Chapter Three
Wren
WAKING UP, IT takes me a minute to realize where I am.
I’m in a hospital room. The sterile smell and beeping machines alert me to that fact without me having to look around.
I’m alone in the room, but that’s not surprising at all.
No one is ever with me. In no time at all, everything rushes back to me.
The fire. Pulling the man from danger. Him putting a chain in my hand and saying the word ‘Fury’.
I have no clue what that means, but I’m sure someone will.
I’m just not sure who I could ask about it.
That’s something to think about another time though as the pain finally registers in my body.
My chest burns and my throat feels raw. There’s a nasty as hell taste in my mouth and it’s so damn dry.
I believe I was hit with debris from the explosion in my back and it hurts.
The back of my upper thigh also hurts really bad.
Even my eyes burn slightly. I feel as if I went ten rounds with a boxer and I was definitely on the losing end of the fight.
I’m not sure what happened after I fell on top of the man other than I do remember hearing shouting and two names.
Did I leave someone else in the fire and explosion?
So many more questions rush through my mind as I try to recall more details about what happened.
I don’t even know how long I’ve been passed out or in a hospital.
The last time I was in the hospital, I wasn’t the patient.
Tristan, my former foster brother, was that time.
He was injured in a football game. They thought he broke his leg when he was tackled wrong, but that wasn’t the case.
He somehow injured his knee and had to be put in a brace and use crutches for several weeks before starting physical therapy for the injury.
Tristan missed the rest of the season that year, but he was able to play the next one.
Zach and him were on fire together on the football field.
They could read one another better than anyone else and make plays I thought looked impossible.
Every single game I attended, I was amazed by their performance.
Tristan was always the more outgoing of the two of them, preferring the spotlight.
It made him the perfect quarterback in my mind.
He could throw the ball anywhere and Zach could always find a spot on the field the defense wasn’t able to get to in time.
I smile when I think of that night and the chaos Zach created.
Zach and I were finally allowed back in the exam room with Tristan.
He’s been here for over an hour and we’ve had to wait in the waiting room while they perform their initial assessment of his injury.
I’d say he broke his leg, but I wasn’t close enough to see what really happened when he got hurt.
I’ve been sitting next to Zach with fear and panic filling me because football means the world to Tristan.
He’s the happiest on the field or preparing for each game.
It’s the only time he truly focuses on something and I worry he’s about to lose it all.
“You guys are here,” Tristan says, a forced smile on his face as Zach and I enter the room we were shown.
“We’ve been here,” Zach informs him, still wearing his football uniform because he left the game when Tristan did. Neither one of us were going to let him be alone while he was in the hospital.
I take the seat next to Tristan’s bed and start fussing over him.
I pull up the blankets higher on his body so he won’t get cold and move his helmet from the bed next to him and place it on the small table next to the bed.
He rolls his eyes, but lets me make a big deal out of taking care of him.
Tristan won’t ever tell me no because he knows this is how I deal when I’m scared in certain situations.
Zach is standing behind me when a doctor walks back in the room. Tristan’s entire body immediately tenses as he grabs my hand and holds it tight in his much larger one.
“We’ll need to get different imaging done.
There’s no injury to your leg as we first suspected.
At this point, we believe it might be your knee that’s injured.
It’s hard to tell because the swelling starts in your lower thigh and goes down to your shin.
Someone will come get you in a few minutes,” the doctor informs us and I watch as Tristan’s face falls because a knee injury is so much worse than a broken leg.
In a matter of hours, he could be told he’ll never play football again.
Zach moves from behind me as Tristan continues holding my hand.
I watch as Zach crosses the room and begins to start looking through all the cupboards and drawers.
He pulls out gloves and blows them up before tying them off and tossing them at Tristan.
There’s nothing he’s not touching and inspecting.
When he finds the blankets, he turns to look at Tristan and me with a smile on his face.
It’s rare to see Zach smile, but since it’s the three of us alone in the room, he’ll smile and laugh.
“You warm enough, Tris? Wren, do you think he’s warm enough?
Do we need to get him a few hundred more blankets because you’re freezin’ so you think we are too?
” Zach questions us as I start laughing because he’s not wrong.
The boys always tease me about being so cold on a daily basis.
They could be wearing shorts and no shirts while I’m wearing jeans and a long sleeve shirt and still cold.
“I’m warm enough, Zach. Wren doesn’t need to worry,” Tristan answers him while I continue laughing at their facial expressions.
“I think he needs five hundred more blankets so he’s warm enough. Maybe half of them could be those heated blankets people are lucky enough to get some times,” I respond as the guys start laughing even harder.
“If you did that to me, I’d feel like I’m in a damn sauna or somethin’, Wren. You’re really gonna make me suffer like that?” Tristan asks me as I adjust the pillow under his injured leg so he looks more comfortable.
“No, I wouldn’t do that to you. I promise,” I tell them as Zach resumes looking through all the drawers.
“What the hell is this?” he asks, causing Tristan and I to turn in his direction.
I start laughing my ass off because Zach has no clue he’s holding a speculum right now. He’s going to be so disgusted.
“You really don’t wanna know what that is, Zach. I promise you that,” I tell him as he moves the speculum closer to his face for a closer look and I start laughing even harder. Tristan just looks at me as if I’m crazy when I’m not. He’s about to lose his mind.
“Why don’t I wanna know what it is? I’ve never seen anythin’ like this before,” he asks me, turning an innocent look in my direction.
“That’s a speculum, Zach. It’s used when doctors have to perform a pelvic exam on a woman. It’s inserted somewhere to help them,” I say as delicately as I possibly can.
Zach hesitates for a few seconds before releasing the item.
His face is a mask of complete horror and disgust as we all watch the speculum drop from his hand.
It lands hard back into the drawer he pulled it out of and I hear it break.
The sound is so loud in the silent room and I jump slightly because I wasn’t expecting it to be that noisy.
“Are you fuckin’ kiddin’ me?” he questions, running to the sink and turning on the hot water. He doesn’t even use the cold as he shoves his hands in the steady stream.
Tristan and I start laughing so hard tears are falling while Zach bitches and moans about disgusting shit he picks up in the name of humor. Zach literally washes his hands fifteen times before moving on to his face. He’s gagging at this point and I worry he’s about to be sick in the sink.
“You okay over there, Zach?” Tristan asks him as I look up to find him looking for something to clean his mouth with.
“No, I’m not, Tristan. This is not funny at all. Why the hell didn’t you tell me to drop that shit as soon as you saw it, Wren?” he questions me in mock anger.
“I didn’t know you were gonna give it such a thorough exam, Zach. If you weren’t going through all the shit in here, you never would have touched it to begin with. You boys are impossible,” I say in fake exasperation because I could never be mad at either one of them.
“I’m never gonna do that shit again,” Zach mumbles, finally shutting off the water and drying himself off before taking a seat next to me.
The three of us talk while we wait for someone to come get Tristan for his next test. Mrs. Smythe knows we’re here and is on her way. She was asleep when I called so I know it will take a while for her to show up. That’s okay because Zach and I have Tristan. We always take care of one another.
Tristan and I used to tease him all the time about touching it and putting it close to his face.
Zach would always rush off to take a shower the second we reminded him of the incident.
Those two made each day special and we always shared a million laughs.
Even Mrs. Smythe found the situation funny and we’d find her randomly laughing when she was alone.
It sent all of us into a fit of giggles.
Zach wasn’t impressed, but he didn’t bitch about it either.
He simply became the butt of the joke and let us have our fun.
If it had bothered him, we never would have brought it up again.
The three of us always loved to make Mrs. Smythe laugh.
Especially on the days she was struggling.
Something would remind her of a time with her husband and it would ruin the day for her.
We all understood it and did our best to be extra helpful those days.
That’s when the boys would pull pranks on one another and do everything they could think of to make her laugh and pull out of her grief.
Those two were sent to her for that reason alone I believe.
Those were the times we really got to see a side of Zach no one else did.
The playful, loving side. To everyone else, he was an asshole with no emotion or feelings.
I’m thankful I got to witness that side of him.
Zach was also the one who would give the best hugs and be there when the world was falling down around you.
I really miss those two boys every single day and I hope they’re living their best life.
Pulling from the thoughts of my foster brothers, I hear a knock on the door before it opens to reveal a doctor and nurse walking in my room.
“Good morning. I’m Dr. Tucker and I’ve been taking care of you since you arrived yesterday. How are you feeling today?” he asks me as the nurse steps up to take my vitals again.
“I feel like I lost against a boxer. Do I have a lot of injuries?” I ask him, trying not to move as the blood pressure cuff squeezes my arm.
“All of your injuries are superficial. Cuts and bruises on the back of your body. The bruising will take the longest to heal. We cleaned all of your wounds and made sure none of them needed stitches. There’s extensive bruising on your back and upper thighs.
Your lungs are also irritated from the smoke inhalation.
We’re going to keep a close eye on that to ensure it doesn’t turn into pneumonia.
There’s one more thing we discovered when we were examining you yesterday.
Did you know you’re pregnant? About two months if I had to guess based on your levels,” the doctor asks me and I can’t answer him right away because that’s the last thing I expected to hear.
“Um, are you sure I’m pregnant?” I question the doctor as I look up at him.
“Yes. We can perform an ultrasound to ensure nothing happened to the baby yesterday. I can schedule it for a few hours from now,” Dr. Tucker says with a gentle smile on his face.
“Please,” I say, getting lost in my head because I don’t know where to find the father of the baby. I definitely know who it is considering that was the one and only time I’ve ever had sex. “Can you tell me where the chain I was given ended up? Is it here with me?”
“It is. We put it in the drawer on the stand next to you,” Dr. Tucker answers me.
The doctor examines me before the nurse and him leave me alone once again.
As soon as the door shuts behind them, tears are falling from my eyes.
I never really allowed myself to think about having a family of my own the last few years.
It’s been all I can do to get through each day in one piece.
Now, I’m adding a baby to the mix. Fear consumes me because I’m all alone and my son or daughter won’t have a dad.
Judge obviously won’t want anything to do with this baby, the way he left the second we were done tells me all I need to know about him and the situation.
“I promise you I’ll love you more than enough for a mommy and daddy, Little One.
I’ll protect you, support you, and raise you the best I can.
You won’t ever question if I want you because it’s not even a question.
I just found out and I have no clue how I’m going to make this work, but I’ll figure it out,” I say to my stomach as I rest my hands on it over top of the blankets covering me.
“It’s definitely time to leave Briar Glen behind so I can find a better life than the one I’ve been existing in. ”
I lay back and stare at the ceiling of my hospital room.
A list starts to form in my mind of everything I have to do in the next few weeks.
The most important one is securing a new apartment somewhere once I leave Briar Glen behind.
Then I have to find a job that doesn’t pay shit.
I’ll have to find a doctor, start buying things a little at a time for the baby, and make sure I always have enough food to ensure my baby grows properly.
I’m so used to not eating and I’ve already done that more than a few times when I didn’t know I was pregnant.
Now, everything is different and I have to make the necessary changes in my life.