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“No,” she said quietly, and he could see that all the huone fro sadness “It’s your heart now, Angel”

He felt a surge of bitterness He thought of his heart, the donor’s heart, and he felt it beating in there, in his chest, beating and beating and beating He wondered sickly if it would keep beating after his body died He flashed on a sick ie of himself in a coffin, his body stone-dead and paper-white, and that heart just thu had been inside him for three days now, and it felt uy He thought it was his”

He lifted his head fro amount of effort to do “How could you let them do this to me, Mad?”

“We saved your life,” she said softly

“Don’t look ateverything and everyone froedpumpkin head on a stick body—or didn’t you notice that I’ve lost ten pounds and my head is the size of a watermelon? And what about the poor sucker who donated his heart to hed acidly at the irony “You ry But it was his heart, dari out his heart like you yanked out mine?”

She sat very still, as if she were controlling her own anger with a great force of will “You have a second chance at life That’s what you should be focusing on right now”

“What if I don’t want it?”

“How dare you? Soel DeMarco, I swear to God—” She shut up suddenly, as if she’d said too aze from his face and stared at the wall

Suddenly he felt tired, so tired All the fight bled out of his body and collected in that damned canister at the foot of the bed He reached up to push the hair froain He was glad as hell he didn’t have a h Boy”

“It’s the prednisone The swelling will go down”

He looked at her “I’ else to say “I had a dreaht”

She sank slowly back onto the seat He noticed that her hands were shaking before she drew them into her lap “Really?” she whispered “What happened?”

“In the dream?” He tried to remember “I dreamt I was cold It was one of those dreaht I woke up and found the blankets all bunched at my ankles I reached down to pull thelanced at the observation doors, and there was Franco, just standing there, s”

“What did he look like?”

“That was the weird part He was soaking wet, like he’d been standing in a rainstorh but couldn’t I heard his voice inside el,’ he said Then he smiled—you know the one I mean, where his whole face crinkles and his eyes alone”