The rest moves fast. The resort employees have our belongings packed up and already loaded in the helicopter. The medic who rides with us wraps Lila’s ankle, asks her questions she answers calmly, takes her blood pressure. Lila sits with her leg elevated and watches the mountains drop away below us through the window. I watch her watch the mountains until we land at the Marble Falls Regional Hospital’s helicopter pad.
The emergency room is small and thankfully quiet today. A nurse meets us at the door with a wheelchair and takes Lila back the second I’m done filling out the paperwork
Name. Date of birth. Insurance. Emergency contact.
I write my name there without thinking twice about it.
The nurse comes back for the clipboard and glances over it. “And your relationship to the patient?” she asks.
“I’m her husband,” I say.
The nurse nods and takes the clipboard. “Wait here. We’ll come and get you when she’s done with x-rays.”
“Can’t I come?” I protest.
“You can meet your wife afterwards,” she says firmly.
I lean down and kiss Lila’s forehead because she’s sitting in a hospital wheelchair looking small and brave, and they won’t let me carry her back there myself, so this is all I can manage.
“I’ll be waiting.”
She looks up at me with those beautiful brown eyes and smiles. “I know.”
I sit back in the uncomfortable, way-too-small vinyl chair and look at my wedding ring.
I’m her husband.
The weight of those words begins to settle in my chest in a major way. Fake marriage or not, this is a real crisis situation, and in the eyes of the law I’m her husband in truth.
That’s some heavy shit.
But it doesn’t make me feel panicked, like I thought I would. Stepping up and taking responsibility… it feels good.
The waiting room is quiet. A man across from me is reading a magazine. A child is asleep across two chairs with her head in her mother’s lap. The television in the corner has the weather forecast on mute.
I pull out my phone and sigh heavily. This part is not going to be fun.
And then I get on the group chat to let everyone know that Lila and I had to cut our honeymoon short under distinctly inauspicious circumstances.
I give my family the Cliff’s Notes version, typing out a dry recollection of everything that happened today. Probably a sprain, I conclude, finishing my brief and unfortunate summationof events.
Two minutes later:
Walker
Are you serious right now? You broke your wife on day 2 of your honeymoon? Lila, when you read this, I’m sorry.
Tanner
Bro you’re so much worse at this husband thing than I could have imagined. And I already knew you’d be bad at it. Lila, you should look into a training camp for husbands. Slade is good at training camps. Might even come back fully housebroken!
In a way, it’s actually comforting to get shit from my brothers. Hearing the worst things I’ve thought about myself said aloud by someone who loves me is weirdly liberating.
I text:
Slade
Both of you can fuck all the way off.
