Thirty-Four
H er dad was sleeping. The monitors chirped happily away, but Lauren hated the sound. More than she hated hospitals. The chirping reminded her of her mom’s last months. She had insisted on going home and hospice care had been arranged for. But before they could move her back to the house, she’d passed away at the hospital.
Her father shouldn’t be in the hospital.
She couldn’t help but think none of this would have happened if she’d hadn’t been spending as much time with Scott. She would have been on top of making sure her father saw the doctor. All of this could have been prevented if she hadn’t let the fun times with Scott distract her.
Except when he wasn’t there to distract her, she missed him. After she canceled their date last night, she expected him to at least call her at some point during the day, but he hadn’t. She hadn’t gone to the bakery today, and when she checked-in with Melody, her friend hadn’t said anything about Scott being there. Lauren hadn’t asked outright, but she had hinted she was curious about his whereabouts.
The more she thought about it, the more she knew what she had to do.
“What’s on your mind, Looloo?”
She smiled at her father’s use of her childhood nickname. He hadn’t used it since her mother died.
“I can guess.” He reached out his hand despite the forest of wires connecting his body to the machines monitoring him. “It’s not the same thing. This is just the easiest way for the doctors to get a better idea of what’s going in. I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”
“You don’t know that.” He wasn’t wrong with his assumption, but he wasn’t completely right either. She wasn’t going to correct him though. Her dad didn’t need to know she was also thinking about her relationship with Scott.
“I do.” He squeezed her hand. “Now, go home, or call Scott and go do something with him. You don’t need to stay here.”
“Let me be the judge of what I need to do.”