For eight nights, I fall asleep hunched over the hospital bed, cheek pressed into the stiff sheets, holding Mom’s hand. Richard is here most of every day, only leaving to grab food or check on his patients at the children’s hospital. Kristen spends a few hours every evening trying to convince me to take a break, go home, sleep in my bed. But I refuse to leave.
Rowan calls. Every day. By the third day, I almost break when he tells me about how they toured the hospital in Dallas where Bri begins her residency next week, how proud he and his mom are. Joy may be in rare supply for me at the moment, but he deserves the small doses he’s getting. I can’t bring myself to disrupt it.
“How’s Lydia doing?” he asks.
I look over at Mom. Still unconscious. Still fighting. I haven’t had the nerve to tell him what’s going on. If he knew what happened after he drove away, he’d never forgive himself. Doesn’t matter if it’s not his fault, he’ll take the weight of it on his shoulders because that’s what he does for the people he cares about—it’s who he is. And,God, it’s one of the things I love most about him.
“Oh, you know”—I swallow past the quiver in my throat—“breaking hearts, taking names.”
He chuckles lightheartedly and it nearly undoes me. I pull the phone away from my ear for a moment to compose myself. The lie burns before I even say it. “Hey, I’ve got a client call coming in. I gotta go. Talk tomorrow?”
A text comes through a few seconds later.
Rowan
Miss you
Me
God, you have no idea
On day nine,Mom wakes up.
The infection has cleared, but the toll on her body is too severe. She already knows the truth, but she listens anyway as the doctors throw around phrases likehospice resourcesandwe can make you comfortable.
When they’re done, she takes my hand, looks up at me with tears in her eyes. Her lips part but her mouth is too dry to speak.
I squeeze her hand and bend low to kiss her temple. “Let’s go home, Mom.”
54
love with no regrets
Hannah
With the newsof Mom’s discharge from the hospital, everyone rallies.
Kristen heads to my place and packs a few bags for me. John and Richard go ahead of us and reconfigure Mom’s living room, bringing her bed to the main space where we can watch the larger television together and she has a view out the oversized front window.
It’s hours later, after I settle Mom in bed for the night, when I discover the fridge full of prepared food. Casserole dishes. Fresh produce, washed and prepped, ready to eat.
“Some guys from the VFW dropped all that off earlier,” Richard says from the kitchen doorway.
I blink, grinning.My Golden Boys.
Richard crosses the tiled floor, rolls up his sleeves, and sets to work unloading the dishwasher.
“You don’t have to do that.”
“I don’t mind. Unless, you’d rather me not be here.” There’s no harshness in his tone, only compassion.
His steady presence these past few weeks hasn’t been lost on me. The days we spent flanking Mom’s bedside in the ICU has me more curious than ever what true feelings lie between them.
If I had to guess…
“No. Stay.”
Bleary eyes crinkle at the corners and he resumes his task. My phone rings from my pocket. I duck into Mom’s bedroom to take Rowan’s call.