Chapter 1

After I got my hospital diagnosis, everything changed.

I stopped trying to stop my brother, Ryan Wynn, from drinking.

Even when he drank so much he ended up with a bleeding stomach, I didn't even bother to fix him anything to help with his hangover.

I stopped trying to talk James out of his reckless racing.

When he was fighting for his life after a crash, I still refused to even give him a glance.

I'd become the selfish, unlikable sister and girlfriend they all resented.

So, before I left for Switzerland, they were all out watching a movie with Lucy.

Not a single one of them wanted to see me.

It wasn't until much later, on a late night when they were still waiting for me to come back and apologize, that everything reached them.

A set of euthanasia records arrived from overseas.

That night, they fell apart and flew out of the country, and they never found me.

*****

After my third follow-up appointment, I walked out of the hospital and booked myself a ticket to Switzerland.

The timing worked out to exactly two weeks later, on Christmas Eve.

Outside the hospital building, an older woman was selling soup from a cart.

It took me a moment to remember that it was the first day of the holiday season.

Ryan actually made the best soup of anyone I knew.

But I didn't want to go home, so I bought a cup from the cart.

I found a quiet corner in the hospital lobby, sat down, and ate it slowly with a spoon.

Ever since I got sick, my appetite had gotten worse and worse.

Even with a cup that small, I only managed a few bites before I had to rush to the trash can and throw up for a long time.

Luckily, the hospital was noisy, and everyone around me was a stranger.

No one paid me any attention, and no one cared about me.

After I finished throwing up, my stomach was so empty that it started churning with acid.

I leaned against the wall to catch my breath, and just then, my phone rang.

It was Ryan calling.

A month ago, we'd had a huge fight, and he'd been so mad that he'd completely ignored me ever since.

I answered the call, still a bit out of it.

For the first time in ages his voice wasn't angry or cold, and it came out shaky, almost pleading.

"You need to come to City Hospital," Ryan said.

"James got into a crash while racing. His life's hanging by a thread."

Ryan's voice was shaky, barely above a whisper as he forced out the last words.

It felt like an invisible hand had closed around my heart and squeezed.

I turned around.

Suddenly, chaos broke out at the entrance as a surge of people flooded in.

James Rowan lay on a stretcher, and one side of his face was covered in blood.

Ryan, phone pressed to his ear, helped the medical team rush the stretcher straight toward the elevator.

I melted into the surging crowd, barely noticeable.

All around was loud and frantic, yet to me, it felt eerily silent.

After a while I finally spoke, and my voice came out flat. "I'm meeting some friends for dinner.

"I'm not coming over. I'm not a doctor."

Ryan sounded stunned. "Emily, do you even understand what I'm saying? I'm talking about James."

In a low voice, I cut him off. "I hear you."

There was a long, heavy silence.

Ryan was speechless with rage.

After a long pause, James' voice came through, trembling with pain and emotion, barely coherent.

"If you can't come this time, then let's just break up," he said.