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My chin quivers.If.If I hadn’t been thinking about how good it felt to lie beside him all night. If I hadn’t been excited to get back to the car and give him yet another kiss. If I’d only kept my wits about me for the fifteen seconds it would have taken to walk over there.
Nothing is more pointless than assigning anifto the past. “The only reason he’s hurt is because I was being stupid and clueless,” I finish, voice cracking. “I’m not leaving him.”
Dad sinks down beside me. “I wasn’t thinking about that,” he says softly. “I was only thinking about you.”
“That’s obvious.” This harsh tone isn’t one I make a habit of using with anyone—especially not my father. I’m beyond caring, though. I’m worried, sick to my stomach, laden with guilt. “Maverick isimportantto me. He saved me today. I owe him, and so do you.”
Dad watches me for a long moment. I take in deep, gulping breaths, trying desperately to fill my lungs. Finally, he says, “I’m sorry, Azalea. You’re right.”
“Are you going to wait with me?”
He settles back on the bench, leaning against the wall. “Of course I am.”
So we wait.
We wait for hours. We see countless people arrive and leave in the time that we stay put. I fall asleep for a while, my head lolling against my dad’s shoulder. When I wake up, he wanders off for a few minutes before returning with a mushy cellophane-wrapped sandwich that he forces me to eat. With no strength to argue, I force it down my throat, tasting absolutely nothing.
A flurry of activity alerts us to shift change at the nurses’ station. Dad tentatively floats the idea of going home. I refuse, and he drops it.
It’s nearly seven o’clock when Maverick’s dad emerges from the back. He looks haggard with big bags hanging under his eyes. I wonder where Lilly is—somebody must be watching her.
He stops in front of us and gives me a sympathetic look before crooking a finger at my dad. “Can I talk to you for a second?”
Dad stands and follows him to a corner of the room. Although they don’t know each other very well, they huddle together like old friends. I strain to hear their voices but can’t make out anything. All I can do is wait until my dad claps Brad on the shoulder, Brad returns the gesture, and they go their separate ways, each returning to their own child.
I know from the look on my dad’s face that I’m not going to like what he has to say. I grip the scratchy cushion beneath me, sinking my fingertips deep into the cloth.
Dad sits right beside me and keeps his voice low. “He’s been awake for a while. He remembers what happened.”
This fills me with relief, but I know there’s more. An unspokenbuthangs in the air.
“Is he going to be okay?” I demand. It was just his leg.Surelyhe’ll be okay.
“He’s okay,” Dad confirms. “No concussion, and his injuries seem to be confined to his leg, aside from a few minor things.”
I chew on my bottom lip and wait for whatever he’s not telling me.
Dad lets out a breath and then nods ruefully, acknowledging that he can’t stall any longer. “Zay-Zay…his baseball career is over.”
Chapter Twenty
Maverick
Thedoctorisbluntwhen he comes to see me after I wake up from surgery.
“Your dad says you’re supposed to be in the MLB draft?” he asks brusquely.
“Yeah. Next month.”
“Well,” he says, “you’ll probably have to hit pause on that one.”
I feel like I’m underwater as he continues talking. He talks about my broken leg, but ‘broken’ isn’t the word he uses—he saysshattered. He talks about wheelchairs and crutches and physical therapy. He talks about nerve damage that may cause me pain for the rest of my life.
“A broken leg will heal,” I interrupt, fishing for reassurance.
“It will, but your ACL was also torn. We had to repair that as well.”
Fucking hell.
