Page 12 of Vow

He hated hospitals with a passion. Every memory he had of hospitals were bad ones. No Marcello came to a hospital for good things … a baby hadn’t been born into their family for years.

His recent memories of hospitals were not ones he cared to remember. Like the time his cousin tried to kill herself, and his entire family spent the night in hard, plastic chairs waiting for word on her condition. Or back when he broke his wrist as a kid, and the doctor told his father he’d given Andino something for the pain, but actually hadn’t before he reset the bone. Gio had not been happy about that—someone died for it, he imagined. Andino never thought to ask, really.

It didn’t matter.

Hospitals meant bad things.

Usually death.

Today was not an exception to the rule except for the fact Andino hadn’t died. He had been shot, though, and the burning that was constantly radiating from his upper arm was enough of a reminder of just how close he had come to losing his life today on a quiet Brooklyn street.

And he knew …. knew without a doubt and without needing to ask … that his mother was even more aware of just how close he’d come today than even he was. He’d been there; he’d taken the bullet graze that left a jagged chunk taken out of his arm. Him.

But she was also his ma.

“You’re supposed to be safe,” Kim whispered.

“I know, Ma,” he replied. There was nothing else he could tell her that would make this any easier. No apologies he could make, not that it was really his fault. She was still going to worry, and fret. It was what mothers did. And when it was a mother of a made man? Andino suspected that only made it worse. “I’m sorry I scared you.”

Kim’s hand came up to pat Andino’s cheek with a light touch. He was acutely aware that the reverberation of her palm against his face made his arm sting even worse, but he held back the flinch. He didn’t want her to think for even a second that she was causing him pain. That would only make her worry worse, and the guilt would start.

No one needed that.

“I knew what this life meant,” she told him, “and what could happen. Of course, I knew. I don’t know anything different, my boy.”

Andino frowned. “It’s okay, Ma.”

Kim nodded. “It’s not, but it is what it is. I just … you’re my only child. Don’t make me bury you, Andino. Parents shouldn’t have to bury their babies.”

He blinked.

He was a grown man, and yet, still his mother thought of him as her baby. He wasn’t quite sure what to do with that.

Instead, he simply said, “You won’t bury me, Ma. I promise.”

Andino did his best to keep his word when he gave it for something. Being who he was in the life that he led, sometimes his word was the only thing he really had at the end of the day. Not that any of that mattered, either. This was his mother … not just someone. His word to her held even more importance.

Kim smiled. “Enough of this, huh?” She patted his cheek again, and that pain flared. Still, he held back from showing his discomfort. It was the very least he could do at the moment. “Do you want something? A drink, or your phone?”

Andino knew that he simply needed to make his mother busy. If she was busy, and had her mind focused on something other than him, then she would be just fine for a while. She needed to fret and worry, but she also needed something to do while she did it.

Not so hard to figure out.

“Water would be great,” he said.

Kim nodded. “But not from the machine, right?”

“Bottled, yeah.”

“Okay. I’ll be back.”

His mother slipped out of the room with a soft smile over her shoulder, but she didn’t bother to close the door behind her. Andino was grateful. It allowed him to listen to the conversation filtering out from the hallway that was happening between his uncles, and his father. He was quite aware that a good portion of the Marcello family had showed up to the hospital as soon as they got word about what happened.

So was their way.

No one had been allowed back to his room, though. Not that Andino was in the mood for guests, to be honest. The pain was making him snappy, and more irritated than normal. He was seriously starting to regret refusing pain medication.

And the stitches were pulling like a bitch in his arm.