It was one of the few nights off I had these days, and I was spending it on the National Institute of Health website, searching the statistics on successful recoveries from opioid addiction with my heart in my throat. 

I couldn’t do this. Addicts died from relapses all the time. Even worse was when they start using again after recovery. They think they still have the same tolerance as they used to. 

He might not love me, but I could still save him. First and foremost, I was a nurse. It was my job to save him. 

I ran out into the rain with my hoodie zipped up to my neck, still skirting around the Acura. I was going to save him from himself, no more than that. I didn’t need to remind him of how good he’d been to me before he turned into a complete dick. 

But Grim. Fucking Grim. My car saw my stubborn pride and promptly punished me for it by carrying me only halfway to Taylor’s house. Then he seized his opportunity. I slowed at a four-way stop, and Grim let out a dramatic death rattle and died. 

“Seriously?” I shouted, slamming the heel of my hand into the dash again and again. “You were fixed, you fucking piece of shit! What the hell do you think you’re doing?”

I turned the key again and again, knowing that I was only making it worse. With one last curse on his entire model year, I shoved the door open and stepped out into the lashing rain. 

Taylor’s house was another two miles away by road. But if I cut through Latham’s farm there and then followed the creek downstream, I’d come out into Taylor’s back yard. It was less than a mile. 

I set out at a run. 

My shoes squished, mud sucking at my feet and slowing me down. Within moments, my shoes were soaked through. It was close to eight o’clock now, and what little light still hung on through the dim gloom was fading fast. I tried to pick up my pace. 

“Fucking hell, Gabe,” I snarled through chattering teeth. In my mind I could perfectly see his face, that strong, straight nose, that sweet, mocking mouth, but my brain kept forcing me to imagine him slumped over, the pills scattered across his chest. “No,” I moaned as I saw him choking on his vomit with no one around who knew how to take care of him like I did. “Fuck you, seriously,” I groaned. 

I was so intent on getting to him before my vision came true that I barely noticed where my feet were landing. They were already numb, so it took me until the water started lapping around my calves to realize that I was standing in the middle of a lake. 

I blinked and stood still, trying to get my bearings. Where Latham’s corn field should have been there was a sea of water. I swallowed as I turned in a circle, looking for a familiar landmark. 

That’s when I noticed the tug of a current at my feet.

“Shit,” I hissed. My heart pounded in sick, terrified thuds. I wasn’t in a lake.

I was in the creek. 

The flood had buried the field, erasing everything familiar, even as the last bits of light bled from the sky. 

“Okay. Okay. I’m okay,” I said, but the water was up to my knees, rushing so fast it was hard to lift my foot without the current threatening to tear it out from under me. I shuffled in a tight circle and let out a little moan when I felt the first splash above my knee. My hands shook steadily as I tried to count five sounds I could hear, five things I could see, but the grounding technique for warding off a panic attack only made me more aware of how fucked I was right now. “Fuck!” I screamed as the current knocked me off balance. Mindless with fear, I started running, half sprinting, half swimming. “Help!” I shouted, my body bobbing and twisting in the water.

The current grabbed me and yanked me off my feet, sending me under. I choked and sputtered as I fought to keep my head above water, then screamed as something unseen in the water raked a long, deep scratch across my leg. I twisted and fought as the current dragged me to the deep water where the flood was moving fastest. I coughed and flung out blindly, and my fingers closed on a low-hanging branch. I grabbed on with all my strength as the creek swept my legs out from under me. “Help!” I cried again.

“Where are you?” came a voice, distorted and faint.

I could barely hear over the rush of the creek and the water in my ears, but I pulled myself higher on the branch, ignoring the scrape of the twigs on my arms. “Here! I’m here!” I shouted. There was an ominous crack and the branch dipped lower in the water. I screamed. 

And then I was being pulled through the water. The current tugged at me, dragging me down and not wanting to let me go, but I was being wrenched upward as I clung to the branch. “Hold on, Everly. For god’s sake, don’t let go.”

“Gabe?” 

“Can you reach my hand?”

My vision swam with water and tears, so he appeared out of nowhere, a blurred shadowy shape of a man. But I’d know that voice anywhere. 

I forced myself to let go of the branch and reach out my shaking hand. His fingers clamped down on my wrist. “I’ve got you,” he cried. “Let go of the branch.”

“No!” I shouted in panic. The fingers of my other hand were so cramped up, I couldn’t have let go if I tried. “No, I can’t!”

“You can.” He sounded calm. So calm. The darkness was near total now, but it was almost as if I could see his eyes looking down at me, more green than hazel, and feel his lips brushing across mine. “I’ve got you,” he said. “But you have to let go of the branch so I can haul us both back up here. Come on, Everly. Trust me.”

I let go of the branch.

In one motion he swung his other hand up, bracing himself by grabbing on to the tree, and hauled me upward with the other hand. The branch swirled, caught in an eddy, then got sucked out into the current as my foot landed on the muddy, shifting bank. Gabe yanked me up, then wrapped his arm around my waist. I clung to him as he leaned hard against the tree. The sound of our panting, gasping breath was almost as loud as the creek itself.

Gabe held me, murmuring with his lips against my forehead, until my breath came easier. Then he pushed off against the tree and gave me a shove up the steep bank. With the last of my strength I clawed my way up to level ground and flopped onto my stomach. The rain pounded my back and washed the tears from my face. 

“What the hell were you doing?” Gabe had climbed up after me and was now crouched down at my side. There was still light enough to see his face, but not enough to read his expression, and I couldn’t tell from his voice whether he was scared or angry.

“Saving you,” I croaked.