The ringtone is ordinary, but it cuts the room like a scalpel. Joseph startles, wipes his eyes, and fumbles for my phone on the tray. The monitor is silent now; I hover above the bed I have left, weightless and unwilling.
He answers. “Hello?"
Marcus's voice arrives sleek and practiced. “Where is Seraphina? Put her on."
Joseph steadies himself. “She can't come to the phone."
“She can always come to the phone when she wants something." Glass clinks in the background. “Tell her to get to Saint Gertrude's now. Vivian's counts are crashing. I've cleared the authorization. We need her blood."
The curtain stirs as if the air knows a cruelty by its temperature.
“She won't be donating," Joseph says.
“Not negotiable." Marcus's consonants are clean enough to frame. “O negative. There's a car d
