Chapter 18
Chapter eighteen
Steven
Sunlight slams into me as I’m wheeled through the hospital’s front doors. It spears straight through my skull, and I nearly beg them to roll me back inside. After nearly two days, the sun should feel like relief. Instead, it just makes the constant ache in my head throb harder.
I shade my eyes as the wheelchair clicks, locking me in place.
“What does your wife drive?”
“I, uh, don’t know.” I look up at the man who wheeled me out here. “I don’t remember?” I pose it as a question, as if this will jog his own memory and the reminder that he was told by the nurse about my situation.
“Right, right,” he says, tapping on his phone. “We’ll just wait, then.”
But before he can settle on the bench a few feet away, Emma pulls up in a white SUV.
She rolls the window down and asks me, “Do you need help?” But her eyes flick to my chauffeur, giving him an expectant look. He takes the hint and hauls me up, like he thinks I’ve never walked a day in my life and guides me toward the car.
“I got it, thanks.” I give him a thumbs up and climb in. He hands me a plastic bag. I don’t know what’s inside, but I cling to it anyway.
“Ready?” Emma’s eyes are patient as she waits for my answer. I nod, and she slowly pulls away from the hospital. My helper, back to tapping on his phone, disappears in the side mirror, oblivious we’ve left.
“Are you hungry?” Emma asks once we’re on the highway.
It takes a second for me to answer, distracted by everything around me. The streets, the landmarks, the sky. I know exactly where we are, but it feels strange realizing this is where I live now.
We used to come to this part of the city when I was younger, and college was only a town over, so it’s not completely unfamiliar. Still, I always thought I’d end up closer to home, working in a small clinic or something.
“Food sounds great,” I finally mutter, my grip on the bag loosening with each mile.
“Do you want me to pick, or would you like to venture a guess on what you typically eat?” she muses, and something about the question makes my heart swell.
It’s simple, but she’s giving me the space to figure things out.
I might not remember Emma, but after the last two days, I can tell she is a leader.
She takes control, especially if someone she cares about is sick.
She’s rarely left my side. And when I needed something, she was on her feet, tending to me like it was as natural as breathing. It made me feel safe and cared for.
“Let’s see,” I ponder aloud. “I have to be a burger fan still.” I am so confident in this that I announce, “Burgers!” and point forward like we’re steering a ship.
Emma laughs, but I catch the grimace that tugs at her lips.
“No,” I gasp. “Don’t tell me…”
“You’ve been a health nut for about four years now.” She winces, knowing her words are gutting me to my core.
“Steven of today sucks.”
“He’s not that bad.” She smirks, taking an exit with a sign for Burger King.
“You had some hypertension for a few months,” she adds, saying it like it physically pains her.
I can hear the worry beneath it. “Heart disease runs in my family, and your sister Jay had some issues, so I think you just wanted to be cautious. For us.”
Us. “Well, that doesn’t suck.” I chuckle. “Today Steven is kind of nice, I guess.”
She laughs softly, but I don’t miss the faint line that deepens between her brows. There’s definitely more to me than she’s willing to share—at least right now. It’s a weird feeling knowing someone knows you more than you know yourself.
As we pull into the drive-thru, I notice Emma’s fingers tapping against the steering wheel. More of a nervous tic than the idle kind of waiting. Sharp and intentional, like she’s keeping count. I shift in my seat, trying to catch her eyes, but she turns to place the order before I can.
“One second, please.” She turns to face me and deadpans, “What does Steven of the past want today?”
I fight a smile at the sincerity of her tone and pretend to study the menu. Does she know she’s naturally funny?
“I’ll take the…grilled chicken sandwich.” My stomach growls in protest. I could kill for a double Whopper right now. I wonder if Whoppers are the same in this decade.
“Are you sure?” She peers at me.
“Yeah.” I shrug. “It sounds good.”
“Okay…” Her eyes are the last thing to leave my face as her head swivels to order. “Yes, hi, can I have two chicken nugget kids’ meals, one grilled chicken sandwich…”—she glances over her shoulder, sounding anything but convinced—“and a double cheese Whopper, please.”
I gawk at her as the cashier rattles off her order and total.
“What?” She smirks, pulling around the corner. “I’m eating for two still; cholesterol doesn’t count for me.”
“Pretty sure that’s false.”
“Well, you would know; you’re the doctor,” she jokes.
“Ouch,” I mutter, clutching my heart, mortally wounded. Joking with her feels natural. I like it.
I would want someone to make me laugh about my situation instead of dwelling in the heaviness of it all. And she knows this. Of course she does. But I still can’t wrap my head around all of it.
After picking up our order, we head into a suburb on the edge of the city.
It’s close to the hospital, but the neighborhood doesn’t feel like what I remember of Emma.
Then again, fragments of her are only just starting to surface.
Nothing whole, but small impressions, flickering back like sparks catching flame.
Moments I can start piecing together. Her long brown hair.
The funky way she dressed. And her laugh.
Oh, her laugh. A sound so vivid it woke me up last night.
I startled awake around 3 a.m., the room clock glaring back at me.
Emma was sound asleep in the recliner. I couldn’t remember the dream itself—the images vanished the moment my eyes opened—but I could still hear it.
I watched her steady breaths flow out of her as she slept, the laugh playing in my head on an endless loop until it finally clicked. Like a missing puzzle piece.
It was her laugh. Fifteen years ago. The night we met.
I think we’d been talking about my family’s ranch.
She couldn’t stop laughing when I told her I used to be a cowboy before deciding to become a doctor.
I don’t know if she thought I was joking or if the idea of me in a hat was just that funny, but I remember the sound of it like it was yesterday. Which I guess technically to me it was?
It was loud and musical and alive. It sent a current through me so strong it left me enraptured.
I remember thinking I’d never felt anything like it before, feeling genuinely confused by the reaction it sparked in me.
My chest tightened so suddenly I half-wondered if I was having some kind of reaction to the homemade ale Liam had made.
But then she laughed again, this time about her childhood crush, Clint Eastwood, and it happened again.
The same electric rush washed over me, skating across my skin and settling deep in my bones.
That was when I knew it was a feeling I didn’t want to lose, the feeling of being with her, of hearing her laugh.
I didn’t want to lose her.
I never got a chance to tell her that night.
But now, sitting beside her as she pulls into the driveway, our driveway, I can’t help but hope I did eventually. That, somewhere in the years I can’t remember, I told her what that laugh did to me.
Surely I did. We are married, after all.
Surely I’m the kind of husband who says those things.
Right?
“We’re here,” Emma says weakly as she parks the car. She gazes at the house and whispers, “It’s not much.”
“It looks cozy.” I encourage and she rolls her eyes playfully, but I mean it.
At first glance, it looks like you’re typical suburban home with blue shutters and a porce swing.
But it has extraw character. Two bicycles lay on the grass, one blue and one red.
The white wraparound porch wears its chipped paint proudly, and a half-dying rose bush hugs the side of the house.
It looks lived in, even from here, and something about that makes me feel at ease.
There’s a faint earthy smell, and for a moment, I let myself sink into the quiet comfort of it all.
Coming home to this every day must be magic.
She gives a single, affirmative nod, as if she’s readying herself, then turns off the ignition. “Let’s go.”
I try to follow her, but my breath shudders out of me, and I go clammy.
The weight of what’s coming seems to crash down like ice through my veins.
My hands clamp around the plastic bag in my lap, slick with sweat.
My neck is tight, my chest burns, and I am suddenly glued to my seat. Too terrified to move.
Then the front door bursts open. Two small bodies burst down the steps and across the yard, moving like light itself. Benny, Ellie’s husband, darts after them, scooping one up by the waist, but the other slips past, running straight for me.
Emma drops the food and intercepts him before he can get to the car. She scrambles to get him back to the house, but he fights it. Everything in him fights as tears streak his face, staying locked on me.
And then, piercing through the air and straight through my chest, he screams.
“Daddy!”
My heart stops. I can’t breathe. His small, terrified cry stabs at every nerve in my body. Before I can think, before I can reason whether this is instinct or something deeper, my hands fumble with the door.
I have to get to him. I need to get to my son.
Before I can get to him, Emma has got him back inside and shut the door.
“I am so sorry!” She reaches for me.
“Daddy!” the boy cries again from inside, and my heart threatens to rip apart.
“Steven, I’m sorry.” Emma shakes as her eyes strain against tears. “I asked them to wait until you were inside. I didn’t want to overwhelm you. I know this is a lot, and we don’t have to do this—”