Chapter 25
E’Levyn ‘Lev’ Laurent
Day Eleven ‘Late Night’
The room was too quiet for the number of people packed inside it.
Machines filled the silence where conversation should’ve been with each one making its own sound around Navy’s bed.
The heart monitor gave a steady beep every few seconds.
Something near the wall hummed low while.
Clear fluid moved slowly through the IV tubing taped to the back of her hand, and every time the blood pressure cuff tightened around her arm, I watched the numbers appear on the screen like I knew what the fuck any of them meant.
All I understood was that she was alive.
The doctor had said the surgery went as well as it could’ve gone.
He’d said they stopped the internal bleeding, repaired the damage around her pelvis, and stabilized the fractures that could be fixed.
He’d said a lot of other shit too, using words that sounded rehearsed from years of standing in front of families and telling them how one terrible second had changed somebody’s life.
None of it stuck with me the way the last part did though.
They couldn’t save her left leg. The damage below her knee had been too severe and the blood supply had been compromised too long, and leaving it attached would’ve put her life at greater risk.
I’d stood there listening to him explain it while all I could think was how the fuck we were supposed to tell her.
Navy was going to wake up believing she’d survived Rome trying to kill her.
Then somebody had to look her in the face and explain that she hadn’t come out of it whole.
My hand rested beneath her forearm, careful not to disturb the wires or the tape holding everything in place.
Her skin felt cooler than usual. They’d cleaned the blood from her face, but the bruising had already begun to spread along her cheek and near her mouth.
A cut on her bottom lip had been stitched, and another thin bandage sat above her eyebrow.
Her hair had been pulled away from her face and tucked beneath a disposable cap that made her look smaller against all those white sheets.
I kept replaying that shit in my mind and every time the memory reached the sound of her body hitting the metal, rage moved through me so hard my trigger finger itched.
That nigga was still alive and that was the part I couldn’t make peace with.
Rome had tried to murder her in front of a parking lot full of people, and he was somewhere breathing.
Maybe at a hospital getting the bullet removed from his arm.
Maybe sitting handcuffed to a bed while some officer stood outside his room.
Wherever he was, his chest was still rising and falling while Navy lay unconscious, missing a part of herself because he couldn’t accept that she was done with him.
I wanted him dead, not locked up, and not waiting on trial.
I wanted to stand close enough to watch it happen and make sure the last thing he understood was who had come for him.
But every time my mind went too far in that direction, I looked down at Navy and forced myself back into the room.
Whatever happened to Rome could wait but she couldn’t.
Right now, she needed somebody beside her who wasn’t thinking about revenge more than he was thinking about whether she opened her eyes.
I hated that me and her grandma had to mee under these circumstances, but Lulu sat on the other side of the bed with both hands wrapped around Navy’s.
She had been praying on and off since we were allowed into the room.
Sometimes the words came clearly enough for everybody to hear.
Other times her lips moved without sound while tears gathered beneath her glasses.
Her best friend Tasha sat near the window wrapped in a hospital blanket somebody had brought her from the emergency department.
She should’ve been home resting after whatever procedure she’d gone through that morning, but nobody had been able to convince her to leave.
Her face looked pale, and every few minutes she shifted carefully in the chair like her body hurt more than she wanted anybody to know.
Navy’s family filled the rest of the room and spilled into the hallway with aunts, cousins, and people I hadn’t met. Some cried openly and others stood in stunned silence, staring at the bed as though Navy might sit up if enough of them watched her.
Monica had come in with Lulu when Lulu did, and I recognized her before she said anything.
She was still interested at a time when I wasn’t trying to belong to anybody.
Later, I sold her a house. By then, whatever had been between us was already dead on my end, though Monica had never acted like she completely accepted that.
I didn’t know I would meet Navy and didn’t know they were cousins until now.
The second she saw me sitting beside Navy’s bed, her steps slowed. She looked from my hand resting around Navy’s arm to my face, then back toward her cousin. “What are you doing here?”
The question came out quiet, but everybody close enough heard it. I didn’t move my hand. “Where else I’m supposed to be?”
Monica frowned. She wore a long cardigan over leggings and had tied her hair up like she’d rushed out without doing much to it. Her eyes were swollen, but there was still something sharp in the way she looked at me. “I didn’t know you and Navy knew each other like that.”
“We do.” I told her. She waited, expecting more and I gave it to her without taking my eyes off Navy. “That’s my girl.”
Tasha looked at me from her chair but didn’t say anything. Lulu stopped praying long enough to study my face. Monica’s mouth parted slightly before she pressed it closed again. “Your girl?” she repeated.
“That’s what I said.”
There wasn’t any reason to explain how Navy and I got there. Not while she was lying unconscious between us. Whatever Monica remembered about me from years ago had nothing to do with who I was to Navy now.
Monica looked at her cousin for a long moment. Some of the attitude left her face, replaced by fresh tears she quickly wiped away. “She didn’t tell me.”
“She had other shit going on.”
“I know that.” She folded her arms, then unfolded them just as quickly. “I’m just saying, she didn’t tell me.”
I finally looked at her. “Would it change anything right now?”
Her eyes held mine for a second before dropping. “No.”
“Then that’s what matters.”
Monica didn’t argue again. She went around the bed and kissed Navy’s forehead, careful not to touch the bandage. When she straightened, her eyes returned to me. “You make sure you take care of my cousin.”
I looked down at Navy’s bruised face. “Ain’t nobody gotta tell me that.” Monica already knew the Lev she got in business mode, wasn’t the Lev she was gone get right now. I had no reason to be professional and talk white collar like Hollywood.
The doctor came back a little after midnight and told everybody Navy would likely remain asleep for several more hours.
The anesthesia was still in her system, and they were keeping her heavily medicated because of the extent of her injuries.
He suggested the family go home, get some rest, and return in the morning when she might be more alert.
Nobody wanted to move at first. Lulu stayed seated with Navy’s hand in hers as if the suggestion hadn’t been directed toward her.
Tasha shook her head before the doctor finished talking.
One of Navy’s aunts started gathering purses and jackets while telling everybody they needed to listen, but her own eyes kept drifting back toward the bed.
It took nearly forty minutes to clear the room. Tasha was the hardest one to convince. She stood near Navy’s feet with the blanket wrapped around her shoulders, staring at the shape beneath the sheets where one leg ended differently from the other.
“I should be here when she wakes up,” she said.
“You need to be in bed yourself,” Lulu told her gently. “You come back first thing in the morning.”
Tasha’s lips trembled. “She was coming to check on me.”
“I know, baby.”
“She was getting me food.”
Lulu pulled her into a hug. Tasha held on longer than either of them expected, her face pressed against Lulu’s shoulder while her body shook.
When she finally stepped away, she looked at me. “Let us know if anything changes please.”
“I got you.”
She nodded and bent to kiss Navy’s cheek before allowing one of the cousins to walk her out.
Monica lingered near the doorway after everyone else started leaving.
She looked like she wanted to say something more, but whatever it was stayed in her thoughts.
In the end, she only glanced at Navy again and told Lulu she’d return in the morning.
Then the room emptied until it was just me and Lulu.
She sat there another half hour before finally standing and smoothing both hands down the front of her dress.
Exhaustion had settled into her face, making her look older than she had when she arrived.
“I’m going downstairs to find some coffee,” she said. “You want anything?”
I shook my head. “I’m straight.”
Her gaze moved between me and Navy. “She’s going to need patience.”
“I know.”
She shook her head. “No, baby. I don’t think any of us know yet.”
That was the truth as it lingered in the air.
Lulu touched Navy’s forehead, whispered something I couldn’t hear, then left the room.
Once the door closed, the silence felt more private.
I pulled my chair closer to the bed until my knees nearly touched the frame.
Navy’s hand lay palm-down beside her hip, with the hospital bracelet loose around her wrist. I slid my fingers beneath her arm again and rubbed my thumb slowly across the inside of it.