by Teague, AS
The nurse shook her head sadly. “I can’t give you any information on a minor who isn’t yours. But I can take you to see Landon and Owen. The doctor can tell you more about their injuries, but they are both on the fifth floor.”
That meant they were alive. My shoulders sagged as relief washed through me, but it was short-lived as I realized that the person who hadn’t survived could be Hunter.
The realization must have hit Aiden at the same time because his knees buckled, and I had to throw my arm around him to keep him from hitting the floor. “Take me to see them.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Aiden
Mel and I followed the emergency room nurse into an employee elevator. The car felt cramped even though there were only three of us in the space. My skin crawled as we slowly made our way to the fifth floor, it taking an eternity for the doors to slide open once we reached our destination. I rushed from the small confines and gulped in a mouthful of air.
Landon and Owen were alive. I didn’t know what condition they were in, but if they were in hospital rooms, it meant they were alive. But the nurse wouldn’t tell me about Hunter, and my stomach rolled every time I remembered the detective’s words.
One fatality.
Was it Hunter?
I shook my head. It wasn’t my boy. But if it wasn’t Hunter, that only left one other person, and I couldn’t handle the thought of that either.
The nurse walked briskly down the hall, the rooms nothing but glass walls with curtains covering them, machines beeping and alarms blaring in each room.
After my injury, I’d spent a week in the hospital and gotten used to the way the antiseptic smelled, but this floor, where my sons were, smelled different. It was a combination of cleaner and my fear. My nostrils burned with each breath I forced myself to take as we followed the nurse down what felt like the longest hall in existence.
We finally reached the nurses’ station, and she went around and whispered into another nurse’s ear. The nurse’s head jerked up, and she pushed to her feet. “Mr. Shaw?”
I stepped forward and shook my head, my body working on autopilot. That was all I’d done for the last however many hours it had been, walked when I was told to walk, talked when I was required to speak, all of it done by sheer force of need to get to my kids.
“Landon and Owen are in rooms across from each other. Both of them are doing okay. Would you like to see them?”
“Yes,” I breathed.
Her eyes darted to where Mel stood beside me. “Is this—?”
She didn’t finish her question. “This is my girlfriend, Mel.”
Mel stepped into my side, and when she gripped my hand, I realized it was shaking. I was fucking terrified of what I was about to walk into.
“Right this way,” the nurse in the light blue scrubs said, and together, Mel and I followed her across the hall and paused as she slid the curtain back to reveal a dimly lit room full of monitors. In the bed lay Landon, several tubes and wires connected to him, but the commotion caught his attention, and he turned his head toward us. “Dad!” he shouted, and I dropped Mel’s hand and was across the room and at his side in less than a second.
“Landon,” I breathed, pressing my face into his neck and inhaling deeply. “Oh, thank God.”
His arms wrapped around my shoulders, and his body began to shake. “Dad,” he sobbed. “Is everyone okay?”
I couldn’t answer him because I didn’t know, so I just shook my head and pulled back just enough to take in his blue eyes. “Yeah, buddy. Are you okay?”
My gaze roamed over his face, and I winced when I saw the dark purple shadow under one of his eyes, the split in his upper lip. Despite looking like he’d been in a fight, he seemed to be in one piece, and he nodded. “Everything hurts. But I’m okay. I don’t know what happened. I was asleep.” Tears began to stream from his eyes. “I fell asleep, and when I woke up, I was here. I don’t know what happened.”
“Shhhhh….” Mel materialized at my side and ran a hand over his arm. “It’s okay, Landon. You don’t have to know what happened. You just have to rest and get better. Your dad’s here. You’re okay.”
Landon sniffed and ran the back of his hand under his nose. “Mom? Is Mom okay? Where is she?”
My heart twisted. I couldn’t answer any of his questions, and it killed me to have to tell him that I didn’t know. “But I’m going to go check on your brothers, and I’ll come back and let you know. I’ll find out where everyone is. Will you be okay while I go check on everyone else?”
Landon’s lip quivered. “I’m really tired anyway. I just wanna go to sleep.”
I pressed three more kisses to his head and cheeks, careful to not put any pressure on his bruise. “I’ll be back, but you get some sleep.”
Mel and I scooted out into the hall.
“Where’s Owen?” I asked the nurse who was waiting for us. She tipped her head to the room that contained my son, and I rushed through the curtain, Mel right behind me.
I froze in place when I saw him lying there, his body seemingly dwarfed in the large bed. “Owen?” I said. When he didn’t move, my eyes darted to the machine beside his bed, the monitor displaying a blood pressure reading and heart rate. The nurse had followed us in, and she said softly, “He’s okay, just sedated. He was agitated when they brought him in, so the doctor went ahead and gave him something to calm him. He’ll more than likely be asleep for a while, but I promise you, he’s okay.”
I nodded absentmindedly and began to watch his chest as it rose and fell evenly. He was breathing, his heart was beating, he was going to be okay.
I repeated it again as I stepped forward and took his small hand in mine. “Owen, I’m here, dude. Mel’s here, and I’m here, and Landon’s okay.” I squeezed his fingers and then set his hand back on the bed.
“He looks just like you right now,” Mel said, and I studied his features that were so much like my own, thankful that I didn’t see any bruising or swelling like his brother had.
I wrapped my arm around her shoulder and pulled her into my side. “He looks so small.”
She leaned into me and murmured, “Yeah, he does.”
We stood at his bedside a few minutes longer, and when I was convinced that he wasn’t going to wake, I said, “Let’s go find out about Hunter.”
I bent and kissed Owen on the forehead. He sighed just like he did when he was asleep at home and I snuck in to kiss them good night, and for the first time since the detectives had shown up, hope washed through me.
Quietly, we backed out of the room, and I found the nurse waiting for us on the other side of the heavy curtains.
“Hunter Malcolm, where is he?” I asked.
She shook her head. “I’m sorry, but if you’re not an immediate family member, I can’t give you any information.”
“But you don’t understand,” Mel began. “He is. He’s Hunter’s father.”
The nurse gave us both a sad smile. “I understand, really, I do. But I can’t tell you anything. It’s federal law.”
“I need to talk to a doctor, to someone who will tell me what the hell is going on with my kid!” I was aware that my voice was sharp, my tone less than nice, but Hunter was just as much my son as Landon and Owen, and it was complete and utter shit that I had no idea what was going on with him.
“Aiden?” Chuck’s booming voice sounded from behind me, and I whirled to see him striding down the hall with a man dressed in hospital green scrubs.
It had been years since I’d seen him last, and the man who was damn near barreling down the hall toward me was just as formidable as he’d always been. Barb trailed behind him at a much slower pace, her eyes red and pouring tears.
I pushed past the nurse and met them halfway. “Where’s Hunter? Shay?”
Barb wailed, and Chuck wrapped an arm around her thin shoulders. Where he still looked as fierce as always, she seemed to have aged twenty years in the last five. She was frail, and for the first time, she loo
ked old to me. “What is it?”
“It’s Shay,” Chuck said, his voice breaking. “She didn’t survive the accident. She’s gone, Aiden.”
Chapter Thirty-Eight
Mel
I was a few feet behind Aiden, not wanting to intrude on his conversation, but her mother’s wail spurred me toward the small group, and I reached them just in time to hear her father say that she was gone.
The most overwhelming sadness crashed over me almost simultaneously as relief coursed through my veins. I would have never wished another person dead, but the sheer fact that Hunter was not the fatality that the detective had told us about had me saying a prayer of thanks. I was not Shay’s biggest fan and the feeling was mutual, but she didn’t deserve to be gone so early. Her boys didn’t deserve to have to face such a tragic loss so young.
“Gone?” Aiden repeated, his voice almost unrecognizable.
Barb continued to cry into the wadded tissues in her hand as she leaned heavily on her husband. “They said,” she sobbed, “they said she died instantly. She hit a tree.”
I swallowed the bile that had crept up the back of my throat and dared a glance at Aiden’s face. It was a mask, unreadable, but I swear I saw the same relief that I felt in his eyes as they swung to the man who was standing beside Shay’s father. “Where’s Hunter?”
“He just got out of surgery,” Chuck told us. “The doctor was about to discuss it with me when I saw you come out of the room.”
“No one would tell me a damn thing,” Aiden huffed. “Why was he in surgery?”
The doctor stuck his hand out toward Aiden and introduced himself, “I’m Dr. Gee. Are you Hunter’s father?”
“Not biologically, but he’s mine all the same,” Aiden said gruffly.
Dr. Gee turned and looked at Chuck. “Is it okay if I speak about your grandson’s condition in front of him?”
I was all too familiar with the medical privacy laws, knew that we would run into this roadblock, but Aiden wasn’t, and the complete lack of communication with him was nothing but insulting. Luckily, Chuck nodded his head in agreement.
“I need to sit down.” Barb sniffed, her body swaying even with Chuck’s arm around her shoulders.
“Waiting room is this way.” Dr. Gee gestured toward the end of the hall. “We can talk privately there.”
Aiden took a step to follow and then turned back to where his boys’ rooms were and hesitated. I put a hand on his chest, his heart thundering beneath my fingers. “They’re okay. I bet Landon’s already asleep. Let’s go talk to the surgeon.”
He dipped his chin and gave the rooms one last glance before striding down the hall, his hand firmly in mine.
The waiting room was twice the size of a patient’s room, the entire wall nothing but windows overlooking the city. It was a dreary day in Pennsylvania, the mood in the room matching the weather outside. There was a TV in the corner mounted to the wall that was on and playing daytime television shows, but the volume was down low, and the captions were on. The hosts were discussing the New Year’s Eve celebrations, and for the first time in twenty-four hours, I realized that it was, in fact, a new year.
Chuck guided Barb to a sofa in the corner, and they took a seat, but Aiden remained standing and waited to hear what Dr. Gee had to say.
He crossed the room and stood directly before us. “Surgery went better than I could have hoped. His tibia and fibula on his left leg were broken in several places that required rods and pins. He also had a broken rib that punctured a lung, but we were able to get a tube in to get it re-inflated, and it should heal quickly. He’ll be in recovery for a bit longer, but they’ll be transferring him to pediatric ICU shortly, and after that you can see him.”
Aiden let out an audible sigh of relief and sank into the chair that was behind him. “Thank fuck.”
“It could have been a lot worse. He really got lucky,” Dr. Gee finished. He shook Chuck and Aiden’s hands and excused himself, and I settled into the chair next to Aiden, the immense relief that Hunter would be okay draining me.
I patted Aiden’s knee, needing to feel his firm thigh under my hand more to reassure myself than to offer him comfort, and whispered, “Hunter’s strong, just like his dad. He’s going to be okay. They are all okay.”
His blue eyes crashed to mine, and he whispered, “Not all of them are okay.”
Emotion clogged my throat, and I pressed my lips together and forced the tears away. He was right. Not everyone was going to recover from this tragic accident.
“Barb, Chuck, I’m so sorry––” Aiden’s voice broke off, and he reached a hand toward Chuck and clapped his knee. Chuck’s meaty hand covered Aiden’s, and they didn’t say another word. Aiden didn’t have to; we all knew what he was talking about.
Chuck gave a jerk of his chin, and then eyes that were the same shape and color of his daughter’s came to mine. I watched as his throat worked and he swallowed hard and then said to Aiden, “You gonna introduce me?”
“Uh, yeah,” Aiden said. “This is Mel. Mel, Chuck and Barb.”
I tried to smile, but my lips wouldn’t cooperate more than a slight curve upward. Barb continued to sniff into a tissue but paused long enough to murmur something that sounded like a ‘nice to meet you’ before blowing her nose loudly and dropping her head to Chuck’s shoulder.
Ever since the kids hadn’t shown up on time, it felt like all we’d done was wait, anxious and afraid, and for the next hour it was no different. We all sat silently, Aiden’s gaze trained out the window while I stared unseeing at the television. I took the opportunity to type out a quick text to Brooke, letting her know what was going on and where we were. She responded instantly that they would be on their way as soon as possible and that she would have Griff let the other guys know.
Every now and again, a nurse would walk by the room and my heart would lurch, hoping it was the nurse to take us to see Hunter, scared it was someone coming to tell us something had happened to the other boys, but each time, they would look at us and smile sadly before scurrying off to wherever it was they were headed.
Barb continued to sniffle, and Chuck turned his back to us to try to comfort his grieving wife.
I rested a hand on Aiden’s knee, and he let out a shudder. “She’s gone, Mel. What the fuck am I going to do?”
“You’re going to take care of your boys. You’re gonna be there for them, no matter how hard it gets, because it will be tough, and you’re going to help them through this. And I’m going to be with you every step of the way.”
“I’ve never been so scared in my life as I’ve been these last twenty-four hours. And I know that it’s only going to get harder and scarier.” He laughed bitterly and tossed a hand in the air. “My boys are in different rooms, for God’s sake. Hunter’s on a whole different floor, and I’m only one person. I can’t be three places at once.” Frustration seeped through his voice, and he pinched the bridge of his nose.
I grasped at his hand and pulled his fingers to my lips, brushing them over his knuckles. “You’re only one person, yes, but I’m one person too. And together, we’re are two people. Hunter will be in the pediatric ICU tonight; they won’t allow overnight visitors. He’ll probably stay pretty sedated anyway. I’ll stay with Owen, you stay with Landon, and tomorrow we’ll regroup and figure it out.” I’d been trying to figure out how we would make sure that each of his kids didn’t feel alone, and this was the best solution I’d come up with. “But no matter what happens, we’re doing this together. I’m here for you. I’ll always be here for you.”
He squeezed my fingers, and his eyes filled with warmth. “Jesus, what would I do without you?”
I laughed lightly. “I’m sure you’d figure it out.”
“I don’t think so.”
“I love you, Aiden. I love Landon and Owen and Hunter. I’ll do whatever I have to do to make sure all of my boys are okay.”
He rested his forehead against mine. “I mean it. I would have completely fallen ap
art if you hadn’t been with me this whole time. How’d I get so lucky?”
I grinned wide and winked. “We met in Vegas. Lady Luck must have been on your side after all. It just took a lot longer than either of us thought.”
He chuckled, and it was the most beautiful sound I’d ever heard. It gave me hope that maybe things would turn out alright.
“Hunter Malcolm’s family?” a nurse called out, and the four of us all jumped to our feet.
“That’s us,” Chuck rumbled. “Everything okay?”
She smiled. “Yes. Hunter’s awake.” She looked between the four of us. “He can only have two visitors at a time though.”
Aiden and I turned to Chuck and Barb. “I need to see him, Chuck,” Aiden pleaded.
Barb sniffed again and nodded. “You and Chuck go. I’ll stay here with Mel and go see him next.”
Aiden pressed a quick kiss to my temple, and then the two of them were gone, following the nurse to the elevators.
Barb’s crying caught my attention, and I turned to see her sobbing into a shredded tissue. I looked around the room and spotted a box of tissues, grabbing it and then wrapping an arm around her thin shoulders and leading her to the sofa.
She pulled a tissue from the box and then noisily blew her nose. “Shay’s gone. My only child, my baby, is gone.”
I rubbed circles on her back. I couldn’t imagine the way she felt right now, and I didn’t know the right words to say, so I kept quiet and let her pour her feelings out.
“I was just complaining to Chuck about taking the Christmas decorations down, and now I’ve got to plan a funeral. A parent shouldn’t have to bury their child.” Her voice cracked, and I stopped rubbing her back and pulled her against me.
“I’m so sorry. My words are not enough, no words will be enough, but know that I am so sorry.” I didn’t know this woman, but from what I’d gathered, she and Chuck were good people who loved their daughter.