“Dr. Campbell?”
He paused, sighing in such a way that left me no doubt that he was extremely busy and I was keeping him from something much more important.
“Can I see my brother?”
He gestured at the door behind me. “He’s in x-ray. You’ll have to wait until they bring him back down.”
I stayed where I was, staring down each and every person who bothered to look at me, afraid this would be the person to ask me to leave. But no one ever said anything. Fifteen minutes passed, then twenty, making me wonder if they had taken him somewhere else. But then I spotted him coming down the hallway in a bed, an IV hanging off of one corner.
I held the door open to his room and watched as the orderly settled the bed back where it belonged.
“Goodbye,” he said touching JT’s shoulder. “Good luck.”
JT opened his eyes a slit and lifted a hand, but that was about all he managed. His head was wrapped in bandages, as was one of his arms. The other arm had a splint around the wrist that began in the center of his hand and moved up half of his forearm. He was in a hospital gown, a thin sheet draped over him. His right leg was exposed, held in place with a crude splint that was wrapped in white gauze.
It physically hurt to see my strong, rebellious brother in such a condition.
I walked around the bed and pressed a hand to his chest, reassured by the strong beat of his heart underneath.
“JT?”
He peeked at me through a slit in one eye, then smiled.
“Hey.”
“How are you feeling?”
“Great,” he said, vaguely indicating the IV with one hand. “Pain killers.”
I smiled despite myself.
“I told you to stay home.”
“Got restless,” he mumbled. “Sorry.”
And that’s when the tears began to flow. I couldn’t help myself. But I don’t think he noticed. He was snoring.
I bent and kissed his forehead, my heart aching for the little boy he once was, the little boy he still was, and for everything that had gone so terribly wrong in his life these last few years. What more was he supposed to put up with before fate or whatever was done with him?
I ran my hand over the top of his head, aware of the tiny pieces of asphalt that were stuck in the strands of his dark hair. I wanted to pick them all out, wanted to make this all better for him. I wanted to be the one in the bed, not the one sitting there, wondering what came next. I wanted to go back a few hours and get home sooner so that I could stop him from going out and getting hurt in the first place.
I shouldn’t have gone. I should have let Jack take care of the agreement. But I had felt I owed it to Harrison to tell him I’d changed my mind myself. Or was that really it? Was that the real reason I insisted on going to the courthouse even though Jack assured me it wasn’t necessary? Or was it that I wanted to see Harrison again?
Damn this! Damn all this!
Why did Harrison have to come into our lives? Why did he have to complicate everything? We were doing just fine before him.
Really.
Not really.
I ran my fingers over JT’s jaw, feeling just the hint of a teenager’s beard. I’d failed him. I’d failed to keep him safe and well provided for. And those were the things Harrison wanted to do for him. I never doubted that he could. I just…I was just thinking of myself. Maybe it really was time to think more of JT. Maybe what I’d done this morning really was the right thing.
JT deserved so much more than I could give him. Maybe living with Harrison was the answer.
They moved JT up to the surgical floor a few minutes later. I stayed with him as long as they would allow, but then the surgeon came and told me I would have to go to the waiting room.
“The procedure will take a few hours,” the doctor explained.
He was an older man with kind eyes. He stood close to me, his hand on my elbow as he quickly, but patiently explained the procedure. JT had what they called a compound fracture that protruded from the skin. They would have to expand the open wound and push the bone back into place, then apply metal plates that would hold the bone in place and keep it strong until it healed.
It sounded incredibly complicated to me. I wasn’t even sure I understood it all.
“Like I said, it should take a few hours, but I will come find you the moment we’re done.”
I nodded. “Thank you, doctor.”
Just as the doctor turned to leave, I felt hands on my shoulders. I turned, and Harrison was there. I half expected to see accusation and anger in his eyes, but all I saw was concern.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I told him to stay home. I told him—”
“It’s okay. Sean was downstairs. He told us what happened.”
Before the word ‘us’ could register in my head, a blonde woman I vaguely remembered from the courthouse appeared beside us.