Chapter 20 Dorian
CHAPTER TWENTY
Dorian
I pace the narrow chapel like the floor might crack open beneath me if I stand still too long.
Rows of wooden pews stretch toward a simple altar, all sharp edges and dull varnish, the kind of place meant for comfort but somehow makes my skin itch.
I don’t come here to pray. I came because I needed walls around me to keep myself from unraveling, and the chapel felt like the only place in this entire hospital where no one would try to pat my shoulder or offer some line about hope.
But the moment I stop walking, everything I’ve held back presses in. My mother must have been so scared last night. The thought pulses through my skull in a way that makes it hard to breathe.
I drag in a slow inhale, grounding myself, and pull my phone from my pocket.
Still nothing from Norah.
I swipe through the call log. Four calls last night. Three more early morning. All straight to voicemail.
I can’t tell if she turned her phone off or if she just didn’t want to hear from me, and both options scrape at something raw inside my chest.
The chapel door opens with a metallic scrape. An elderly couple steps inside. Their arms are looped together, their cheeks damp, their clothes rumpled like they left the house in a panic.
The woman presses her face into the man’s shoulder, trying to contain her sobs, and the sight sinks into me with a sharp twist.
This room belongs to them more than it does to me.
I slip out without making a sound.
The hallway outside is all harsh hospital lighting and a faint antiseptic smell that clings to my tongue. I move toward the waiting area outside the surgical wing.
Beige walls. Plastic plants. A vending machine humming beside a row of uncomfortable chairs.
Waiting. Thinking. Falling apart in slow motion.
Her surgery is taking longer than they told me it would.
I check my phone again. I don’t know why. The screen stays blank except for a notification from the only person who has reached out: my boss.
Conference call with the Berlin team at 8 a.m. tomorrow. Don’t forget.
My jaw locks. I press the heel of my hand against my chest, pushing down the ache that keeps rising every time I think about how damn alone I am here.
If something had happened—if I’d lost her last night—I would have stood in this same hallway with no one to call, no one to lean on, no one to witness the moment my world collapsed.
Even now, the only person I spoke to was Anna, Mom’s nurse, and she left for home hours ago after making sure I knew exactly what would happen post-surgery. She hugged me before she left, warm and brief, and even that small contact almost shattered me.
I scroll back to Norah’s name. Her number sits there like a pulse.
I tapped out messages between pacing, between talking to doctors, between trying to keep my lungs working. Messages she hasn’t seen. Or has seen and not replied to.
I shouldn’t care. But I do.
My phone buzzes in my hand.
For a moment, my breath snags. I think it might be Norah, but the notification banner shows the hospital’s automated system. My stomach drops.
Then I hear my name—or rather, my mother’s name.
A doctor stands a short distance away, scanning the waiting room with a clipboard in hand. His scrubs have a pale smudge along one thigh, and his hair is tucked behind his ears like he has run his fingers through it multiple times.
“Family of Margaret James?”
I step toward him. “I’m her son. Dorian.”
He nods once. “The surgery went as expected, though it took a little longer because of her bone density. When she lost her balance and went down, she fractured her hip in two places. Calling the ambulance when you did made a huge difference. Any delay and complications would have stacked up fast.”
Something inside me loosens enough that my knees almost give out. I grip the chair beside me until my fingers tingle.
“She’s alive?” My voice comes out rough, low, and strained.
“She’s stable for now,” he says carefully.
“We’ve moved her to recovery. She’ll be groggy for a while.
” He pauses, his expression tightening. “Her MS is progressing more rapidly than we’d like.
I know she has a home nurse, but we need to discuss long-term care options soon. Not this minute. But soon.”
The words land like a blow I half-expected but still can’t brace against.
They want to take my mother out of her home.
I swallow hard. “I’ll talk to her nurse. We’ll figure something out.”
The doctor gives a thoughtful nod. “For now, she’s resting. I’ll come get you once she’s fully moved.”
He walks away, leaving a trail of tension behind him that I inhale like smoke.
The moment he disappears around the corner, everything inside me snaps open.
My throat burns. My vision blurs. The air in my lungs escapes in a jagged rush I can’t control.
Tears push down my face before I can stop them, hot and fast, tracking along my jaw and dripping onto the front of my shirt.
She’s alive.
After everything—after the fall, the ambulance ride, the endless hours of not knowing—I still have her. The thought takes me apart. I press my palms to my face, trying to block the flood, but it pours through anyway.
I sink onto one of the plastic chairs. My breath comes uneven, shallow. I bend forward, elbows on my knees, letting the kind of tears fall that I never allow anyone else to see.
Tears I’ve swallowed for years. Tears I’ve forced myself to bury every time her illness worsened, every time a doctor told me she’d need more help, every time I felt the ground shifting beneath us and tried to pretend I could keep everything from collapsing.
She’s alive.
I repeat it silently until the storm inside me settles enough to let air in again.
A few minutes pass. Maybe more. I sit there until the trembling in my hands slows, until my lungs stop clawing for control. Then I pull myself upright, drag my palms down my face, and force the tears to stop.
I need to be strong when they let me see her. Not shattered. Not shaking.
I push up from the chair and walk to the small window near the nurses’ station. Outside, dawn is creeping over the parking lot in long bands of pink and orange.
Cars move in and out of the drop-off zone. Nurses change shifts. A couple argues near the curb. Life keeps going.
I check my phone again.
Still nothing from Norah.
I tilt my head back against the wall and stare at the tiles overhead. I don’t blame her. She owes me nothing.
But her silence lands in the same place my loneliness does—in the empty spot that expands every time I remember how many nights I sat with my mother through muscle spasms, choking spells, memory lapses.
Nights when I held her hand and told her I was there, even when she didn’t always recognize me right away.
I rub the bridge of my nose. My eyes sting from exhaustion. My shirt smells like hospital sheets and stress. The button at my collar digs into my throat.
I wish Norah were here.
The thought hits me out of nowhere, but it’s true. She would have soothed the jagged edges inside me.
Or maybe she wouldn’t. Maybe I’m imagining that. But the idea stays.
A nurse in pale-blue scrubs approaches, her expression warm but brisk. “You’re Margaret’s son?”
I straighten. “Yes.”
“You can see her now. She’s groggy, but she’s awake.”
The breath I let out feels like a release valve being pulled.
I follow the nurse down the corridor. Machines beep in distant rooms. A stretcher rolls past, pushed by two orderlies. My shoes tap against the linoleum in a steady rhythm that almost calms me.
We reach her room. The nurse pushes the door open.
Mom rests on the bed, head propped slightly, hair flattened on one side. Her skin looks pale, but her eyes open when she hears me. A soft, tired smile curves her lips.
“Dorian,” she whispers.
I move to her bedside, pulling the chair close. “Hey, Mom.”
I take her hand. It feels smaller than it used to. Her fingers curl around mine with the faintest pressure.
“I didn’t want to scare you,” she murmurs.
“You didn’t scare me,” I lie too easily. “I just needed to get you help.”
She looks at me for a long moment, her eyes clearer than I expect. “You’ve always taken care of me.”
I swallow the lump forming in my throat. “That’s not changing.”
She traces her thumb against my knuckle. “You look exhausted.”
“I’m fine.”
“You say that even when you’re breaking.”
Her words land too close to the truth, and I glance toward the window, trying to pull myself back together. The nurse steps out, giving us space.
Mom sighs softly. “You know… you’re allowed to have a life.”
I shake my head. “We’re not having that talk today. You just came out of surgery.”
She gives a faint smile, the kind that shows she won’t push it further—for now.
We sit like that for several minutes. Her thumb moves along my hand in a rhythm that reminds me of childhood.
The ache in my chest pulls tighter, but this time it doesn’t hurt. It warms instead. She’s alive. She’s here. That’s what matters.
Eventually, she drifts off again, breathing deep and even. I stay sitting, holding her hand, thumbing the inside of her wrist the way she did mine.
When I finally step out of the room, the hallway feels brighter. My shoulders loosen. My heartbeat calms. I stand there a moment, letting the hospital noise wash over me.
I’ll deal with the facility talk. I’ll deal with work. I’ll deal with everything else when it comes.
For now, I still have her.
I pull my phone out once more, not really expecting anything.
Norah still hasn’t replied.
But for the first time since last night, the silence doesn’t squeeze my lungs shut.
I take a slow breath, lean against the wall outside my mother’s room, and wait for permission to go back in, ready to stay as long as she needs me.