My mouth was dry, tongue like sandpaper. “What?” I said. “What did you say?” Vaguely, I could hear the heart monitor picking up speed next to me.

The deputy looked uncomfortable. He stood in the doorway of my hospital room, in his blue pants and his blue shirt and his stupid blue hat, a gun and taser holstered at his side. He was barely a couple years older than me. I remembered him dully as a senior when I started high school. Kyle Dunphy.

His forehead was slick with sweat, and he licked his lips nervously. The lights in the room made him look like a ghost. But then again, hospital lights made everyone look like a ghost. Foreshadowing, some would call it.

To my right, Leah was taking her turn to sit with me, attention rapt on the deputy. Her hands were knotted anxiously in her lap, frizzed blonde hair pulled back in a ponytail.

“We have to call off the search,” Kyle said again.

“Call off the search?” I echoed quietly. As if I hadn’t heard him the first time. “Why?”

“We can’t keep our resources on this,” he said, looking between me and Leah. “We’ve already gone far past the usual amount of time for search and rescue. It’s been over a week, and we haven’t found a trace of Mickey and Bell.”

Anger washed over me, hot and bright against my skin as I sat up. I fought back another wave of dizziness that threatened to overtake me, leveling a glare at the man in front of me. “You just want to give up?” I demanded. “Mickey and Bell are a part of this community, Kyle. Mickey used to babysit your baby sister.” Next to me, I saw tears rolling down Leah’s cheeks.

“I know, Sloane,” he replied. There was an edge to his voice. Whether it was guilt or annoyance, I couldn’t tell. “And the community will continue to organize search parties. But we are all exhausted.” He motioned towards me. “You’re exhausted.”

He meant me, in this room, sitting in my hospital bed, having collapsed from dehydration and malnutrition two days before. A banana bag and a saline bag flowed down a tube into my elbow, a blood pressure cuff on my arm to monitor my blood pressure every two hours, and a pulse-ox on my finger to monitor my heart rate. I was supposed to be let out today, with strict orders for bed rest for three more days.

“Exhaustion doesn’t mean you give up,” I hissed. “I’m not going to give up on my brothers, Kyle.”

“We’re not asking you to.”

“But you’re asking me to accept that you, our proud boys in blue, won’t help me anymore. You are asking me that.”

He didn’t respond.

“Sloane,” Leah said softly.

I ignored her. “I fucking knew I couldn’t trust you. The minute it gets hard, you give up. Just like cops always fucking do. Fucking lazy pigs,” I spat.

“Sloane!”

“It’s okay, Leah,” he said. I could see the heat in his eyes; I had made him angry. Good. “She’s just having a hard time.”

“Don’t talk about me like I’m not here!” I shouted, throwing the blanket off my legs and leaping out of bed. My head pounded, and I fought back another wavy of dizziness.

“Sloane!” Leah stood up, grabbing my arm.

I saw Kyle put his hand towards his taser.

“Oh, big man going to tase an eighteen-year-old girl in a hospital? Is that what we’re going to do?” I screamed. I wrenched myself from Leah’s grip, yanking out the IVs from my arm. “Fuck you, Kyle.” I grabbed the IV cart and launched it at him.

Even with how dizzy I was, and how my head hurt, and how dehydrated I’d become, I was still strong.

Kyle dodged the cart, but the bag of saline still hit him in the head, and he shouted out in pain. The cart clattered to the floor. I could hear the drone of the heartbeat monitor from where I had pulled the pulse-ox off.

Leah shouted, trying to pull me back. “You can’t throw things at him!”

“Why not?” I shouted, lunging at Kyle. Leah’s grip was tight this time and I drew up short, wrenching my arm in its socket. My vision lurched, my stomach rolling with it.

Two nurses pushed past Kyle to see what was happening. When they saw the IV on the ground, they glanced at each other.

“Sloane, I’m going to have to charge you with assaulting an officer,” Kyle said tightly, reaching for the cuffs on his hip.

“Oh,” I said, black spots filling my vision. “Are you gonna . . . cuff . . . a sick person . . .”

I heard Leah scream my name before everything went black.