Chapter 181

Nelson Cooper stepped out of the hospital room with a face so dark it could scare anyone away. There was this stifling frustration bottled up in his chest—too heavy to swallow, too bitter to spit out. That feeling? It hit just like every time he was punished as a kid, every time he was forced to do stuff he didn't want to—same helplessness, same disgust. And if he didn't give in back then? They'd throw him into that pitch-black place for the whole night. No way out, no one to save him. The tighter his mom pressed him with words, the more the suffocating pressure from his childhood came back. He could feel the darkness creeping up again. He had to leave, fast—before the rebel inside him snapped again. So he walked fast, almost running, like he was trying to get away from everything behind him. "Yo, Nelson, what's with the rush? You that hungry or what?" Dominic called out behind him, half-joking. He'd just caught up from the room, but Nelson had already put a good distance between them,