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I’m losing him.
30
Jackson
I made a promise I can’t keep.
Marlow’s been gone longer than expected. Sitting in the waiting room, I stare down the hall where a doctor and nurse flanked her sides and then led her away. It’s been more than thirty minutes, and I’m debating when I should go ask about her.
I’ve already been told once that I’ll have to wait since I’m not family.
I’m her fucking family. They may not know it, but I do.
Two nurses at the nurses’ station keep glancing over at me. I’m used to women staring at me and checking me out, but this is different. Their expressions are not filled with flirtation. As they whisper to each other, I stand, unable to read their faces, and return once again. “Hi, I’m here with Marlow Marché. Her father is in surgery.” I glance down the hall when the doors open, but it’s not her. “Since we were told not to use our cell phones in the hospital, I’m hoping you can update me.”
“We can’t give you any details since you’re not family, but we do understand that she’s alone and . . .” They stop to glance at each other again.
“Alone and what?”
The older one pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose and then picks up the phone. “Let me see if I can locate her.”
“Thank you.” I step off to the side when a lady walks up to talk to the one at the computer.
I purposely eavesdrop, needing more information and hoping it will lead me to Marlow’s location. Fuck the rules. Although it’s tempting to call or text her, I’m not risking lives to do so, but I’ll physically search this maze until I find her.
She sets the phone down and signals me to the other end of the tall counter. “Ms. Marché would like to see you.”
Wait, has it been her keeping me out this entire time? “Okay.” I follow her down the hall. She swipes her key card to open the secured double doors. We go up another floor and down a long hallway. She’s not been answering any of my questions, but finally stops where two hallways intersect, and says, “I can’t give any updates. I’m sorry.”
As much as I don’t get what I want, I know she’s following policy to protect the patients and their families. Family. I want mine back. I want to see her smile and feel the brush of her hand against mine. I want to see her blue eyes finding me across a crowded room and taste her lips once more before I fall asleep.
“Here we are.” The nurse steps aside and says, “But I will say, hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.”
The drop of my stomach has me hesitating. The nurse doesn’t stay, but shit, what have they told her?
I slowly open the door to find Marlow staring out the window. Her back is to me, and she doesn’t move, not a muscle. I shut the door and then quietly cross the room. “Marlow?”
Her gaze pivots to me as her arms, which are crossed over her chest, tighten together. There’s an emptiness in the usually vibrant blue skies of her eyes, like death has already taken its toll. I reach out, but she shifts her shoulder.
Dropping her head forward, she closes her eyes, squeezing them tight. One deep breath is taken and then another. “He’s not going to make it. He’s not going to live.”
“I’m sorry.”
She levels me with a glare. “You promised. You promised me he would be okay.”
Faith and reality are two different things. I said what I needed to make her hold on to hope, but I crossed a line. I can’t explain my way out of this no matter how badly I want to. There isn’t a way. I’d rather her hate me for reassuring her than to ever realize she can’t count on me.
I think I just screwed that up as well, though.
“I’m so sorry. What did the doctor say?”
Tears overrun her lower lids, and through strengthening sobs, she says, “They don’t know, but he’s had a series of minor heart attacks that he chalked up to heartburn. This was a massive one. He might need a new heart or angioplasty, stents, a pacemaker. I don’t know. They were saying so much, and I didn’t understand the terminology. I understood when they said he won’t get a heart in time. The list is too long and there’s already a patient in this hospital waiting. His health alone precludes him from topping the list from the other person. God, I hate myself for selfishly wishing he’d get it.” Her arm flies out to the side. “Someone else would have to die.”
“It’s not selfish. You love him. He’s your dad.”
“He’s my dad, Jackson,” she cries, looking at me through blurry eyes that have brightened through the tears. “He’s not even sixty. Sure, he drinks a lot, loves a good party, and smokes cigars like a chimney, but I was naïve and thought I had years, but now I have hours, and I don’t even know if I get that because he’s still in surgery. I wasted the time I did have with him being mad for stupid reasons. Money kept us apart.” She steps forward almost involuntarily.
