Left for Dead by My Brother

The air in the field treatment tent was thick and foul. It felt like someone had packed my chest with broken glass, and my whole body wouldn't stop convulsing.

Warm liquid kept spilling from the corner of my mouth.

"Doctor! There's someone badly hurt over here! I think she's dying!"

A college volunteer in a red vest spotted me. She was a young woman, and she stared in horror at the caved-in side of my chest before spinning around to drag over an empty stretcher.

"Excuse me, please move! Somebody help me get her onto this..."

Her voice was close to breaking. But the moment her hand touched the edge of the stretcher, a strong hand yanked her away.

It was my brother, Derek.

He still had the incident commander's radio clenched in his fist. His face was dark, his brows knotted tight.

"What do you think you're doing? That stretcher is being held for critical casualties!"

The volunteer pointed frantically at me on the ground.

"She is a critical casualty! She's coughing up blood, and her face is turning purple!"

Derek followed her finger and looked at me.

His eyes rested on my face for one second. Only one. Then they filled with disgust and impatience.

"She's my sister. I know exactly what's wrong with her!

"She's been faking illness for attention since she was a kid. She just saw Ethan carry Maya to the ambulance, and she's jealous, so now she's lying here putting on a fake asthma attack to scare everyone!"

He snatched the stretcher out of the girl's hands and shoved it aside.

"Do you know how many people are still waiting to be rescued out there? Use your heads! Don't let someone like her fool you. She'd fake a near-death experience just to fight over a man!"

"But..." the girl tried to argue.

"No buts!" Derek cut her off sharply and pointed outside the tent. "Right now, go find two spare cold packs for Maya! If her ankle swells and she can't dance in next week's final, which one of you is going to answer for it?"

The girl shrank back from his glare. She bit her lip, then turned and ran out.

The medics hurrying through the tent had heard the incident commander's verdict. One by one, they looked away and went back to the other wailing casualties.

No one looked at me again.

I lay in the muddy water and stared at my brother.

I wanted to tell him I wasn't faking. My ribs were broken. My lung had been punctured.

But when I opened my mouth, no sound came out. Only mouthfuls of bloody foam ran down my chin into my neck and stained my white down jacket red.

His radio crackled with static, followed by a report from a rescue team at the scene.

Derek rubbed the bridge of his nose in irritation, raised the radio, and strode out of the tent.

He never looked back at me. He never noticed that the mud beneath me had soaked through, dark red with blood.

The air was being squeezed out of my chest, little by little.

The suffocation grew heavier. My oxygen-starved brain filled with a shrill, roaring noise.

I strained to move my eyes. Less than ten feet away sat an open emergency kit.

On top of it lay a simple oxygen mask.

If I could just reach it. If I could just get one breath of oxygen...

On any other day, ten feet would have been two steps.

Right then, it might as well have been a canyon.

Behind me, I left a long, horrifying streak of blood across the mud.

My fingertips finally touched the edge of the kit.

My heart leapt. I gathered the last of my strength and reached up to pull the oxygen mask down.

At that moment, a foot came down mercilessly on the back of my hand.

"You followed us here too?"