Page 12 of We Drank the Dawn

My stomach bottomed out. Why did she not want to tell me?

“Okay,” I croaked.

As if summoned by the mention of his name, an older gentleman with a long white coat bustled into the room. The nurse smiled. “Perfect timing. I was just about to page you.”

Rubbing disinfectant onto his hands, he smiled at me. “You must be Peter’s wife.”

I nodded. “Sarah.”

He sat on a rolling chair a few feet away. “I’m Dr. Abrams. I know you’ve got a lot of questions, so let's get right to it.” He braced his hands on his blue-green scrub pants. “First of all, he looks worse than he is. From what we understand, he got jostled around pretty hard but his condition is completely stable. His heart rate, blood pressure, and oxygen all looked great. Exactly the kind of thing we hope to see after a collision. So you can take a deep breath knowing that.”

Finally given permission to breathe, I cleansed my lungs with oxygen, moving my hand to cover Peter’s.

“CT will show what his bones look like. If I had to guess from the bruising, he probably popped a couple ribs. But the major concern I have right now is the knock he took to his head. During the transfer, Peter kept asking the medics to turn the lights on—he was pretty panicked about the fact he couldn’t see well. So they administered a sedative to calm him down and keep him still and he’ll be sleeping that off for a bit.”

I couldn’t breathe as I hung on to the doctor’s every word.

“Why couldn’t he see?”

“There’s a lot of potential reasons.” He nodded to reassure me. “Shock, nerve issues from the whiplash, swelling, confusion—all of which are temporary reasons. His pupils are responsive to light which is a good indicator that the eyes themselves are healthy. CT will be our first line of defense to make sure it’s nothing serious. Of course, our concern after an accident is traumatic brain injury but we’ll rule that out as quickly as we can.”

“When will he wake up?”

He made a clicking sound with his cheek. “That sedative usually wears off in two or three hours. He’ll be groggy for a while though.”

“What if he still can’t see when he wakes up?”

He smiled. “We’ll just do our best to keep him relaxed and reassure him that it’s most likely temporary.”

Most likely.

I could hardly bring myself to ask. “But, it is temporary?”

“Again, most likely. Even if there are some brain contusions, most of the time they heal up after a while. Best thing you can do is encourage him and stay positive. After his scans, we’ll admit him to observe overnight at the very least.”

“Okay.”

“We’ll also see about getting his neurologist in to see him in the morning since it sounds like we need to get his epilepsy back under control.”

“Peter is a lucky man. A lot of collisions like that go straight to ICU. Overall, I think he’s going to be just fine.”

FIVE

Sarah

Six weeks later

Islammed the door as a gust of wind sent snowflakes spiraling into my car. My nose and lips tingled from the bitter cold, but my eyes were warm, heated by emotions welling in the corners. I blinked and swallowed them back, the dam around my heart quivering under the pressure.

I had to be strong for him.

With numb fingers, I turned the ignition and clicked the heat to full-throttle, denying my need to look at Peter in the passenger’s seat. I didn’t want to see how much he was hurting. Blowing into my hands, I rubbed them together. “Want your seat on?”

“Yeah.” His voice was flat, monotone. And the sound landed like a cannonball against my weakening walls. With blurry eyes, I tapped his heated seat on. Then mine.

The long walk back to the car from neurology had taken us through winding corridors, down an elevator, and across a gigantic parking lot. And even though Peter could walk, it was terrifying for him, and he wanted to be pushed. So I pushed him in a wheelchair. After a long day on my feet giving deep-tissue massages, pushing my husband through a snow storm did me in.

I was empty—in so many ways.