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“You!” he snarled in Gavin’s face.
Gavin stared at him in disbelief. “What’s going on?”
“You fucking liar.”
I shuddered at the word. My parents didn’t cuss. I’d heard words like that out of my parents’ mouths only a handful of times. Usually when they werereallymad at me.
“Dad, stop!” I shouted.
He rounded on me, as if remembering where his real anger lay. He was shaking from head to toe. The exertion of the last few minutes catching up with him, but doing nothing to dispel his anger.
“You lied to me, Whitley Jo. You’re a liar.”
I shrank backward at the accusation. He wasn’t wrong. But … how did he know?
“I came to you with my entire life on the line and said I wanted to walk you down the aisle as my final wish. And you two lied and conspired to have thisfakewedding,” he snarled. His shaking progressed as his breathing became labored. “I don’t care what reason you had for doing it, but you’ve made amockeryof my wish. A mockery of my illness. A mockery ofme!”
He coughed violently for a few seconds.
“Dad, you need to calm down. You’re too sick …”
“Don’t talk to me … about my sickness,” he raged. “You don’t care about any of it. And this is … this is over!” He took a step away from me, as if he couldn’t stand to look at his only daughter another second.
My jaw was on the floor at the words, the horrible words filtering through my brain. The realization that he was right. That we should have come clean from the start. We’d done it all wrong, and now, there was no going back.
“I won’t be made fun of,” he spat. “This wedding is … over!”
With his final pronouncement, he collapsed onto the floor in the lobby of Percy Tower.
“Dad!” I screamed as I fell to my knees at his side.
All of my training kicked in at once. I hadn’t been in medical school in years, but that didn’t make it go away. So, I got to work.
I looked up at Gavin. “Call 911.”
My father was still breathing, but it was labored, and his heart rate was through the roof. We were going to need an ambulance.
My mom came rushing toward us and dropped down next to me with tears in her eyes. “Oh my Lord, Whitley, what are we going to do?”
“Get through this moment,” was all I said.
That was all we could do.
32
WHITLEY
When the ambulance finally showed up, I was shaking and exhausted. They put him on a stretcher with a breathing mask on his face and carted him onto the ambulance. Mom went with him, and I promised that I would be right behind them.
My father could be dying.
He could be dying from his cancer.
And it was my fault.
“Whitley,” Gavin said carefully, reaching for me.
“Don’t.” I broke away and turned to English, who had stood by through all of it, keeping the lobby clear and working her magic. “Will you take me to the hospital?”
