by Raquel Belle
“He seemed fine this morning, but he complained of a headache shortly after lunch and then he fell into a seizure. He actually hit his head on a bench, as he was seizing. The squad has him on the way to the hospital now, if you could meet them there.”
“Okay, of course,” I say, rushing back inside. “Thanks for calling.”
I pull my purse from a desk drawer and rush to Roger’s office.
“I’ve got to run to the hospital,” I say. “My son’s had a seizure and hit his head.”
“Is your work caught up for the day?” he asks, not looking up.
“I think that’s irrelevant at the moment,” I say sharply.
“Well, I’m not paying you for the hours you miss,” he says.
“Oh, that’s a surprise,” I answer.
“Is that sarcasm I sense in your tone?”
“It’s the truth,” I say. “I haven’t gotten so much as a thank you since working on this big data project.”
“It’s part of your job, why would I thank you for doing what I pay you to do?”
“It’s not, actually,” I say. “Look, I’m going to the hospital. You can probably manage to get your own coffee for the afternoon.”
“I don’t appreciate the way you’re talking to me, Hope.”
“I don’t appreciate being treated like garbage, made to work extra hours on a project outside the scope of my job description for no extra pay, either.”
“Other duties as assigned,” Roger says, rolling his eyes.
“I’m sorry, but I don’t view a major database conversion as ‘other duties as assigned.’ I have a college degree and the skills to do it, but major IT projects are not typically something a leader would assign to an administrative assistant. You were just being cheap.”
“You should be glad you’ve got employment, Hope,” Roger says. “Seriously. I trusted you with a major project, and you’re complaining.”
“I’m complaining because it was a project you should have paid me to do!”
“I do. I pay you a bi-weekly salary.”
“I wish you could hear how stupid you sound right now.”
“Hope,” he says, his tone a warning. “Watch it. I could have ten people lined up for your job tomorrow.”
“Well, I think you should start rounding them up, then,” I say, “because I quit.”
“You wouldn’t do that,” Roger says. “You’ve got two kids to support.”
“And I barely support them because you don’t pay a fair wage,” I say. “I should have done this a long time ago.”
I turn on my heel and hold my head high, as I gather my few personal belongings, set a “Hope doesn’t work here anymore” email responder, and walk out the door. I’m in the car before I let myself cry, but through my tears manage to start the car and back out. I drive as fast as I can on the way to the hospital, panic setting in to the point that I can barely breathe by the time I park and run into the emergency room entrance.
Oh my god, what did I do? I just quit my job? What kind of idiot quits her job when she has two kids and a baby on the way? I rush to the nearest trashcan and throw up everything in my stomach, heaving until I’m empty, tears streaming down my face. A nurse touches me on the shoulder and asks if I’m okay. I tell her I’m fine, just pregnant, and share that I’m looking for my son.
She helps me locate Eric, who is in an ER stall, a tiny space surrounded by white curtains. He looks a little dazed, as I enter but smiles when I take his hand.
“Hey, baby,” I say quietly.
“Hey, Mom.”
“You feeling okay?”
“I threw up, and my head hurts.”
“That’s terrible. I’m sorry. I just threw up, too.”
“That’s terrible,” he says. “You okay?”
“We’ll both be fine, buddy,” I answer, patting his hand.
A doctor steps in just then. “Are you the boy’s mother?”
I nod, standing, sniffling.
“He’s stable, but he’s concussed from the fall. The greater question is why he’s seizing again. I have a theory that it may be a hormonal imbalance, which is rare in a kid his age but not unheard of. We’re going to keep him overnight and wait on some blood work to confirm.”
“Okay,” I say.
“We’ll get him up to a room in a few minutes, here.” He puts his hand on my shoulder and adds, “It will be okay. We’ll figure this out.”
I nod, and he leaves. Pulling out my cell phone, I text Meredith to see if she can run and get Amy from camp for me. She responds that it will be no problem, and that Amy can stay with her for the night.
Eric is pale and tired as we move him to his room. He falls asleep as soon as he get into his bed. I panic but the nurse says he was awake and talking, with no other signs of major trauma, so he should be allowed to rest. She says they’ll be back in to check on him in thirty or forty minutes, and to ring them if I see any signs of distress.
The room is so quiet, just the steady beeping of the heart monitor to keep me company. The quiet means my thoughts have room to roam, and my mind immediately goes to my impulsive decision to quit my job today.
“Oh my god, what was I thinking?” I whisper to myself, rubbing my temples as a headache blooms behind my eyes. I can feel the sick flip-flop of anxiety in my belly as my breathing becomes labored from panic. I quit my job. I am pregnant. My son is so sick. Oh my god. Oh my god. Oh my god.
I stand up and pace, rubbing my head. My vision feels blurry. Oh my god.
A nurse wanders past the room just as I reach out. “I can’t … I think …”
My vision goes fuzzy as my legs fail me.
***
I wake up in a bed. A hospital bed, to be exact. My head is pounding, and there is an IV line that disappears into my wrist. I blink a few times to clear my vision, watching the drip, drip of the bag into the line that makes its way into my arm.
But why am I in a hospital bed? Why do I have an IV? I sit up quickly, looking around, panicked. I was here for Eric, and …
And then I see them. Amy in Rob’s lap on a small couch next to my bed. Asleep. They’re both asleep, and she’s curled in his lap, her head on his chest, his arm around her protectively.
I sit back and watch them for a long while. It’s a peaceful scene. A scene I have missed very much these past months.
Rob’s eyes flutter open, as if he’s trying not to be asleep. He sees me staring and gives a little wave with his free hand. I raise my eyebrows, and he shrugs before slowly moving to stand and place Amy on the couch without disturbing her. He stretches, the planes of his stomach visible as his white t-shirt raises, baring just the slightest strip of his warm, tan skin. I long to touch him. Not sexually, but I just miss his warmth very much.
He makes his way to the side of the bed then sits awkwardly near my feet, picking at something nonexistent on the blanket.
“What are you doing here?” I ask quietly.
“Meredith called at Amy’s request,” he says. “They got here and found out that not only was Eric in a hospital bed, but you were, too. Amy was worried and thought I should know. She wanted me here, so I’m here.”
“Why am I, though?” I ask. “Here, I mean. In this bed.”
“You had a panic attack and passed out, they said,” he says. “You and your son have matching concussions so they’re just monitoring you for a few hours. Meredith stayed to sit with Eric.”
I nod and swallow back the lump in my throat, looking out the window to avoid meeting his eyes. We’re both quiet for a long time, Rob just staring at the floor, his hands in his lap, his posture hunched where he sits with his feet up on the bed’s lower railing.
He clears his throat after many minutes. Finally, he says, “By the way, when were you going to tell me you were pregnant?”
I open my mouth, but there isn’t much I can say, so I just shut it again. I look up and find him staring, waiting, his gaze intense. I can tell he won’t stop until I give him an answer.
&
nbsp; “I haven’t quite processed the news myself. Not really. And I quit my job today. And you hate me.” It all comes out like word-vomit, tears threatening.
“Is it his?” he asks, practically spitting the words.
I shake my head furiously. “No. No. I never … he and I never … It’s yours, one-hundred percent.” The tears let loose, and I lay my head back, closing my eyes, my chest heaving as I make a futile effort to stop the torrent. I can’t stop crying, and Rob does nothing to try to comfort me. He just watches for a long time, his expression unreadable.
“Why are you crying?” he asks.
“I can’t … I don’t know.”
“I should be the one crying, Hope,” he says. “For more than a decade I have loved you. I’ve only had eyes for you. And when Alex left, I thought, Here’s my chance. Surely she’ll see that she loves me, too.”
“I do,” I say. It’s barely a whisper.
He shuts me down with a dubious look. “I thought we could be happy together. Raise the kids together. Maybe have a baby of our own,” he says.
“But then Tate came along,” Tate says from the doorway.
Chapter Seventeen
Rob is on his feet instantly, his hands balled into tight fists, mouth twisting into a feral scowl. I think he growls, like an animal. He gets right up in Tate’s face. I don’t even get a chance to speak.
“You are always showing up at the wrong damn time,” Rob says. “Always showing up where you’re not needed or wanted. How is it that one person can always show up at the wrong time like that, ruining perfectly decent moments?”
Tate smirks. “How is it that one person can be so utterly pathetic? Pining over a woman who doesn’t love him for twelve years while she makes a life with someone else. Sleeping with students in the meantime. It’s really very sad.”
“What’s sad is that no matter what you tried, she always came back to me.”
“Yeah, you got the scraps. That’s great.”
“That’s enough,” I say sharply, my face twisted in disgust. “’Scraps,’ Tate? Seriously? We never even slept together.”
The cockiness falters for a moment as Tate’s eyes shift from Rob to me. He seems to have only just remembered that I’m even here. He shifts on his feet, and his eyes slide back to Rob, but he addresses me by saying, “You’re right. That was over the line, Hope.”
“Get out of here, Tate,” Rob says. “Just go.”
“I’m not going anywhere unless Hope tells me to go. You should go. You’re the one who threw her out in the garbage, told her it was over. I’ve been the one around. I’ve been the one trying to help her figure out her life. You’ve known her for years, and you’ve let her sink further and further into the hole. How’s that partnership? Or even friendship? I think you like a meek, mild, needy Hope who can’t function without you. And now that she’s venturing out in the big world, standing on her own two feet, you finally see how pathetic and useless you really are.”
Rob throws a wicked punch. I hear the smack of bone on flesh, and it makes my teeth hurt, but Tate takes it like a prize fighter. He barely even moves, instead just running his hand over his jaw. “You shouldn’t have done that.”
A flicker of worry crosses Rob’s face. He obviously put everything into that punch. I heard it, and I know Tate felt it, but it did not have the intended effect. Not at all. But Rob stands straight, his hands still in tight fists, ready to give it another try.
“Rob,” I say, “just back off. Tate, leave Rob alone.”
Tate eyes me, his lips in a tight line. “This guy acts like he’s the one hurt. He’s off screwing around and then acting like a wounded dog when you don’t want him. He’s not good enough for you.”
“I decide who and what is good for me,” I say, gritting my teeth.
“Well, you make shitty choices, then,” he answers, just as Rob throws another punch. Tate ducks the blow, bigger and better-trained, he grabs Rob by the shirt before punching him in the gut. I can hear the air whoosh out of Rob’s body, as he grunts with pain, falling to the ground, holding his stomach. Tate kneels and puts all of his muscle into holding Rob down.
“Don’t get back up,” he warns. “I didn’t come here for a fight. I heard Eric was back in and thought I’d check on him. I’m sorry I came. I’ll just go now and come back later.”
He shoves Rob down as he stands and turns toward the door. I hear Rob grind out, “The hell you will,” before he gets to his feet and runs full-barrel, knocking an unsuspecting Tate to the ground.
The men punch each other, grunting, I hear the sound of the impact landing as they scuffle.
Amy, awake now, screams for them to stop as she scurries from the loveseat and climbs up in the bed with me, sobbing, trying to hide from the violence by shoving her face into my armpit. I’m yelling for them to stop but they don’t stop until armed security guards rush in and subdue them, holding their arms back as they hurl insults at each other. Rob’s nose is bleeding. Tate’s lip is bleeding. They call each other names as they’re pulled from each other.
Tate looks at me, still wrestling against the two security guards that are required to keep him from taking another swipe at Rob. He says, “Hope, I’m sorry,” and I can see in his eyes he knows this is over. Whatever this was between us—it’s over now. There’s anger, and sadness, and resignation in his face, and I feel really unsteady about it.
Rob is hauled off, too, and as the room empties and the hallway returns to its normal quiet, Amy and I just sob and sob together on the little hospital bed. I cry until my eyes are puffy, and my head hurts.
Eventually, we both settle and Amy asks, “Why were they fighting, Mom? Why were they both so mean?”
“They’re men, and men are kind of dumb,” I say.
“Mom … seriously. Do you have two boyfriends? Are they fighting over you? Do they hate each other?”
“They do not like each other, that’s for sure,” I say, “and I don’t have any boyfriends, but yes, I think they were fighting over me. Which is so silly because I’m nothing special.”
“That’s not true,” Amy says quietly. “You are special and Uncle Rob really loves you a lot. But is it true, all the things Mr. Tate said about him?”
I kiss her head. “No. It’s not true. They were trying to hurt each other.”
“But they hurt you, too, right? By fighting like that?”
“Some of it hurt me, yes, but I forgive them.”
“Why?”
“Because they’re both good men, and this is a strange situation. They’re upset and people say things they don’t mean when they’re upset.”
Amy nods and goes quiet for a couple of minutes before asking, “Mom?”
“Yeah?”
“I heard what Uncle Rob said. That you’re pregnant.”
I take a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Oh, you heard that?”
“Are you happy about it?”
I bite my bottom lip. “It’s been hard to feel happy about it, honey, if I’m being honest.”
“Why? It’s a baby. That’s a new baby brother or sister for me.”
“That excites you?”
She nods. “I think it will be fun to have a baby to help with.”
“Well, if you’re happy, then I’ll do a better job of being happy, too.”
“What about Uncle Rob?”
“That’s complicated.”
“Well, then, uncomplicate it.”
There doesn’t seem to be much more to say after that sage bit of wisdom, so I change the subject and ask about school. We talk for a bit until a nurse comes in, shines a light in my eyes, and asks how I’m feeling. I report that I feel just fine, so she clears me to get out of bed and head down to Eric’s room. Amy holds my hand, as we walk to the elevator, take it to the third-floor pediatric wing, and walk the long hallway to his room.
As soon as we walk inside, Amy announces, “Mommy is having a baby!”
Eric, who is playing Uno with Meredith as
she sits by his bed, turns his head so fast I’m surprised it doesn’t snap. His eyes are wide, as he breaks into a big, cute smile. “A baby brother or sister? For real?”
I nod and shrug. “Seems that way, bud. How do you feel about that?”
“I think it’s awesome!” he cheers. “So are you and Uncle Rob getting married now?”
I can feel my face heating. Funny that he just assumes it’s Robs, that we have that kind of relationship, and that we’ll naturally decide to all be a family now. “Well, life isn’t that simple,” I manage to answer. “Uncle Rob and I have been having some issues with our friendship.”
A clearing of the throat from behind me announces Rob’s return. I turn to look at him and he’s sort of hunched over, not meeting my gaze right away. At first I think he’s injured, but then, looking at the sheepish half-grin on his face, I realize he’s embarrassed. There’s a security officer with him who asks if it’s okay for him to be here.
I nod, my eyes meeting and not leaving Rob’s. “It’s fine,” I say. “Rob’s fine, but keep the other guy away if you can, please?”
The security guard affirms my wishes and walks off as Rob says, “Sorry for causing a scene.”
“It’s okay,” I say.
Meredith stands up. “I think I should head home now that everything seems to have settled a bit.” She hugs me on her way out the door.
Eric announces that he absolutely must have pizza, so we order a pizza and start a new Uno game. The tension between Rob and me practically crackles, but we manage to act like everything is normal until Eric finally falls asleep for the night.
“You should go home and get some rest,” Rob says quietly. “I can stay with him if you need me to.”
“No, I can’t ask that of you,” I say. “We’ll head home, and I’ll just come back early in the morning. He seems fine, and they’ll call if I need to come back sooner.”
“Well, then, if you’re okay with it, I’d like to follow you home. You have a concussion, too. Just want to make sure you and Amy make it home safely.”
I chew on my bottom lip as I consider this. “You hate me, but you want to follow me home?”