22. Millie
MILLIE
As soon as I wake up, I know something is wrong.
My heart is beating hard in my chest, and I look around into the darkness, trying to figure out what has awoken me from my sleep so suddenly.
My first thought is Matt, drunk, trying to get into the apartment to confront me like he did with the guys at the office.
But then I hear a noise from next door, and I spring to my feet and rush through to check on Lewis.
When I open the door, my stomach drops. Lewis is on the floor, curled up into a ball, and he’s clutching at himself as though he’s in agony. I hurry over to his side, dropping down on my knees and putting a hand on his cheek. He feels cold.
“Are you okay, sweetheart?” I ask him, doing my best to sound as calm as possible. The last thing he needs is for me to flip out on him, even though that’s all I want to do right now.
“It hurts, Mommy,” he groans, and I reach over to flick on the light. His face is pale, and he closes his eyes, turning to bury his face into the carpet. Sensitivity to light, that’s never a good sign.
“What hurts, honey?” I ask him, smoothing his hair back from his face as gently as I can.
It’s clammy with sweat, and I wonder how long he’s been awake.
He seemed okay before he went to bed, but then, it’s been a long time since he last had a flare, and I should have expected that one would be on the way eventually.
“My stomach,” he groans, and I manage to pull him upright.
“Okay, baby, just try and straighten out,” I tell him—but he writhes away from me as soon as I move him, not even able to look at me.
I bite my lip, a lump leaping up into my throat. This is bad. Really bad. I need to get someone to see him, right now. No way can I just send him back to bed and hope for the best, not when he’s in this much pain.
“I’m going to get you a glass of water and your medication,” I tell him, rising to my feet. “You stay here, okay?”
He doesn’t even reply as I rush out of the room, my hands shaking as I root through the bathroom cabinet to find something that might help.
We don’t have much here, not for an attack this bad, but if I can at least get some peppermint capsules down him, that will help him feel like he’s doing something to manage the pain.
I need to get him to the hospital. I could drive him myself, but with the state I’m in, I doubt that would be a good idea. I can already feel a panic attack threatening, and the last thing I want is to be behind the wheel when it kicks in.
No, I need help—and that’s exactly why the guys moved me here in the first place.
I fire off a text to Cole and Ross, telling them that Lewis is doing badly and I need help getting him to hospital, before I pour the glass of water and go back to check on my boy.
He’s crumpled up again, and I hug him close as I ease him up once more, handing him the glass of water and bringing the pill to his lips.
“There you go, sweetheart,” I tell him. “You’re doing a great job. We’re going to get you somewhere you can get some help, okay?”
He nods, his jaw still clenched tight. There’s nothing that hurts more in the world than seeing your child in pain, especially knowing there’s so little you can do about it, but I have reached out to the guys and hopefully they won’t leave me waiting long.
Shit, if they’re even up right now. I wonder if I need to go to their apartments myself, see if I can get them up—
But the thought has hardly even crossed my mind before I hear a banging on the door, and my head snaps up.
“Millie!”
Ross’s voice comes through the wood, and I get to my feet, rushing over to answer it as quickly as I can. I can feel the tips of my fingers prickling with worry, and the sooner we get on the road, as far as I’m concerned, the better.
“Oh, thank God,” I sigh as soon as I lay eyes on him. “I—thank you so much for coming. It’s Lewis, he’s having a bad attack, and I want to get him into hospital so they can get some fluids into him—”
“Can he walk?” Ross asks, looking past me to search out my son. “Cole’s bringing the car around outside, and James’s going to meet us at the hospital.”
“You’re all going to be there?”
“Of course we are,” he replies, as though it should have been obvious. “Where is he? I’ll carry him down to the car.”
I lead him through to Lewis’s room, where my little boy is still sitting there in his pajamas.
Ross, speaking quietly to him, reaches down to pull him into his arms, and my chest pangs seeing how tiny Lewis looks right now compared to Ross.
He closes his eyes and rests his head against Ross’s shoulder, as we head for the elevator to meet Cole where he’s waiting for us downstairs.
Within a few minutes, I’m sitting in the back of the car, Lewis’s head pulled into my lap so he can try and get some rest, as I watch the city streak by outside.
I can hardly take all of it in, the strange sights seeming alien through the lens of panic threatening to get the better of me at any moment.
Cole and Ross are in quiet conversation in front of me, and I can just about make out them talking about the possibility of getting Lewis set up with a specialist they know is on duty at this time of night.
It’s hard to believe something like that could really be set up at such short notice, but honestly, right now, I will take whatever I can get.
We arrive at the hospital, where James is waiting outside for us, and he lifts his chin in greeting as Ross hitches Lewis into his arms once more and carries him out of the car.
“How is he?” James asks, and Ross shakes his head.
“Not good,” he replies. “He’s going to need fluids. And he’s cold, looks like he’s not retaining body heat well—maybe a blanket too. Were you able to speak to Johnson?”
“Yeah, he’s not around, but one of his trainees is,” James replies. “He told me that he trusts her to handle this, but we can call him if we need anything more to fix him up.”
I follow them inside, trying to keep up with the back-and-forth that’s going on over my head.
They get Lewis into a wheelchair, and take him down to the ward at the far end of the hospital, what feels like endless corridors of fluorescent lights and blinding white around us before we finally reach the spot we’re looking for.
“Hi, I’m Mathilda,” a woman greets us with a sympathetic smile. “And this must be Lewis, right? How are you feeling, little guy?”
She tends to him as she asks me questions about his symptoms, listening carefully and nodding as she takes in each answer. It’s clear that she knows what she’s doing, and something of the fear and tension at the base of my stomach start to unwind, hearing her take control like this.
Cole lays a hand on the small of my back, and I jump slightly, a little surprised by his touch.
“It’s going to be alright,” he promises me, and there’s a certainty to his tone that’s almost enough to convince me that he’s telling the truth.
“I know,” I breathe back, and I reach out to rest my hand on Lewis’s shoulder, silently reminding him that I’m still here and that I will not be going anywhere.
“I’m going to get a few rehydration packets,” Mathilda tells me, once they have Lewis settled in bed. “And then I’m going to head down to the pharmacy to get some medication dispensed.”
“We can handle the rehydration side of it,” James announces, stepping forward. “We’re all doctors.”
The woman glances around for a moment, clearly a little surprised—but I nod.
“Please, just get the medication,” I tell her. “I just want him feeling better, that’s all I care about.”
She nods, and ducks out of the room to pick up some supplies before she brings them back to the guys so they can start to make use of them.
James makes up the drinks, and Ross leans against the door to make sure we’re not going to be disturbed.
Cole is still at my side, doing everything he can to keep me calm.
“See, he’s already starting to doze off,” he remarks, and I look to the bed to see that Lewis is beginning to get a little heavy-lidded. He sips on the drink that James made him, drinking through a straw as best he can, but then rests his head back against the pillow and begins to fall asleep.
I breathe a sigh of relief; him being able to sleep is a good sign. When he’s in a lot of pain, he can’t do anything but lie there awake and in agony, and there’s nothing I hate more than seeing him suffering like that.
I close my eyes, pinching the bridge of my nose between my fingertips.
I can’t believe all of this has happened.
Not just Lewis having a flare, I mean—something like that was always bound to come up again—but the way the guys leapt into action to help me when I needed them most. They didn’t even think twice, taking on the responsibility of looking after my son even though they have no reason to.
They should have been asleep, out for the count, and they likely had been.
But the second I called on them for help, they dropped everything to come running.
And as I look around at them again, it strikes me what a good sign this is for the other children in my life right now.
The unborn ones. I cup my hand over my belly, which is just starting to show now, a tiny bump beneath the baggy tee that I slept in.
I know it’s ridiculous, but I can’t help but hope that they’re aware of this, somehow.
Aware of everything their fathers are doing for their brother, even though they have never so much as met him.
I haven’t given much thought till now of what they might actually be like as parents, but seeing them here, with Lewis, at his side like it’s the most natural thing in the world, it’s hard to imagine they will be anything other than perfect.
Look at the way they’ve dealt with this—better than I ever could.
I wonder, briefly, if I should have reached out to them before this to try and figure out something with them then—maybe I could have gotten Lewis better help sooner if I had dared to get in touch with them.
But it’s not like I knew how it was going to turn out, and the risk had just seemed too huge at the time.
“Here, take a seat,” James murmurs, guiding me to a chair sitting just next to Lewis’s bed. “You should get some rest.”
“I’m fine, honestly,” I attempt, but I find that I’m yawning before I can even finish what I’m saying.
Ross smiles slightly, shaking his head. “No, you’re not,” he replies. “Get some sleep. We’ll wake you up if anything happens, okay?”
I nod, already feeling my eyes starting to grow heavy.
Normally, if my son was going through an attack like this, I would find it hard to switch off for days, constantly checking over him to see if he’s doing okay, to figure out if he needs anything, to check to see if there are any more signs of an oncoming issue.
But I know I can trust the guys to handle that for me. They have shown themselves over and over again to be capable in more ways than I’ve even given them credit for, and I intend to do everything in my power to show them how much I appreciate it.
Just as soon as I get a little sleep.
Before I know it, I find myself drifting off, and soon, a comfortable quiet rises up inside me and allows me to find some peace.