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“It does,” Rhys agrees, tears pooling in his own eyes. “I love Riggs like a brother and this fucking hurts so much. He wouldn’t want us to be making ourselves sick over things out of our control. When he’s better, he’ll tell you all of this himself. Until then, the rest of us will keep reminding you.”
“This isn’t easy for your family,” Poppy says, reaching over to pat my arm. “You have each other to lean on, though. Use that. Don’t fall into the black pit that is grief. It’s not good for you and it won’t help anything.”
“Thank you,” I whisper to Poppy, my eyes still so wet from the continuous crying, but the exhaustion from the stress of everything has my eyelids slowly closing.
“Get some sleep, love. We’ll wake you up if any more news comes in.” Rhys strokes a hand up and down my back, using my exhaustion and the warmth of his touch to put me to sleep. “Both Hudson and the babies will need you rested. Close your eyes, Lay. I’ve got you.”
The last thing I see before my body succumbs to the exhaustion is a sad, single tear falling down Poppy’s cheek.
**********************
Looking at Dot’s puffy, red face, I wince and turn away, looking over at Adam and Rhys instead. Despite what Rhys and Poppy said earlier, the guilt hasn’t stopped eating away at me for even a moment.
Dot has already lost one child and because of me and what I brought into Hudson’s life, she may lose another one.
It’s been seven hours of surgery and I slept restlessly for maybe three of them. Eventually Rhys and the nurse convinced me to go down to the NICU for a few hours and see the twins. They’re so small and fragile lying in those incubators. The nurses in the NICU are fantastic and went through what each monitor was for, what the lights were for, and how their feeding was going.
The babies are so strong for being so tiny. When Rhys said they remind him of me, though, I had to leave. They deserve a better mother than me. God how I wish I could be a different person for them.
Dot’s voice brings me back to the waiting room we’re sitting in. “They have him in a medically induced coma at the moment. The swelling in his brain needs to go down before they can attempt anything else. The surgery went well, but it’s a waiting game for now. He’s doing better than they expected, at least.”
Rhys nods his head, letting out a deep exhale with relief. “That’s good. If the doctors have some hope, we should as well. Riggs is incredibly stubborn and tough, I don’t think he’ll let this take him out.”
Adam massages my shoulders, leaning against the wheelchair the nurses insist I have to use until I’m cleared by a doctor to be moving more.
“Alayna,” Dot calls my name and I flinch as if she slapped me. It’s really the least I deserve from her. “Can I have a moment with Alayna? We could use some coffee and maybe a snack. It may still be a bit of a wait until we can see Hudson.”
Everyone files out of the private waiting room, leaving only myself and Dot in here. She moves over to the seat beside me and gently presses her fingers to my cheek, turning my head until I’m looking at her.
“Sweet girl, I can see the guilt written across your face as if it were my own.” Dot drops her hand from my face and looks down at her lap. “I’m going to tell you something that a very smart, courageous young man once told me when I was fraught with guilt just like you are now. He saidmom, no one is saying this isn’t hard, but that guilt you’re holding onto for something you had no control over is eating away at the person Hannah loved. If she came back right now, she wouldn’t recognize you anymore. Let go of the guilt, it’s only taking away something else that Hannah held dearly.”
“It is my fault, I could have walked away when it was clear that Kevin wasn’t going to leave us alone,” I rationalize, to me or her, I don’t know. “I don’t know how you can look at me when I’m the reason your son is fighting for his life because of me.”
Dot shakes her head, grabbing both sides of my face. “I’m looking at the woman who made my son smile more than he ever did before her. I’m looking at the woman that my son would burn the world down for. Seeing you is seeing the very best parts of my son. He loves you, as do I. You did nothing wrong. That guilt is nothing more than fear wrapped in a different packaging. You feel guilty because you love him, and how could a mother not want that for her son.”
“I just want him to be okay,” I sob, holding onto Dot as we both cry together. “I’m so scared I’ll never be able to see his face again or hear him call my name.”
“You will, my sweet girl. We have to have hope,” Dot explains to me, brushing my own tears as hers fall down between us. “Hudson is going to call your name and when he sees your face again, that light in his eyes with spark brighter than the sun. He will come back to us, Lay. There’s no doubt in my mind that just hearing your voice will bring him closer to us again.”
A nurse walks in, smiling at the two of us sitting in the waiting room. “Mr. Riggs is in his room now. He can have one visitor at a time for a short period, but he does need rest.”
“She’s going to go first,” Dot says to the nurse with a squeeze of my hand. “This is the love of his life, she should go be with him. She just had his children, however, so she will need help getting there.”
“Of course,” the nurse answers, walking over to me. “Are you ready to go, Alayna?”
“Are you sure?” I ask Dot, not wanting to take this from her.
“I’ve never been more sure. Bring him back to us.” Dot waves me off, which the nurse takes as the signal to go.
It’s a short trip down the hallway into the ICU rooms. Hudson is about five doors down when you take the first hallway and it feels like no time at all before I’m placed beside his bed and left alone in the room.
My hands shake as I stare at him with wires and bandages coming from everywhere. He barely looks like himself, lying so helpless in that hospital bed. This is one of my worst nightmares coming to life for me.
Dot said to talk to him, that he could hear me and fight to come back. That's so much easier said than done. How do I talk to him when all I want to do is scream at him to wake up? That I can't do this without him.
Sitting beside his pale, lifeless form, I let out another sob into the scratchy hospital blanket, every part of me in complete agony at the sight of Hudson.
Talking to him feels like reaching into my chest and ripping my heart out to watch it break. I do it, though, if only to see if he’ll come back to me. Each word is barely audible between the sound of my heart breaking and my agonized crying.
