“That wasn't your fucking call to make. You don't get to run my life mother. If I make a mistake, I have to clean up my own mess and don't blame me for the shit storm that is Damien. That man had been damaged long before I came back to this town and he will be damaged long after I am gone again. Fuck! Whose mother are you anyway? You are starting to act a hell of a lot like your loyalties lie with him over your own daughter!” I scream at my mother.
“What the hell is going on in here?” Damien's voice breaks through the screaming match.
I look up to see Damien standing in the doorway. My face sheds all color and goes stark white.
“Ouchhhh!! Mom!” I grab my stomach as the pain pierces through me. Everything begins to spin as I start to collapse. The last thing I see before my eyes close is Damien rushing towards me.
All is see is darkness everywhere I turn. I reach down to feel for my baby. I can't feel her.
“Where is she? Where is my baby?” I scream out.
I start feeling my way around in the darkness that holds me captive. No one is answering me. Where is everyone?
“Mom? Mom, please help me find my baby! Where are you?”
Why is my mom not answering me? Where did she go?
I start to scream until my head begins to pound. The sobs wrack my body uncontrollably.
In the distance I see a light. I begin to walk towards the light and the closer that I get, the clearer the faint voices become.
As I walk through the lit doorway, I see a crib in the corner of the empty room. Nothing personal on the walls. No furniture adorns the room except for a single, solitary bassinet. I rush to the crib to find my little girl there. She is sleeping like a beautiful angel. In her hand is the small little giraffe that I just purchased for her last week. I reach down to pick her up only to find she is gone.
The room begins to spin and everything goes dark again.
“Summer? Can you hear me baby? Just squeeze my hand if you can hear me.”
“Mom.” My eyes begin to flutter open but are blinded by bright lights.
“Yes baby. I'm here.”
My mother's face comes into focus as my eyes begin to adjust to my surroundings. I am in a hospital room. My mother is sitting beside the bed holding my hand. She begins to kiss my hand and I can feel the cool wetness of her tears against my skin.
“Mom. The baby?” I look at her pleadingly as I struggle to free my hand from hers. I need to feel my baby.
“Shh... You need rest. The baby is fine. Just relax and take it easy. It's best for you and the baby that you stay calm.”
What the hell is going on? I am trying to make sense of everything as a tall Middle Eastern man makes his way into the room. I can tell by his coat that he is a doctor. Dr. Mussad is the name printed on the label of his coat pocket. I try to sit up but I can't seem to move. Panic starts to build.
“What is going on? Why can't I move? I want to sit up.”
“Miss Montgomery, I am Dr. Mussad. We have you medicated. The medication has you weak. Your body will need some time to allow the medications to run their course and leave your body and then I promise you will be able to sit up. Just try to relax and stay calm.”
“Medications. Why? What is going on? I want to sit up. I want to go home. Mom, please. I just want to go home.”
“Listen to the doctor, baby. You have to do what he says is in the best interest of the baby.”
“Just tell me what the fuck is wrong! Do not talk around me. Why is it in the best interest of the baby?” As I begin to get agitated the monitor next to the bed begins to beep. The doctor moves to inject another medication into the IV.
“Okay, Miss Montgomery. When you fell, you hit your head on the corner of a table on your way down. The trauma you sustained to your head caused you to slip into a coma. Since you have been out, your blood pressure was continuing to spike. After further testing, we have determined that you have a serious case of preeclampsia. This is a very serious and dangerous condition for both you and the baby. Often times, the only solution is to take the child early. We are trying to wait as long as we can to give your child time to develop a little more. Any activity or stress that causes your pressure to continue to spike will make waiting impossible.”
“You can't take my baby. I am only four months along. She won't survive.” I am waiting for my mom to speak up to help me convince the doctor that we have to wait but she is looking at him as if she doesn't quite know what to say.
“What? Tell me what the fuck is going on?” I plead.
“Baby, you were in a coma for three months. You are just now coming out of it. We just need to try to hold off the surgery as long as we can. You have to know that this condition can not only kill the baby, but it can kill you too. We just need you to calm down and take a deep breath.”
Three months. I reach down and I am suddenly aware that my belly is huge. I place my hands on my stomach and begin to rub it. Tears slide down my face to land on the hospital gown. How can I have been out for three months?
“I don't understand. Damien? Where is Damien? Does he know?”
“No. After the fight, I didn't want to do anything else that would hurt you. He tried to catch you, to break your fall that day but he didn't make it to you in time. He does know that you were in a coma. He came to see you every day for the first month. When you began to show, I panicked. I told him I needed him to man the shop while I was here. I have been calling every day to provide him with updates. I have asked him to refrain from visiting until we know more. At first, he was a little hesitant. However, I explained to him that the last thing we all wanted was for you to wake up and see him, and it be too much all at once. He agreed with my decision. We wanted to wait for you to wake up and make the decision on your own as to whether you wanted to see him or not. The doctors couldn't tell us how long it would be. At first, they said it could be days or a few weeks. After the first couple of weeks you didn't wake up and they just weren't sure. It was up to you and your body. When you were diagnosed with preeclampsia, they felt it was a good thing that you were still in a coma, as it was less stress on your body. Along with medication, it aided them in keeping you stable. Had you come out of the coma that first week, your child would not have survived. So every day that you didn't wake up became another blessing for the baby and for you.”
“So what happens now that I am awake? What are the chances for the baby?”
The doctor speaks up to answer my question and put my mind at ease.
“Being that you are at twenty eight weeks the chances of survival for the baby are good. However, there are still complications that we can run into. The baby would still need help breathing and would be at a greater risk to conditions such as hypothermia, low blood sugar, and infection. If we need to deliver at this point, she would have a greater chance at survival than even two weeks ago. We are doing everything we can to hold out as long as we can but I can't guarantee how much longer that may be. It is going to depend on your blood pressure. It is likely that if we cannot get your pressure down by within the next twenty-four hours, we will have to take the baby.”
Everything is happening too fast. The realization that I have been in a coma for three months was hard enough. Now to know that my baby is at risk, that I was at risk, is too much to bear. All of this information is flooding my senses and I can't think. I just to need to feel like I can breathe.
“This is all your fault. You did this.” I turn all the hurt and anger onto my mother. “If you had minded your own business, we would have never had that fight, I wouldn't have gotten worked up, and this would not be happening. Why? Why did you do this? I want you out. Now!!!”
I scream at my mother, looking for someone to blame for this situation. I wanted to feel my child grow inside of me, I wanted to feel her kick and move, and I wanted to watch how my body grew to adjust to her. I missed out on all of this time and now they wanted to take my baby before I had a chance to bond with her.
The machines
begin to beep rapidly and I watch as my blood pressure begins to sky rocket and my heart rate continues to climb on the machine.
“We aren't going to be able to wait. Summer, I'm sorry. It's time.” The doctor said before he began ordering nurses into the room to prep me for surgery.
“No. Not yet. She isn't ready yet. I am not ready yet. If it comes down to me or the baby, you save my baby. Do you hear me? You save her and you let me die.”
I reach for my mother's hand. Everything that I need to say is lost as they put a mask on me and everything fades away.
Chapter Eighteen
Damien
The phone is quiet today, leaving me drowning in all of the events from the past seven months. I try to remember what my life was like before Summer Montgomery walked out of that airport and the only thing that comes to me is the fact that my life did not exist until that very moment.
Everywhere I turn I see her, smell her, taste her, and crave her. If someone had told me that the little girl who first pushed me off of my bike, would be my protector as a child and my savior as an adult, I would tell them they were crazy.
Looking back, I see it all so clearly now. She walked into my life a little miss know-it-all with the toughest attitude and the smartest little mouth that I have ever seen. As we grew up, she never strayed too far from my side, always there bossing me around and telling me what to do.
She was a thorn in my side even then. I can see that little girl was molded to always be my best friend and my soulmate. There is not a part of my life that hasn't been touched and changed by this woman. She taught me so many lessons, she gave me a glimpse at a different type of love. One not riddled with pain.
A lesson even harder to endure than the beatings that I sustained at the hands of my mother, is the fact that for the past seven months I have had to suffer the loss of the one woman who is able to erase all of that pain from my memory.
All of it, somehow now irrelevant, as the past that crippled me no longer holds a place in my heart anymore. I am sad and disgusted at who I allowed myself to become over the years. My heart actually hurts for the women who found so little value in themselves that they allowed me to use them and toss them to the side like they were no better than yesterday's garbage.
I wasted so many years playing games, discarding women, and sleeping my way all over the city. There is not a single thing that I gained, not a single heart that I touched, or a woman that I made feel more beautiful or worthy of herself.
Everyone in my path became part of the damage that I left in my wake. Yet, Summer still only saw the best in me. She used my game, found a weakness I was blinded to, and used it against me. In the end I lost.
No matter how much of a bad ass I think I may have been, Summer knocked me on my ass.
There is nothing lonelier than the silence that leaves me with my own wandering thoughts because in those moments, I have to face the truths I have chosen to ignore.
Using sex as a substitute for love is a vicious cycle that I fell into. It has always been my drug of choice. The drug in my system now is far more intoxicating and addictive. Going without it, the withdrawals are a fucking nightmare.
I pace the apartment as I wait for the call that should have come hours ago. Every day for the past seven months, Marie would call to give me an update on Summer. I can't explain how hard it is to respect her wishes to stay away when I want to be there curled up in that bed asleep with her.
I blame myself. If I had just been fast enough and been able to catch her fall, she would not be lying in that hospital bed all alone, lost to those of us out here in the world.
Time has been standing still. I go through the motions of my everyday routine but I cannot feel anything but her absence.
Why did I wait so long to go to her? Why did I ever allow her to leave in the first place?
What the hell was I ever afraid of?
All of the excuses that I held onto seem so trivial now. It is the not knowing that is slowly killing me. Each day that she remains in a coma, I am afraid she will be lost to me forever.
Never a man to pray, I have been on my knees morning, noon, and night. I need her to come back to me. Now that I have had her, now that my soul has intertwined with hers, I can't begin to envision a life where she no longer exists.
Just as I am about to crawl into bed my phone starts to ring.
“Hello.”
“Did I wake you?” Marie asks. Exhaustion strains her voice.
“No. I have been up. I couldn't sleep. How is she?” I ask. I know that she has had problems with her blood pressure but the doctors have been monitoring it and trying to keep it regulated.
“She is awake. She wants to see you. It's late so do you think you can come by to see her tomorrow?” As if there were any question. My heart finally feels like it can begin to beat again. I have been holding my breath since the phone rang. I want to rush to her bedside to be there next to her but I know that she has probably had a hard time absorbing the news and needs time to process it all.
“Of course. Marie can you do me a favor? Tell her that I love her. I will be there first thing in the morning.”
We make small talk for a few more minutes and by the time we get off of the phone, I fall to my knees and start to break down. The sobs are guttural and wracking my body until I can't feel anything but relief begin to take over. This has been the most painful and agonizing waiting that I have ever gone through.
I crawl into bed and lay there thanking God for another chance to finish what started over twenty years ago. This time I know how short life is. I know the value of every second that we are blessed with. In an instant, words that are left unspoken, can die on a tongue too scared to speak.
I want more than a moment with her because moments are fleeting and vanish in the blink of an eye. I want a lifetime to tell this woman how much I love her, to remind her daily that she is my best friend, and show her that she is my saving grace.
I don't want to waste another second caught up in the little things that are here today and gone tomorrow. I don't want to face a day of regrets. I never want to miss the chances that we have to share our hearts. Pride could have changed our paths, took us in different directions, and all that we have, could have been lost to us forever.
You do not find a love like this every day. It is a once in a lifetime kind of love and if you lose that there is absolutely nothing that can ever take its place. You walk through life only able to give pieces of you because the whole is gone.
I don't know how some of us, even those not quite deserving, are ever blessed enough to find that one perfect person, but I do know that I will never take love for granted again.
I fall asleep trying to rush the hours away until I can see her face, knowing that tomorrow I am going to ask this woman to share her life with me.
***
When the alarm clock sounds at 7 a.m., the night before seems like a dream itself. I rush through a shower and my routine for getting ready, anxious to get to the hospital. I take the time to call the shop and let Cash and the guys know that Summer is awake.
When I arrive at the hospital, her mom meets me in the waiting room. She updates me on Summer's condition going over the events of last night. A couple of things do not quite make sense but at this point the only thing that I want to do is see her. I don't stop to ask questions because that keeps me from her longer.
As we make our way into the room, I see Summer sitting up in the hospital bed. Marie gives me a hug and heads back to the waiting room to give us some time alone. I don't want to freak Summer out so I take things slowly. I can't imagine what she has been through or is continuing to go through.
I knock on the door before I enter.
“Hey, baby girl. I heard sleeping beauty decided to wake up from her nap,” I say as I make my way to the chair beside her bed.
“Yeah, good thing I wasn't waiting on Prince Charming to wake me up or I'd be sleeping until I was eighty. You have no sense of t
iming,” she jokes as she adjusts her pillow.
“Well, I would definitely have to agree with you that my timing is pretty shitty. Then again, so is yours. I mean I have been told that I am a knockout but you didn't have to go and really knock yourself out over me.” This is what we do. This is what I have been missing. No matter the situation, we can find humor to get through any situation.
“Oh for fuck's sake. You are insufferable.”
“I disagree. I am very insufferable. Just ask anyone who has been around me for the last seven months. Seriously though, you gave me one hell of a scare.”
“Well, I do have a passion for the theatrics.”
“Summer,” I say as I take her hand. “I am so glad that you came back to us. I have so many things that I want to say to you. I am so sorry. I am so sorry that it took me so long to tell you that I love you. I am sorry that I let you walk away eight years ago and I am even more sorry that I let you walk away a second time. My timing is shitty but I finally get it.” I struggle to find the words to express every emotion that is jam packed into my heart and realize there are no specific words that could fully describe what I feel. Everything falls short.
“Hey, it's okay. Listen, I was stubborn too. I threw everything at you out of the blue and you didn't see it coming. I was selfish to want you to react the way that I wanted and not give you time to come to me the way you needed to. Have I mentioned that I suck at this shit? I am not perfect and I can't expect you to be. I know that you love me Damien. I never doubted that and I guess somewhere along the way, I just wanted to know that you knew it too.”
“Summer, I knew it. I just couldn't say the words at that time because I felt telling you carried a commitment not to hurt you and I couldn't take the chance of failing at that. I used a crutch for so long that I was terrified of trying to walk on my own. I let the pain hold me back but it has always been you, Summer. I have loved you from a distance, but I loved you nonetheless. The last thing I ever want is to have you out of arms reach again. I am done with the distance thing.”
Dared (Boneyard Bad Boy #1) Page 18