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I had gotten on the very first flight of the morning.
I had no luggage.
I was still wearing the same yoga pants and workout blouse I had been wearing when I was watching TV during dinner.
I could not sleep on the plane, and I could not eat. Not when I kept seeing my daughter’s panicked face. I just moved to get as close as I could to her. Thankfully, I had the good sense to reach out and call the numbers she’d given me because I would not even know where to go once I landed. Right from the plane, they picked me up and brought me to the hospital. I only knew one face, and that was Wolfgang’s. He took the time to explain everything he could, even went to bring the doctor to see me, who told me she was off the ventilator and awake, happily. I did not realize she had gotten that bad to begin with. It was all blur and yet all so clear.
Either way, nothing else mattered other than seeing my daughter, my little Sunrise, lying in bed, her lips and eyelids swollen. I held her hand and kissed her forehead, but she was only able to open one eye.
“Mommy.”
“Shh.” I shushed her, petting her face. “You’re okay. I’m here. You’re okay.”
She was not okay, which was why she began to cry.
Knock.
Knock.
“Ma’am, Prince Galahad is here,” Wolfgang spoke from behind the door.
“No,” Odette whispered, gripping me tightly, shaking her head beside me. “I don’t—”
“It’s okay. I’ll go. I’ll talk to him,” I replied slowly, releasing her and going to the door. She turned away from the door, lifting the sheet to cover her face.
When I opened the door, he stood in wrinkled dress pants and a simple white shirt. His hair was disheveled, and his face low. As if he had the hardest time.
“Wil—”
“Don’t say anything—just go.” My fist clenched when he dropped his head. “Don’t look down. What good does looking down do now? You were supposed to protect her. You asked her to stay. She didn’t want to. She was scared. I was scared. Why? Because of this! Because I knew this would happen! That just because you both wanted this, it doesn’t mean the rest of the world would stop and applaud for you. And you, you made her stay. You did not protect her, and now you stand here looking a mess with your head down. What does that do for me? For her? Nothing. You can do nothing, so leave. Don’t come back. She doesn’t want to see you.”
He didn’t say anything. He nodded, turned, and left, leaving only Wolfgang and some giant woman waiting in the hall.
“He—”
“I don’t want to know. And I don’t care,” I replied, turning and going back to the only person I did care about.
The only person I had left that I loved in this world.
I was going to help her recover and get her out of here.
Enough was enough.
It took two days for the swelling in my face to go down.
It took another day after that for me to actually begin to eat food, though I was scared to. If not for my mother’s pushing, I think I would have just stuck to applesauce. But I ate and spent my time talking to her. My throat ached, but I didn’t want silence. The silence made me think. And I didn’t want that. So, I talked to her about Seattle and everything I had missed while I was away. What she knew about the family company, who was dating who, and what new facials she had been using. It was all very generic and superficial. But it was noise to fill in the dead space.
On the fourth day—after more rounds of her pushing—I let her wash and style my hair. It was weird. I had gotten used to other people doing my hair now, but for some reason, having my mom do it made me feel like I was a kid again. She had brought the white plastic chair into the hospital bathroom just so she could do my hair.
“Are you ready?” she asked with her hands over my face.
“I was ready an hour ago.”
“Shh. I don’t know why you act as if you don’t know you have a lot of hair, child. Perfection takes time.”
“I thought you said perfection was never possible.”
