She opened my fridge and frowned at the sad shelf of leftovers and half-used condiments. “You’re alive,” she corrected. “That’s not the same as fine.”
Sophie drifted in behind her, hoodie up, eyes scanning corners as if the house still contained echoes. Even months after the arrest, she moved differently here—careful, alert. Her body remembered.
Catherine set the grocery bags down and said, “First, you’re coming with me to cardiology. Second, you’re meeting with Sharon about the estate. Third, we’re throwing out every pill bottle in this house that wasn’t prescribed directly by a hospital pharmacist.”
I opened my mouth to argue, then shut it. I’d spent too long being the one who decided what was “reasonable.” Reasonable nearly killed me.
In the cardiologist’s office, the doctor spoke in a calm voice that didn’t soften the facts. My heart had been stressed. Not destroyed, not irreparable, but harmed. Repeated digoxin exposure had pushed me toward the edge.
“You’re lucky,” he said, flipping through test results.
Lucky. That word made me feel sick. Luck implies randomness. What happened to me wasn’t random. It was planned.