Kara.
Fuck.
Panicking, I try to sit up, but Robert eases me back down.
“Hey, beautiful, relax. You need to rest,” he says, stroking my hair.
“But Kara — she got away with the camera.”
“She didn’t. I got it back when I went to her place and returned the sex tape. It’s the only time I left your side since you were admitted here yesterday.”
A relieved breath escapes me. “Oh, thank God.”
“We had a long chat, and she seems to have calmed down a good deal. She told me that when Gary found out I’d taken the DVD, he broke up with her. She’s been in a state ever since. When I was there, her mother Eleanor showed up to bring her back to live at home for a while. She found out about Kara’s eating disorder and is making her go to a clinic for treatment.”
“Really? Well, that will be good for her. She’ll destroy her body if she continues making herself sick.”
Robert pulls at his already mussed-up hair. “I’m so sorry about what she did. I never expected her to go that far. It won’t happen again. I made a copy of her DVD before I returned the original, so if she tries anything else I’ll always have something to use against her.”
His words sink in, and anger pulses through my veins. “Robert, Jesus Christ. Are you stupid? You shouldn’t have done that.” I want to say more, but weakness overcomes me.
“Baby, I have to protect you from her.”
Trying to stay calm, because I know stressing out will only function to bring on another episode, I say to him, “Don’t you see? You’re just doing the same shit all over again. I told you before that this would come back to haunt you, and it will again. I can’t…” I lose my voice just as a nurse comes into the room.
“Ah, you’re awake. How are you feeling, honey?” She looks at me with sympathetic eyes.
Not wanting to be around Robert right now, I respond, “My head is sore and I’m really tired. Could you tell my friend here that I’d like to be left alone for a while?”
“What? No way. I’m not leaving,” Robert exclaims loudly.
“Look, you should allow her some time to rest. She’s been through an ordeal,” the nurse tells him in a calm voice, ushering him up from his seat.
“This is bullshit, Lana. We need to talk.”
“Language like that won’t be tolerated, sir,” says the nurse, more sternly now.
“I’m paying for this fucking room, so I’ll use whatever kind of language I like.”
“I have to insist that you leave. Otherwise, I’ll be forced to have you removed from the building.”
Robert stares at me, his expression agonised, but I can’t find it in myself to feel sorry for him. Not after what he just told me. How can he seriously believe that keeping a copy of Kara’s sex tape after she’d broken into his house like a lunatic is a good idea? Finally, his face loses some of its hardness and his posture slumps as he slowly opens the door and leaves the room.
An hour or so later a doctor comes to talk to me, reiterating what Robert already told me, that I went into a diabetic coma after suffering from hypoglycaemic shock. We talk for a while, and he arranges an aftercare regime for me.
I get to leave the following evening. When I’m walking through the lobby, thumbing through my phone to call Sasha, I notice that she and Robert are already there, waiting on me. Robert pulls me into a tender hug and apologises for his behaviour yesterday, kissing me all over and telling me how panicked he was for me. I remain stiff, not knowing how to handle him.
Sasha squeezes my hand, a solitary tear running down her cheek, portraying the fear she’d felt when I’d been unconscious. She says Robert told her all about the sex tape debacle, giving her brother evil looks all the while. He at least appears a touch shame-faced.
I think about the factors that caused me to go into shock, and the little things that have been accumulating over the last few weeks. Like how I never get as much sleep when Robert’s in my bed, or how I’m so wrapped up in him that I don’t give enough care or time to my health or my sugar levels, or anything else for that matter.
I’ve said it so many times before, but he makes me forget myself, and it’s not all his fault. It’s not his fault I’m so in love with him that it makes me careless. That all I can think about is being with him, to hell with important stuff that could mean the difference between life and death.
Worst-case scenario, I could have died yesterday. My short life could have come to an abrupt end between one second and the next.
As Robert’s helping me inside the car and buckling in my seatbelt, I come to the stark realisation that even though he makes me feel amazing, he’s also entirely detrimental to my health. That even though I said people sometimes have to follow their emotions where they want to go, for me that’s not really an option. I understand that now.
And then, quite tragically, I know that I have to break my own heart if I want to survive.
And his, too.
Robert is and always has been a tornado, swooping into my life, sometimes making it better, but most of the time making it worse.
Oh, God, am I thinking clearly? I’m too exhausted to tell. All I know is that in this moment my fear of dying young far outweighs my fear of being sad and alone. I’ve been in a coma at only twenty-two years of age, and that’s certainly not normal.
I need to talk to my Gran. She’s the only person I know who’s wise enough to give me advice and who can remain impartial, unlike my mother.
Robert is all quiet and loving when we get back to the house. He carries me up the stairs to bed and a few minutes later returns to my room, presenting me with a DVD broken in half, the copy he’d made.