The doctor moved the boy, covered my body with a sheet, and left them to grieve while he saved those that could still be saved.

It was silent, traumatized and dead silence, that I woke to. The heart monitor didn’t beep— the man had turned it off as he left— so no one noticed at first, not the wolves in the room, not the cat in the room, even I didn’t know I was awake at first.

My heart was loud in my ears, blood rushing like waves on a beach, and it was then I knew I was alive. I sat up with a gasp, a horrid choking sound of desperation, and then sudden exhalation had my body trembling back onto the pillows.

“Carlie?”

Eyes watering over with tears, my slender fingers clutched at my ribcage, forearms feeling the pulse of my heart through the skin. I was alive. I might not be okay, but I was alive, and that was the first step.

The pounding and swooping I heard didn’t lessen, my body trying to make up for lost time. I didn’t hear my friends; only the sounds of life. And what glorious ones they were.