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“Does anyone even know I’m here?” I ask as Miss Hot Pink Kitty-Cats turns to pull something out of a cabinet under the sink.
The nurse comes back to stand next to my bed, handing me a green scrubs top. Her judgmental look is gone, replaced with… fuck, pity. I fist the scratchy sheets, tamping down the urge to scream, to argue, to jump out of this goddamn bed and leave all this shit behind.
“Sweetie, we didn’t know who to call. Your phone is broken and you don’t have any numbers in your wallet. We did send the LA police to the address on your driver’s license, but no one was home.”
No kidding. Because everyone is here on tour, with me, and I have no one else. Except Abby. Fuck, she’s going to kill me.
“Thanks,” I tell the nurse, holding my breath until she finally leaves the room. I fumble for the bedside phone and dial Gavin. Sadly, it’s the only number I know by heart. He answers, his voice hesitant, probably because he doesn’t recognize the number.
“Hello?”
“Gav, it’s me.”
“Hawke?” I hear a muffled sound and Gavin shouts to whoever is in the room with him. “Hey guys! It’s Hawke.” His breathing returns to my ear. “Where are you?” I wince at the worry in his tone.
“I’m in the hospital.”
Thirty minutes later, the entire band storms into my hospital room in a flurry of noise and activity. Everyone is talking at once, half of them asking how I’m doing, the other half yelling at me for being so unbelievably thoughtless and selfish.
“Guys.” I try to get everyone to quiet down. Their voices are making my head throb. They continue arguing, thoroughly pissed at me for taking off and getting injured—for going alone, for fucking up, for existing—hell, for everything. I’m surprised I’m not being blamed for sinking the Titanic and causing world hunger, what with the huge list of accusations being flung at me. “Guys,” I repeat, to no avail.
“Shut up!” Everyone’s heads, including my own, whip around when Ross steps into the room and shouts.
“Out!” he snaps at my bandmates. No one moves, still dumbfounded at the sound of Ross raising his voice. My uncle is a pretty gentle guy, easygoing, calm. Until you push him over the edge. Right now, I’d say he’s waaay over that edge. “Move, now!”
Gavin, Dax, and Adam trip over each other to get to the door. Ross follows, closing it, trapping me with him in the tiny, and getting smaller by the minute, hospital room.
Instead of yelling, telling me what a disappointment I am, how I fucked up and screwed the band by getting injured, Ross takes out his phone and drops into the requisite blue vinyl chair next to the bed. “I have to give a press release. You’re going to miss tonight’s concert, maybe the one in Seattle tomorrow as well. Your doctor said you have a mild concussion on the back of your head and three broken ribs. Do you want me to tell the media the extent of your injuries, or do you want me to leave it vague?” He starts typing out an email.
My mouth falls open in shock. “You…you’re not mad? You’re not going to yell at me?”
He’s here to formulate a press release?
Ross closes his eyes for a moment, rubbing the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger, and sighs before meeting my gaze. “Hawke. Henry…” I flinch at his use of my name, his brother’s, my dad’s name. “Is there anything I can say to stop you from doing something like this again?”
I don’t even have to think about my answer. “No.”
“Is there anything I can say to get you to talk to a professional about everything you’ve been through?”
“No.?
??
He sits back in the chair and spreads his hands wide. “So… Tell me, what’s the point of lecturing you? I love you. I care about you. It hurts to watch you suffer, but you’re an adult and I can’t control you or make you come to terms with what happened to your family.”
Somehow, his words, though intended to let me off the hook, make me feel worse than if he actually did yell and lecture. It’s like Ross has given up on me. I don’t know why it upsets me—he should give up on me. I’ve given up on me.
“Thanks.” I pull at a thread on the so-thin-it’s-nearly-transparent fabric of my blue hospital gown.
“No problem,” Ross replies.
* * *
By the time I’m released, get back to the hotel, and have a brand new phone in my hands—courtesy of someone’s assistant running to a nearby electronics store—it’s nearly six p.m. Gavin offered his phone to call Abby, but I refused. I want to be alone when I call her. Right now, everyone else is at the arena, prepping for the concert with a backup drummer while I’m lying in bed, achy and feeling like shit warmed over.
Abby answers on the first ring, her voice hoarse with the distinct sound of someone who has been crying. “Hawke?”
“Hey.” Jesus, I’m such a fucking asshole. “I’m sorry, Bee.”
