Buried Truths

Chapter Two: The Silent Hospital

The hospital was quieter than usual, the sterile smell of antiseptic filling the air. Elliot’s shoes echoed through the empty halls as he made his way toward the room where his father lay.

Dr. Robert Carter was a figure of respect in Harrison Creek. He had saved countless lives, performed surgeries no one else would even attempt.

His hands were steady, his mind sharp—but now, as Elliot stood outside his father’s hospital room, he wondered how much of the man he knew had been a lie.

The room was dimly lit, and Robert Carter lay in the bed, hooked up to machines that beeped rhythmically.

The once powerful man now seemed frail, his skin pale and drawn. His eyes fluttered open when Elliot entered, and for a moment, they locked onto each other.

There was a flicker of recognition, but also something more—a distance that had never been there before.

Elliot cleared his throat, stepping closer. “Dad,” he said, his voice rough. “How are you feeling?”

Robert’s eyes flickered to the window, his lips twitching into what might have been a smile, though it was hard to tell.

He didn’t respond at first, his breathing shallow. Finally, he thought ‘’I’ve made mistakes, son. Mistakes that… can never be undone.”

Elliot leaned in, his pulse quickening. “What happened to Mom? ”

Dr. Robert Carter’s eyes widened for a fleeting moment, then slowly fluttered shut as if the weight of the unspoken truth was too much for him to bear.

His lips parted, and a faint, desperate tremor ran through his fingers, but no sound came. The ventilator’s rhythmic hiss filled the room, mingling with the beeping of the heart monitor, both of which seemed to mock the silence of his unvoiced thoughts.

There’s… a lot you don’t understand, Elliot. You have no idea… what I’ve done. His mind screamed these words, but they remained trapped behind a wall of physical limitation. His throat, paralyzed from the stroke that had ravaged his body, refused to cooperate.

Still, the urgency in his eyes was palpable, and his mind raced with memories—memories he could no longer articulate, but which he was desperate for his son to understand.

His gaze flickered towards Elliot, as though pleading with him to somehow hear the thoughts that had been tormenting him for years. But instead,he could only have the thought saying

Lily Rose… she wasn’t a victim. She was… part of something much bigger. Something I couldn’t stop.

Elliot stood frozen, his breath caught in his throat. He saw the desperation in his father’s eyes, but there were no words—just the quiet, suffocating knowledge that something terrible had happened. His father’s expression shifted, caught between a warning and regret.

Elliot leaned closer, his hands gripping the edge of the hospital bed, desperate to hear him speak but his father couldn’t talk.

For a moment, Robert’s eyes seemed to flicker with recognition, as if he was trying to respond, but no words came. The faintest quiver of his lips suggested the effort was unbearable. He thought in his mind “I couldn’t. I couldn’t risk it. Not with you…”

The silence pressed down harder, more suffocating than ever, as his father’s eyes slowly drifted closed, and his body gave a subtle, almost imperceptible shudder.

The machines around him beeped in quick succession, the sound escalating with each passing second.

Elliot’s heart hammered in his chest, hopelessly hoping his father would say something, but the room remained quiet, save for the cold hum of the hospital machinery.

The questions gnawed at him, spinning in his mind, as he longed for an answer.

He had once been a loving son, but that had all changed years ago when he was told that his father poisoned his own mother.

He could still hear her last words on the hospital bed echoing in his mind: “I’m sorry, son… for everything… including Lily.” She had said this as she placed her trembling hand over his heart.

In a panic, he had fled from that moment, from the awful truth, but it had haunted him ever since.

Now, as he stood there in his father’s sterile hospital room, those words and memories came rushing back with a force he couldn’t escape. He ran out of the room, each step heavy with the weight of his thoughts.

“I must uncover the truth about Lily,” he thought desperately, “and the reason why Dad poisoned Mom.”