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The middle-aged woman stares up at me in annoyance. “Youfamily?”
“The father of the twins she’s pregnant with. My sister is a nurse here and will vouch for me. Lauren Barnes.” Never thought I’d use that to my advantage of getting insomewhere.
The way her face falls confirms it’s not good news. She picks up the phone. “Will you please tell Nurse Barnes her brother ishere?”
The doors open, and Lauren comes sprinting into the waiting room. “Dallas!” she calls out, nearly out of breath, and waves her hand. “Come withme.”
We speed-walk through the crowded hallway, and she knocks on a door before opening it. Willow is lying in the bed, tears and mascara running down her face, while the nurse checks her vitals. Her eyes are puffy from crying. She’s exhausted. Broken. Worn out. Like she’s been through hell. I’m positive I’m about to go there,too.
I rush over to her side, take her shaking hand, and slowly massage it with my thumb when she starts to cryharder.
“I don’t know what happened. I was driving down the road, and all of a sudden—” Her free hand flies to her mouth, stopping any words fromexiting.
“All of a sudden what?” I ask, swallowing hard, my voice breaking, my heartbreaking.
The nurse hits a few buttons on the monitor and scurries out of the room. Lauren shuts the door and leans back againstit.
Willow moves her hand, so I can understand her. “All of a sudden, I got these sharp pains in my stomach.” She plays with her admittance bracelet over my hand and glances at Lauren in torture. “Can you … willyou…”
Lauren takes a step forward with a pain-stricken face. “They did an ultrasound. It’s the first thing we did when the EMTs brought herin.”
My eyes pierce hers. “The EMTs. An ambulance brought you in?” I’ve already heard more than I want to, but I know it’s only going to getworse.
“There was only one heartbeat,” Willowwhispers.
A knot forms into my stomach, tightening every muscle, and I gag, positive I’m about to vomit. I squeeze her hand before pulling away to sitdown.
“One heartbeat? What do you mean, one heartbeat?” I ask, practically begging for the answer I want even though I’m not going to get it. “We have two babies.Twins.I saw them with my own two eyes at our ultrasound!” My lip trembles, and I lock eyes with Lauren. “Tell them to do it again.” My tone isdemanding.
“I already had them do it again. They showed me ten times!” Willow cries out. “I begged them to keep doing them, so I could prove them wrong. There were two heartbeats during our last ultrasound. I swear therewas!”
“There was,” I gulpout.
“They did multiple ultrasounds,” Lauren says, wiping her eyes. “Trust me when I tell you, they wouldn’t put an expecting mother through this unless they were positive about it.” She moves across the room to rest her hand on my shoulder. “I’m sorry, but the second baby isgone.”
“The fuck you mean, the second baby isgone?”
There’s a knock on the door that gains our attention, and Lauren tells whomever it is to come in. I’ve been to too many doctor visits and had too many hospital stays with Lucy to know when a doctor is about to deliver bad news, and the doc that walks in is about to deliver some bad news. I prepare myself for theblow.
He shoves his glasses up his slender nose. “Hello, I’m Dr. Jones.” I stand up, and he holds his hand out for me to shake. “I’m deeply sorry for your loss. I’ve talked to Willow, but I wanted to come back when you arrived in case you had any further questions forme.”
“Sure do,” I reply. “Where’s my otherbaby?”
He doesn’t seem surprised at my aggression. No doubt, he was expecting it. “We performed an ultrasound on Willow. She immediately told us she was pregnant with twins when she was brought in, but we could only find one heartbeat. I double-checked. Another doctor did, too.” He looks over at Lauren. “Your sister didalso.”
Lauren’s facefalls.
“Willow experienced symptoms of a miscarriage. She lost one of the fetuses from what appears to be vanishing twinsyndrome.”
She lost ababy.
One of our babies isgone.
Gone. I’m so sick of thatword.
If I could set that word on fire and kill it, I would. Risk doing time. Risk going to hell. Risk anything not to hear that fucking wordagain.
Everything good in my life gets taken fromme.
