Chapter 15
Chapter Fifteen
S he actually thought I would go to practice today. To film. As if I could sit in a room with a bunch of dudes and watch a two-hour game broken down play-by-play and somehow find any of that serious or worth my time.
I stand up from the thinly padded chair, stretching my arms up as I arch my back and groan. I knew sleep would be hard. I didn’t quite think it would be impossible, though.
“I wish I could say you’ll sleep better tonight but I won’t lie to you,” Reed says. Mrs. Johnson’s head is on his thigh, her legs bent as she huddles under a throw blanket he grabbed from the truck.
I wander down the same hallway I’ve walked about two hundred times since I arrived last night. My mom showed up around an hour after me, and she sat with me and Peyton’s parents for a little while before heading home. She has a long shift today, so I told her I’d call with updates. I pull my phone out to send her a quick text that Peyton’s still in surgery.
This corridor is filled with quiet rooms, the lights still dim as the sun hasn’t fully risen for the day. People are all pretending to sleep in cots and in chairs. I don’t even think the patients in here are actually sleeping. They’re all just drugged to make it seem like it.
I fish my credit card out of my back pocket and swipe it on the vending machine at the end of the hallway, staring at the dismal choices for breakfast for a few seconds before landing on a Payday. I don’t even like nuts. I make a stop at the water fountain and fill the gas station cup I’ve been using since Reed dipped across the street to get us sodas at about two a.m. The ice is long gone, but it’s nice to have a straw. I guess.
Reed nods toward the candy bar in my hand as I near the seats.
“You like those things?” he asks.
I look at it, clutched in my hand before me, and shake with a short sarcastic laugh.
“No.”
Reed laughs hard, but covers his mouth when Nolan stirs at the sound. She rolls her head, briefly glancing up at him, then pulls the blanket up over her face and falls back asleep. I’m glad one of us is getting rest. At some point, we’re going to need to take shifts. Hell, I’m still in my sweatpants and football hoodie, and wearing the stench of last night’s game.
I plop down in the chair across from Reed, a smattering of magazines on the table—all health-related except for one. It’s a two-year-old Sports Illustrated , and I’ve already read it. I’m in that one—just a photo with a caption hyping my junior season. Heisman hopeful, I think it said.
“You know your daughter tried to get me to go to practice today?” I peel open the candy bar and break off half, holding the other half out for Reed. He leans forward and snags it, along with the wrapper.
“She’s going to be pissed as hell when she finds out you didn’t, you know?” He quirks a brow, then peels the wrapper the rest of the way, biting off nearly a quarter of the Payday.
We chew in silence as we stare at each other, Reed finally uttering, “This is awful,” just before he swallows down his bite.
“It’s the nuts,” I say, choking down mine. We both take a second bite. Fucking gluttons.
“Would you have left Nolan in the hospital during surgery? For practice, I mean?”
It takes him one chew of the jaw to answer.
“Not a chance in hell.”
I nod.
“See?” I swallow the rest of my sad breakfast, then pick a caramel-crusted nut from my back molar. It feels like it might pull my filling out with it.
I stand up and take the wrapper from Reed, walking it to the nearby trash to toss away before checking my phone again. My mom texted back for me to hang in there. I smirk at her reply. It’s the same shit people said to her after Dad died. Hang in there. It gets easier.
It doesn’t. It never did.
This is different. I know it is, and my mom was simply trying to inject a little levity, I’m sure. But now my brain is correlating these two terrible things, my dad’s cancer death and Peyton’s injury. I’m sure it’s the sleep deprivation, and probably a good bit of anxiety, but I feel a little like I’m the common denominator.
I shake off the nonsense and move back to my seat just as the doctor steps through the doors by the information desk. I’m back on my feet quickly, and Reed rustles Nolan awake and stands with me. The doc crosses the room, removing his cap as he approaches.
“Surgery went well. She’s resting,” he says.
My legs suddenly feel weak, so I take a step back and land on my heels.
“Good,” Reed breathes out, his hand on his chest.
The doctor gives us a second to sit with our relief, and he’s also waiting for Nolan to rub the sleep from her eyes and stand next to her husband.
“What did you find?” she asks, suddenly alert and ready to advocate for her daughter. Reed and I exchange a quick glance, and I get a feeling he’s also glad his wife is the rested one.
“Well, the scans told the correct story. The fifth vertebra is definitely fractured. The swelling seems to have gone down a bit, which is a good sign. I’m hopeful she’ll be able to feel her right side when she wakes up, or at least most of it.”
I blink at his words and glance off to the side. She couldn’t feel anything? She didn’t tell me that. Nobody told me that.
“We’ll see what our baseline is in a couple days, then go from there. I’d say we could be looking at a spinal fusion surgery within a week, then comes a lot of rehab. She’s going to need to find her balance first before she can move on to anything—walk before we run and all that.”
The three of us hum in response, and the doctor gives a short laugh.
“I take it she’s more of a run first kind of girl?” His right brow lifts above the rim of his surgical glasses.
“She’s more of a fly before anything kind of girl,” Reed responds.
“Ah, well . . . then you all are going to have to remind her to be kind to herself. It’s hard to start back at square one, especially when you’re an elite athlete used to operating at one hundred. She’s going to be doing things she hasn’t done since she was a toddler. Taking first steps. Throwing a ball. Touching her toes. But she’ll get there. This is the best-case scenario that we hoped for. I truly believe that.”
We all smile at his positivity.
“When can we see her?” I ask.
“A nurse will come get you when she’s awake and stable. Not too long.” His eyes rest on me for a beat, and I sense he’s trying to warn me to prepare myself for a new job. Peyton’s number two. Her support. Her ride or die.
“Thank you, Dr. K,” Reed says, moving his arm around Nolan and giving her a squeeze. I’m not sure if the shortened name was the doctor’s idea or Reed’s, but we can all agree we’re tired of hearing Reed absolutely butcher his attempts to say the man’s last name. This letter system is the way to go.
“I’m going run to the ladies’ room, splash some water on my face before she wakes up,” Nolan says, stepping up on her toes to kiss her husband’s cheek.
“Wyatt, shouldn’t you be at film?” She winks at me, having heard her daughter say as much before they wheeled her back.
“I think I saw enough of the game firsthand last night. I’ll be fine,” I respond. But when Nolan disappears into the ladies’ room, leaving Reed and me alone, he questions me a little on the being fine part.
“Coach know the full story?” His mouth pulls into a bunched-up, wry smile as he squints.
“I chatted with him for a minute before I left, yeah. I should probably call him or text him with an update. He’s good about family stuff. He understands.” My worries vibrate underneath my words, though, and I think Reed can sense them.
“You know, Bryce might get the start next week. Road game.” Reed’s matter-of-fact statement crashes with my paranoia and I suck in some air before nodding.
“I know. I feel it, that it’s slipping away a little? That it might happen? But . . . I don’t even care,” I say.
“Maybe not now. But you will. At some point. When you have time to take stock of it all.”
I hike my shoulders up in response and maintain eye contact.
“Perhaps. But right now, everything I care about is in that room down the hall. And I wouldn’t be any good to the team if I wasn’t present here for this.”
Reed nods, then lays his palm on my back, resting it there for a beat.
“And what do you think Peyton will think about all that?”
My lip quirks. I don’t have to say it out loud. We both know what she’ll think. I need to get my lazy ass back out there, and I need to fight.
Well, pot, meet kettle, Peyton Johnson. I think you’re going to need to fight a bit, too. We may as well do this together.