, kicking off her heels as she sank onto the sofa. "Okay. Thanks, Jen."
"Anytime," Jenna said. "Night, love."
When Jenna disappeared into her room, Hazel was left in the quiet dark, staring up
at the ceiling fan spinning slowly overhead.
Her thoughts pulsed with everything she'd remembered, everything she didn't yet understand.
And as her eyes slipped shut, exhaustion pulling her under, she felt the weight of
another presence—a past self reaching out.
THE DREAM – EMILY
Cold.
That was the first sensation.
Emily's fingers twitched against sterile bedsheets.
The air smelled like antiseptic and soft bleach.
A low beeping echoed in her ears — rhythmic, steady.
Alive.
She was… alive?
Her eyes fluttered open.
Blinding white light.
Her body felt like it had been broken and stitched back together.
Limbs heavy, ribs aching, head pounding.
She tried to move, but the IV tugged sharply against her wrist.
A soft voice beside her.
"You're okay. Just rest."
She turned her head. Slowly. Dazed.
There was a man beside her — a doctor, in pale blue scrubs.
His voice was warm, soothing. Gentle fingers checked the monitor, brushed hair back from her face. But…
His face was a blur.
No matter how she focused, it refused to come into view — like it had been wiped
clean by a dream she wasn't supposed to remember.
"Where… am I?" she whispered, her voice dry and broken.
"You were in an accident," the doctor said. "You were very lucky."
Emily tried to speak again, but the memories came crashing down — the
headlights, the cold street, the sound of her own scream.
She flinched.
"Easy," he murmured, pressing a button that made the pain in her chest dull slightly. "You're safe now."
Tears welled in her eyes. "I shouldn't be."
She remembered the betrayal. Liam. The woman. The note she left on Aiden's desk.
She had wanted to die.
So why had fate stepped in?
"Don't try to think too much," the doctor said. "You're not ready."
But she was.
Emily wasn't just a woman who'd survived a car crash.
She was someone who'd escaped.
Someone who'd been given a second chance—one she never asked for.
She tried to memorize the room, the voice, anything that would anchor her when
she woke—but the edges of it blurred like fog rolling in.
The doctor's face remained hidden, just outside her memory's grasp.
And then everything faded again.
PRESENT – HAZEL
Hazel sat up on Jenna's couch, gasping, drenched in sweat.
The dream still clung to her skin.
The hospital. The voice. The pain. The strange warmth of being alive when she shouldn't have been.
She touched her chest as if to confirm it.
She had seen it all—the death she once lived through… and the moment she didn't die.
Someone had saved her. But the answer was still buried in shadows.
And now, the past wasn't just following her. It had woken up inside her.