Chapter Nineteen #2
My shoulders slumped. Fuck, this was torture.
Absolute torture. I released Kenny and dropped into a chair.
It crunched and whistled beneath my ass as air leaked from the cracked vinyl.
We sat in heavy silence for what felt like ages.
Hundreds of questions bombarded me, but I couldn’t give voice to them.
I didn’t scroll through my phone, listen to music, or people-watch.
I stared at the double doors, willing someone, anyone, to walk through and give me a crumb of information about Alex.
With each passing minute, my anxiety ramped up until I was practically vibrating in the seat next to Kenny, who sat much the same as I did without any attempt to distract himself from the worry.
I have no idea how much time passed, but it wasn’t quick.
If you pressed me, I’d guess at least two hours before a man in navy blue scrubs and a matching cap strode through the double doors.
My breath caught as it did every time those doors had opened over the past few hours.
So far, my hopes had been dashed every time.
“Family of Alexander Morgan?” he announced, scanning the room.
I launched out of the chair like I’d hit an ejection button, with Kenny hot on my heels.
“Here!” I shouted as I lifted a hand and ran to the doctor.
“Is he okay? Can I see him? Where is he?” A huge part of me had clung to the idea that he’d be wheeled out in a chair, bitching about the policy and begging to go home.
My eyes filled, and my chest tightened. There went my hope that Kenny had overreacted about Alex’s condition.
The doctor lifted a hand, quieting my bombardment of questions. “You’re family?”
I nodded. “This is his brother. I’m his boyfriend and emergency contact.
” After my father’s stroke, we’d officially made each other the primary contact with work and our insurance companies, should something happen.
I never thought I’d need to use it, but my father’s stroke taught us that crazy things could happen at any time.
The decision no longer felt like the flex it had when we’d talked to my lawyer, but I was so grateful I wouldn’t have to battle privacy laws to see Alex. “Please tell me Alex is okay.”
“Alex suffered a brutal beating and significant injuries.”
“Oh God.” My knees threatened to give out as they’d done in the elevator, but I locked them out, forcing myself to remain upright. “Is he…” No way could I finish that sentence. I didn’t even know what I wanted to ask.
The doctor gave me a sympathetic shoulder pat.
“He has significant soft tissue damage, basically a fancy way of saying severe bruising on his face and torso, mostly, with some on his legs too. He sustained a fracture to his eye socket, which we repaired surgically. He also has multiple rib fractures and suffered a pneumothorax, or a collapsed lung, during the ambulance ride.”
Broken bones? Surgery? Collapsed lung? This was done to him by another person? I was going to vomit.
The doctor didn’t seem to notice my distress.
He continued cataloging Alex’s injuries as though reading from his grocery list. “We are monitoring him extremely closely because he also has a small skull fracture. Luckily, there is no evidence of bleeding in his brain, but we will be doing a few more scans throughout the night. We also have him sedated and intubated with a breathing tube and a ventilator. There is a lot of facial swelling and swelling in his chest, which is compromising his ability to breathe on his own. He’ll remain sedated and ventilated for a few days until we get some of that swelling down, and he can safely breathe without assistance. ”
I stared at the physician as though he’d spoken another language, one I didn’t understand and never would. How could this be real? I had to be in the throes of a sickening night terror.
My Alex. My boyfriend, my lover, my life was lying back there somewhere, alone and unconscious with a machine doing his breathing for him. Any second now, I’d wake from this nightmare, roll over, and pull him against me. If I held him a little too tight, he’d just have to deal.
Any second now.
Right?
I’m waiting…
“Do either of you have any questions for me?”
Did I have questions? Fuck yes, I had questions. At least a few million, but as I blinked at the physician, a few inches shorter than me, I couldn’t think of anything to ask. “I….” I shook my head. “I don’t know. I can’t… my brain isn’t working.”
The doctor reached out and squeezed my shoulder.
“I know this is overwhelming, but Alex is young, and he is strong. He will recover well with time and proper care. He’s fortunate you found him when you did,” he said, shifting his gaze to Kenny, who seemed to have shrunken in on himself.
Someone must have explained to the doctor how Kenny discovered his injured brother.
“Can we see him?” I whispered.
The physician nodded. “He’s been transferred to the ICU.
Two at a time may visit, so you can go in together.
” He pointed to his right. “Follow that hallway and make the first left. You’ll see the elevator bank there.
The ICU is on the fifth floor. They will admit you, and a nurse will take you to his room. ”
Yeah, I knew the drill. It’d barely been half a year since I did this very same thing with my father.
Only this time, the shock and numbness were a million times worse, and I didn’t have Alex by my side to get me through as he’d done when my father had a stroke.
I had to make my way there without Alex, and God, did I miss him already.
“Okay, thank you.”
The doctor extended his hand. “I’m so sorry to have to meet you this way, but I promise your boyfriend is in the best of hands. Try to stay positive, okay?”
Positive. Sure, no problem. I gave him a limp handshake, then began the trek to the ICU.
Kenny followed suit, mumbling his gratitude to the physician as well.
Maybe I should check in with him and see how he was holding up, but I couldn’t.
My mind was one hundred percent focused on getting to Alex.
Anything else would have to wait, and that included Kenny.
We rode the elevator in silence, then I used the familiar phone to request entry to the intensive care unit. A young nurse with a blunt bob cut and a no-nonsense expression met us as the doors opened.
“I’m Peggy,” she said with a sympathetic smile on her makeup-free face. “I’ll be taking care of Alex until the morning. He’s in room eight over here.” She pointed to a glass room with pulled curtains. “Follow me. I’ll explain everything once we’re in there.”
I followed her with wooden movements, feeling like I was slogging through five feet of thick mud. Every step took a monumental amount of effort. My heart pounded like the hooves of a wild stallion, dreading and demanding to see Alex at the same time.
“Here we are,” she said as we reached the room.
“Peg, Dr. Seymore is on hold for you.”
The nurse glanced toward the semicircular desk where another woman in scrubs held out a phone. “That’s Alex’s doctor. Excuse me for one moment,” she said with a squeeze on my forearm. “You can go on in and see him.”
My skin prickled, and I swallowed hard before reaching for the curtain. Beside me, I could feel Kenny trembling with anxiety. Were I in a better headspace, I’d grab his hand or offer a reassuring word, but I had nothing to give him.
I opened the curtain wide enough to slip into the room and immediately gasped at the sight before me.
Alex lay flat in the bed with wires extending from every angle, attached to various machines, medications, and monitors.
As we’d been warned, a tube ran from his throat to a loud machine that made a whirring sound every time it pumped oxygen into my boyfriend’s lungs.
I stepped close, whimpering when my gaze landed on his skin.
There were bruises, so many bruises on his face, arms, and peeking out the top of his hospital gown.
One eye was grossly swollen shut, looking like a black-and-blue bubble on his face.
As much as his unconscious state scared me, at least he couldn’t feel pain, because this had to be excruciating.
He looked like an extra in a horror movie.
What he’d endured must have been beyond terrifying.
I tried to put myself in his shoes and envision the attack, but the fear nearly choked me.
A harsh sob beside me made me jump. For a second, I’d forgotten I wasn’t alone with Alex.
“I’m so sorry,” Kenny whispered, staring down at his unmoving brother.
The phone call from Kenny came back to me in a rush as I sucked in a harsh breath. This was his fault. Kenny owed some asshole money, and that guy came to collect, taking payment from the man I love in the form of pain.
In a hot rush, all my shock, fear, and sorrow morphed into a venomous rage, flowing through my veins like lava. A fiery ball burned low in my gut, increasing in size with every mechanical breath Alex took. Within seconds, the molten orb expanded, exploding out of me.
I whipped around, shoving Kenny with both hands.
“What the fuck?” he cried as he staggered back and hit the wall.
I came at him again, ramming him against the wall with my forearm across his chest.
“You did this,” I snarled in his face with ice-cold ferocity. “He’s in here because of you!”
“I’m sorry.” He sobbed with tears and snot running down his hollow cheeks.
“Sorry? You’re sorry? Do you see him?” I screamed, gesturing to the bed. “Do you think those bruises give a shit that you’re sorry? Do you think those machines—”
“Hey! Get off him. I need security!”
Someone rushed in and tried to wrestle between us.
Peg.
She pried me off Kenny with a firm hand on my chest. “Get out of here. I’ve called security.” She stood between us with one arm held out, warding me off. “Go! They’ll drag you out if you don’t leave on your own.”
Her chest heaved, and her eyes were wide with fear. I imagine I looked much the same.
“No.” Kenny stepped forward, shaking his head. “I’ll go. He should stay.”
“But…” Peg looked between us. “But he…”
“It was my fault.” He lifted his hands in surrender. “I’ll go. Let him stay. He’s who Alex will want here with him, anyway.”
Shit. I’d fucked up big time. My shoulders dropped as guilt began to replace the anger. “Ken…” How did I fix this? Where did I even start when I had nothing inside me but thoughts of Alex?
He shook his head. “I’m going.” He stared at Alex for a second with an expression of abject misery, then turned and strode from the room, hunched and dejected.
Peg glared at me with a furious scowl. “This is the only time I will have a problem with you, correct?” she asked, jabbing a finger in my face.
Shame burned my cheeks as I nodded. “Yes. I promise. I’m so sorry.” My gaze drifted to Alex, and tears flooded my eyes. “I’m not like this,” I whispered.
Her sigh barely registered over the loud machine breathing for Alex. “Okay. You can stay. I’ll go deal with security.” She slipped out of the room, leaving me alone with Alex.
I stared at the rhythmic rise and fall of his chest as my chest grew so heavy I could no longer stand. Somehow, I walked the few steps to the chair by his bed, dropping into it like a lead anvil falling from a tall building.
“Alex…” I whispered as the thickness of overwhelming emotion clogged my throat.
I pushed the button, lowering the bed railing, which I knew exactly how to do thanks to my dad’s ICU stay, then took his flaccid hand between mine.
It had an IV with multiple lines, so I had to be careful with my hold, but I couldn’t not touch him, and I was terrified to touch anywhere else.
“Alex,” I said again in a low, tortured groan. My forehead hit the bed, and everything I’d been holding inside since Kenny’s call came out in a downpour of hot tears soaking into the sheets.
They flowed unchecked, turning into body-wracking sobs that shook the bed and had me worrying I’d dislodge one of Alex’s vital tubes.
Still, I couldn’t seem to turn off the weeping.
Eventually, the tears slowed to a trickle, and I lifted my head to find Alex in the same position he’d been in since I walked in, bruised, battered, and fighting for his life.
“I love you,” I whispered. “I love you, and I will be right here when you wake up and come back to me.”