YOU’RE STILL MY EMERGENCY CONTACT

At 2:13 in the morning, Nora Bell answered the phone because she thought her mother was dead.

That was the only reason.

Her mother lived alone, had recently developed a passionate relationship with blood-pressure medication, and believed “I’m fine” covered everything from a headache to falling off a ladder.

So when Nora’s phone began vibrating across the nightstand, dragging itself toward the edge like it had somewhere else to be, she sat up before she was fully awake.

“Mom?”

A woman said, “Is this Nora Bell?”

Nora’s hand tightened around the phone.

“Yes.”

“Ms. Bell, my name is Tessa. I’m calling from St. Vincent’s Medical Center.”

Her feet hit the floor.

“What happened?”

The room tilted gently around her.

There was a sock near the dresser.

A glass of water.

The ugly chair she kept meaning to sell.

All of it suddenly became incredibly important because if she looked directly at any of those things, perhaps the woman would not say the next sentence.

“Ms. Bell, you’re listed as the emergency contact for Luke Hart.”

Nothing happened.

Her heart did not stop.

The ceiling did not crack.

There was no thunder, although somewhere in the city somebody probably deserved some.

Nora sat back down.

“I’m sorry?”

“Luke Hart.”

“I heard you.”

The woman waited.

Nora rubbed one eye.

“You have the wrong Nora Bell.”

“I have this number ending in zero-four-six-two.”

“That’s my number.”

“And your date of birth?”

Nora stared at the wall.

“Why do you have my date of birth?”

“Ms. Bell—”

“No, sorry. That sounded more hostile than I meant it.”

It hadn’t.

She got up again.

Sleep had left completely.

“What happened to him?”

“He was brought in after a motor vehicle collision.”

Nora stopped walking.

“Is he alive?”

“Yes.”

The answer came quickly.

Too quickly to contain tragedy.

Some part of her body unclenched without permission.

“He’s stable. He’s being evaluated now.”

“Was he driving?”

“I don’t have all the details.”

“Is anybody with him?”

“I’m calling the contact listed in his medical record.”

“That doesn’t answer the question.”

Another pause.

Professional this time.

“No one is with him at the moment.”

Nora looked at the clock.

2:16.

Seven years.

Seven years and four months, if she was being pathetic about it.

She was not being pathetic about it.

She simply knew the date because September ninth had also been the day the elevator in her old apartment broke and she had carried three boxes down six flights while crying so hard the super had offered her a chair.

“Ms. Bell?”

“Yes.”

“Are you able to come in?”

The answer should have been no.

It was, in fact, no.

There were approximately seventy reasons for it to be no.

Her first meeting was at eight-thirty.

She had no car.

She had work in six hours.

Luke Hart had a brother.

Luke Hart had parents.

Luke Hart had friends.

Luke Hart had once had a woman named Melissa who wore enormous earrings and had touched Nora’s elbow while saying, I’ve heard so much about you, which was how women sometimes announced territorial ownership while technically smiling.

Most importantly:

Luke Hart had left.

No fight.

No affair.

No dramatic final scene.

He had simply chosen a job in Seattle, said they would figure it out, then gradually demonstrated that by we he meant Nora.

Her last text to him had been:

I can’t keep having a relationship by myself.

He had called eleven times.

She had not answered.

Eventually, he had stopped.

That had been seven years ago.

“Nora?”

The woman had given up on Ms. Bell.

Nora looked down.

She was wearing an old Northwestern T-shirt and underwear.

“Give me the address.”

At 2:39 a.m., Chicago was mostly traffic lights changing for nobody.

Nora sat in the back of a rideshare driven by a man named Hakeem who smelled faintly of peppermint and had a plastic St. Christopher medal clipped to the air vent.

He did not talk.

She loved him.

She opened Luke’s contact.

Still there.

Not because she had kept it deliberately.

Deleting people from your phone required a small amount of emotional administration, and Nora had never found a Saturday dull enough.

Luke Hart

No photograph anymore.

She had changed phones twice.

Under the number was an old address in Logan Square that he almost certainly did not live at.

Then:

Birthday — March 18

She hated that her phone knew this.

She hated more that she did.

At a red light, she opened their old message thread.

Bad idea.

She knew it before the screen loaded.

Seven years had stripped the conversation of context and left behind a museum of ordinary things.

Get milk.

Can’t. Hostage situation.

At work?

Trader Joe’s parking lot. Worse.

Then:

Your dad called me again.

What did he want?

To complain about you.

Fair.

Then a photograph of somebody’s burnt toast.

A dog she didn’t recognize.

A restaurant name.

Her own message:

Can you come over?

His:

Already downstairs.

Nora closed it.

Outside, they passed a twenty-four-hour Walgreens.

A man in pajama pants was walking a beagle.

Two women in scrubs stood near a bus stop sharing something from a paper bag.

The city had continued all night without consulting her.

At 2:47, her mother texted.

Why are you awake?

Nora stared at the message.

Of course.

Her mother had the supernatural ability to detect wakefulness across fifteen miles but could not remember where she left reading glasses while wearing them.

Nora typed:

Bathroom. Go to sleep.

Three dots appeared.

At your age that is concerning.

Nora put the phone facedown.

Hakeem glanced at her in the mirror.

“Mother?”

“Yes.”

He nodded.

Nothing else needed saying.

The emergency department waiting room was brightly lit in a way that made 3:02 a.m. feel like a clerical error.

There were nine people.

Nora counted because she did not want to think.

A man holding a dish towel around his hand.

A teenager asleep across three chairs while an older woman watched him.

Someone coughing behind a mask.

A little girl in unicorn pajamas drawing on the back of an insurance envelope.

At the desk, Nora said, “I got a call about Luke Hart.”

The woman behind the computer asked for his date of birth.

Nora gave it.

The woman typed.

Nora wished she hadn’t been able to.

“And you are?”

“Nora Bell.”

“Relationship to patient?”

There it was.

One of those forms of language designed by people who had never had to answer them honestly.

Nora put both hands on the counter.

“I don’t know.”

The receptionist looked up.

“Sorry?”

“I mean, I know who he is.”

“That would help.”

Nora almost laughed.

The woman waited.

“I’m his emergency contact.”

“That’s not quite what I—”

“Ex-girlfriend.”

There.

The receptionist returned to her screen.

“How long ago?”

Nora blinked.

“Is that medically relevant?”

“No.”

The woman’s mouth twitched.

“Just curious.”

Nora stared at her.

“Seven years.”

Now the receptionist actually looked at her.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“That’s…”

“Yes.”

A nurse came through the secured doors.

“Nora?”

She followed.

Luke was not dying.

Nora knew this before she saw him because the nurse said, “He’s being difficult,” with the weary affection reserved for patients who were well enough to cause trouble.

“What is he doing?”

“Trying to leave.”

“That sounds like him.”

“You know him well?”

“No.”

The nurse glanced sideways.

Nora sighed.

“Apparently.”

They passed several curtained bays.

Monitors.

Soft voices.

The squeak of rubber soles.

A man somewhere was complaining that nobody had brought him ice chips.

Then the nurse pulled back a curtain.

Nora stopped.

For seven years, Luke Hart had existed in a particularly tidy storage room in her brain.

He was twenty-nine.

He wore a blue jacket.

He had a crooked smile and a habit of leaving cabinet doors open.

His hair was too long because he hated paying for haircuts.

His right knee made a clicking sound after soccer.

He drank coffee before brushing his teeth, which Nora had considered evidence of moral failure.

The man sitting on the hospital bed was thirty-six.

That was obvious before anything else.

Not older in some tragic sense.

Just finished in places Nora remembered unfinished.

His shoulders were broader.

Hair shorter.

There was gray at one temple.

A cut ran along his cheekbone.

His left wrist was wrapped.

His shirt was gone, replaced by a hospital gown he looked ready to sue personally.

He turned.

Saw her.

Every muscle in his face changed.

“Nora?”

She almost left.

Not because she hated him.

That would have been easier.

Because he said her name like she had been expected.

The nurse said, “Good. Maybe you can convince him not to sign himself out.”

Luke looked at the nurse.

“I said I’d wait for imaging.”

“You said you’d wait if we stopped asking you to wait.”

“Important distinction.”

Nora looked at him.

He looked back.

Then, inexplicably:

“You cut your hair.”

She touched it.

She had cut eleven inches off four years ago.

“Apparently I did.”

The nurse stared between them.

“Okay. I’m going to go find literally anyone else.”

She left.

The curtain swung shut.

Nora and Luke were alone.

For a moment neither spoke.

Then Luke said:

“You came.”

Nora put her bag on the chair.

“Don’t.”

“What?”

“Do not make that sound meaningful.”

“I didn’t.”

“You absolutely did.”

His mouth moved.

Almost smiled.

Nora hated that she recognized the beginning of it.

She folded her arms.

“What happened?”

“Car accident.”

“I gathered.”

“A guy ran a red.”

“You were driving?”

“Yes.”

“Seat belt?”

“Yes, Mom.”

Nora stared at him.

Luke’s face changed.

“Sorry.”

“My mother is fine.”

“I didn’t ask.”

“You were about to.”

“I was.”

That silence was worse than the first one.

Luke looked down at his wrapped wrist.

Nora noticed blood dried near his thumb.

A bruise was beginning along his collarbone.

The sight did something primitive and unwelcome inside her.

She sat.

Not close.

“Are you actually okay?”

“Probably.”

“That is not a medical term.”

“CT was clear. Wrist isn’t broken. They want another X-ray of my shoulder because I complained at the wrong time.”

“You should try complaining less.”

“I tried once.”

“How did it go?”

“Terrible.”

There it was.

The old rhythm.

Not gone.

Just waiting.

Nora leaned back in the chair.

The room felt too small.

“You still have me listed.”

Luke’s eyes lifted.

“What?”

“Emergency contact.”

He did not answer.

“You have me listed as your emergency contact.”

“I heard you.”

“Why?”

Luke looked toward the curtain.

For one second, she thought he might pretend not to know.

Instead:

“I forgot.”

Nora laughed.

Loud enough that somebody outside coughed in response.

“You forgot.”

“Yes.”

“For seven years.”

“I don’t regularly review my emergency contacts.”

“You changed cities.”

“Yes.”

“You changed jobs.”

“Yes.”

“You apparently moved back to Chicago.”

His mouth tightened.

“Yes.”

“And through all of that, not once did you encounter a form asking who should be called if you got hit by a car?”

“Apparently not.”

Nora stared.

He stared back.

“I don’t believe you.”

Luke shifted on the bed and immediately regretted it.

His face went pale.

Nora stood without thinking.

“What?”

“Nothing.”

“Luke.”

“Rib.”

“You said you were fine.”

“I am fine.”

“You’re sweating.”

“It’s warm.”

“This room is twelve degrees.”

“I forgot how nurturing you are.”

She pressed the call button.

Luke reached for her hand.

“Don’t.”

His fingers closed around her wrist.

Neither moved.

Nora looked down.

His hand was warm.

Familiar in a way hands should not be after seven years.

Luke released her.

Slowly.

“Sorry.”

Nora pressed the button anyway.

At 3:41, he had pain medication.

At 3:48, he hated pain medication.

At 3:55, he informed Nora that hospital crackers had become smaller.

At 3:57, she told him no one had conspired against him personally.

At 4:02, he asked whether she was married.

Nora looked up from the terrible magazine she had found on a chair.

“What?”

Luke was watching her.

Pain medication had made his eyes heavier but apparently not his judgment better.

“Are you married?”

“You have a concussion.”

“They said I don’t.”

“You should ask for another opinion.”

“Nora.”

“No.”

“No, you’re not married?”

“No, I’m not answering.”

“So no.”

She threw the magazine at him.

Not hard.

It landed on his legs.

Luke looked at it.

“Home décor?”

“It was that or golf.”

“You hate golf.”

“I know.”

“Still?”

“Yes, Luke. My personality did not reset when you moved to Seattle.”

The sentence landed before she could stop it.

His face lost its amusement.

Nora looked away.

Good.

Let him sit with it.

A nurse came in to disconnect something from the wall.

Luke asked when he could leave.

The nurse said, “When the doctor says.”

He asked when the doctor would say.

She said, “Possibly sooner if you stop asking.”

Nora liked her immediately.

When they were alone again, Luke said:

“I came back two years ago.”

Nora kept reading.

The same paragraph.

A sofa described as “unexpected.”

“Congratulations.”

“I almost called.”

“Don’t.”

He looked at her.

She turned the page.

“There is no version of that sentence I want.”

“I wasn’t asking you for anything.”

“You called me from a hospital at two in the morning.”

“I did not call you.”

“You arranged it seven years ago.”

Luke laughed once.

Then grabbed his ribs.

Nora did not smile.

Mostly.

“Serves you right.”

“Cruel.”

“Resilient.”

Luke rested his head back.

His eyes closed.

Nora thought he had finally fallen asleep.

Then he said:

“I didn’t forget.”

She went still.

He opened his eyes.

“Your number.”

Of course.

There it was.

The thing she had known from the moment the hospital called and had spent the last hour allowing him to lie about.

Nora put the magazine down.

“Why?”

Luke looked at the ceiling.

He was quiet long enough that she became angry all over again.

Then:

“Because I never found anyone I trusted more.”

Nora stood.

Luke looked over.

“That is not romantic,” she said.

“I know.”

“It’s actually worse.”

“I know.”

“You don’t get to say something like that after seven years.”

“I know.”

“Stop saying you know.”

He stopped.

Good.

Nora picked up her bag.

“I’m going home.”

Luke’s face changed.

Not panic.

Something smaller.

“Okay.”

She hated that too.

A doctor came through the curtain just as she reached it.

“Mr. Hart?”

Luke looked at Nora.

The doctor looked at Nora.

“Family?”

Nora opened her mouth.

Luke said:

“Yes.”

The word was quiet.

Automatic.

Nora turned.

Luke had already realized what he’d done.

The doctor was checking the chart and hadn’t noticed.

Nora should have corrected him.

She did not.

Not because it was true.

Not because she wanted it to be true.

She was simply too tired to explain seven years to another stranger.

The doctor pulled up a stool.

“Good news. Nothing’s broken.”

Luke looked at Nora.

Nora looked at him.

And for the first time since 2:13 that morning, she understood she had made a serious mistake.

She had come.