Sonya and Peter were in tears at the sight of him, but Sonya was the first to turn to me and nod. They knew. They saw Rob in him just as I had. The phlebotomist took my blood but it wasn’t necessary, not to me. The boy in that room was Aiden, and we all knew it.
I had almost fallen asleep when the social worker turned up to talk to me. Jake ended up doing most of the talking. By that point, little seemed to matter to me except for Aiden, and certainly not a cross-examination about me as a mother. By 10pm, my head was spinning but the social worker appeared happy with the interview and informed us that she would ‘pop round’ to the house when Aiden had been discharged from the hospital. Reluctantly, I left Aiden’s room to let him rest, and slipped away from the others, picking up a bottle of water. Outside the hospital, I sat down on an uncomfortable stone bench, and let a pattering of drizzle land on my hair. It would frizz, but I didn’t care.
“I’ve called Rob.”
I flinched. Sonya moved like a panther. Her voice cut through my own suffocating thoughts, jarring me back to reality. “Thanks.”
She sat down next to me, leaving adequate space between us for another person. She wrapped her arms around her body. “It’s really him. I don’t know whether to rejoice or cry for what he’s been through.”
“I know the feeling.”
“I bet you do.” She turned towards me. “I want to call it a blessing, but… I can’t. The way he sits there, barely moving…” She covers her mouth with her hand. “He was never this quiet. Peter used to call him Chatterbox. He’d tell us all about the spiders and worms he’d collected from the garden. A real boy’s boy.”
I nodded. “I remember.”
She shuffled uncomfortably. “Rob will be here in the morning. He’s arranged a leave of absence.”
“That’s good. Aiden is going to need him. He’ll need all of us.”
Sonya nodded and bit into her thumbnail. “Where is Aiden going to stay when he leaves the hospital?”
Surprised, I turned to face her. “He’ll be staying with me. I’m his mother.”
Sonya lifted a hand like she was trying to placate me. “Oh, I know, it’s just… Well, you don’t live in your parents’ home anymore. I wondered if maybe he’d want to stay somewhere he already knew, like the B&B.”
I let out a cold, hard laugh. “Absolutely not. Aiden is my son and he’s coming home with me.”
Her lips tightened into a thin line. “Okay. As long as that’s what’s best for Aiden. He’s all I care about now. All I’m thinking about.”
“And I’m not?” My chin lifted as I regarded her through the dim glow of the hospital windows around us.
“Now, Emma, I never said that. It’s just that I know you have the baby coming soon, and Aiden doesn’t know Jake at all, does he? He knows us though. He knows Rob. He knows the B&B.”
“But that wasn’t where he grew up,” I said. I hated that some of what she was saying made sense. I pushed that thought away. Aiden needed me more than he needed Rob, Sonya, and Peter. “He grew up with me more than anyone else. I was his constant before he…” I struggled to compose myself. “I know I’m going through some changes at the moment, but I was the one to bring him up and it won’t matter where we live or who lives with me, I’m his mother and he’s coming home with me.” I paused to brush away a stray tear. “If that was Rob in there, would you let anyone else take him home?”
Sonya sighed. “No, I wouldn’t. You’re right.”
But there was a note of disagreement in her voice. She didn’t believe I was right at all, but I didn’t know why.
*
I fell asleep in the chair in Aiden’s hospital room that night. Managing that was a feat in itself, given the uncomfortable nature of the chair and the uncomfortable nature of my pregnancy. But the body takes what it wants, and I wanted sleep. It was Dr Schaffer who woke me after 11pm. Jake slipped my coat over my arms and they ushered me out. Aiden needed rest. It had been a long day for him. While I had slept, Aiden had sat up awake, either watching me or watching television.
I thought I would feel more human after a night in my own bed, a hot shower, and some real food—not hospital canteen food—but that Friday morning I woke still feeling half-conscious, like I was living in a dream world. It was only the occasional kick from Bump that reminded me everything was real. Aiden really was alive, and he really had been captured and kept like a performing bear. Every time I thought about it, the cereal churned in my stomach.