Chapter Thirteen
Marin
I woke up holding Crew Donnelly’s hand in a hospital chair and immediately considered faking a coma.
Not a real coma.
A brief one.
A dignity coma.
The kind where a woman could pretend she had not voluntarily allowed her ex-boyfriend to hold her hand in the dark after specifically saying, You can hold my hand if you don’t make it weird.
Unfortunately, I had made it weird by waking up first.
Crew was asleep.
Mostly.
His head was tilted back against the wall, his hair rumpled, his jaw shadowed with exhaustion, and one long leg stretched slightly into the narrow space between our chairs. His hand still held mine.
Not tightly.
That was important.
Not like he was keeping me there.
Just there.
Warm.
Careful.
Too familiar.
Too new.
The room was dim except for the monitor glow and a thin line of pale morning pushing around the blinds. Tom slept in the hospital bed, one hand resting on the blanket Junie had sent upstairs. His breathing was steady.
Everything was steady.
Which made my heart’s behavior feel especially unnecessary.
I looked down at my hand in Crew’s.
His thumb rested lightly along the side of my knuckle. At some point while sleeping, my fingers had curled more securely around his.
Betrayal.
From my own hand.
I tried to loosen my fingers without waking him.
Crew’s hand shifted.
His eyes opened.
For one terrifying second, neither of us moved.
His gaze dropped to our hands.
Then lifted to my face.
He did not smile.
Smart man.
He did not say good morning.
Smarter.
He did not look smug, hopeful, tragic, or lighthouse-adjacent.
He just waited.
Giving me the choice to make the next move even while half asleep in a hospital room.
Infuriating.
Effective.
I pulled my hand free.
He let me.
Of course he did.
I rubbed my palm against my jeans like I could erase warmth.
I could not.
“Do not make eye contact about it,” I whispered.
Crew looked at the wall immediately.
“Okay.”
“That was too obedient.”
He kept looking at the wall. “Would you prefer difficult?”
“No.”
“Then I’m out of options.”
I bit the inside of my cheek.
Absolutely not.
No laughing before coffee.
Especially not at him.
Tom stirred in the bed.
Both of us froze like teenagers caught making out in a kitchen we were absolutely not making out in.
Tom opened one eye.
“Why is everyone whispering like I’m already dead?”
Crew leaned forward. “Dad.”
“I am hospitalized, not deaf.”
I sat straighter, smoothing my shirt like that would undo sleeping in a chair and making terrible emotional decisions.
“How do you feel?” I asked.
“Observed.”
“Medically.”
“Also observed.”
Crew exhaled through his nose.
Tom’s eye moved from him to me.
Then to the space between our chairs.
Then back to our faces.
No.
Absolutely not.
He had better not.
Tom’s mouth twitched.
He did.
“Sleep well?” he asked.
“No,” Crew and I said together.
Tom’s twitch turned into a smile.
I pointed at him.
“You are in a hospital bed. Behave accordingly.”
“I am. This is how I behave in hospital beds.”
“Poorly?”
“With charm.”
Crew rubbed both hands over his face. “Dad.”
Tom looked at him. “What? You look terrible. She looks slightly less terrible. I’m trying to boost morale.”
“Insulting patients’ visitors does not boost morale,” I said.
“It does if the visitor has known me long enough to know I mean it lovingly.”
The words landed softer than they should have.
Known me long enough.
I had.
I knew Tom’s coffee order. His drawer of spare batteries. His hatred of weak tape. His favorite church potluck casserole. The way he pretended not to tear up during the national anthem and then claimed wind damage to his eyes.
I knew him.
And he had asked me to stay in his life.
For him.
Not for Crew.
The memory tugged at my ribs.
I looked away and pretended to check the water cup on the side table.
“Drink,” I told him.
Tom sighed. “Morning tyranny.”
“Correct.”
He drank.
Crew watched him like every swallow was a tiny verdict.
I saw that too.
I wished I did not see so much.
It was easier to be furious when Crew was abstractly guilty. Harder when he sat exhausted in a chair, looking at his father like he could keep him alive through attention alone.
A nurse came in before the room could get too quiet. She checked vitals, adjusted a monitor lead, and said the doctor would round soon. Tom’s numbers looked steadier. Labs were being reviewed. Observation had been uneventful, which in hospital language meant boring in a good way.
Boring in a good way became my new favorite phrase.
When the nurse left, Crew’s phone buzzed.
He looked at the screen and went still.
I knew.
Coach.
He turned the phone toward me without being asked.
Progress could be very rude when it arrived before coffee.
The message preview read:
Coach Gordon: Call when you can. Need to confirm schedule.
Crew looked at me.
I looked at the screen.
The clock had started again.
Tom noticed.
“Coach?” he asked.
Crew nodded.
“Call him,” Tom said.
“Now?”
“No, next Christmas. Yes, now.”
Crew’s jaw tightened. “You’re in a hospital bed.”
“And unless your coach is hiding in my IV line, that is unrelated.”
“Dad.”
Tom looked at me. “Marin, tell my son he cannot prevent my medical events by avoiding leadership calls.”
I blinked.
“Do not drag me into Donnelly stubbornness before breakfast.”
“You’re already in it.”
Unfair.
True.
Crew looked at me.
Not asking exactly.
But not not asking.
I rubbed my tired eyes.
“Call him,” I said.
Crew’s expression tightened.
“If he says you have to leave early, better to know.”
That one hurt on the way out.
It showed.
I hated that it showed.
Crew saw it.
Of course he did.
His voice came low.
“I’ll tell you what he says.”
I swallowed.
“Good.”
Tom pointed toward the hallway. “Call.”
Crew stood.
He hesitated near the door.
Then looked back at me.
Not with a promise.
Not with a plea.
Just truth.
“I’ll come back.”
My chest tightened.
A simple sentence.
A loaded one.
I nodded.
“Okay.”
He left.
The door clicked softly behind him.
Tom was quiet for three seconds.
A personal record.
Then he said, “That boy looks at you like he lost his map and found the road again.”
I closed my eyes.
“Tom.”
“I’m hospitalized. You have to be gentle with me.”
“I will unplug something.”
“No, you won’t.”
“No,” I admitted. “But I’ll think about it with passion.”
Tom smiled faintly.
Then his face softened.
“Thank you for staying.”
I looked at him.
No jokes this time.
No easy place to put it.
“You scared me.”
“I know.”
“Don’t do that again.”
“I’ll make a note.”
“I’m serious.”
“So am I.”
His eyes held mine.
The monitor beeped steadily beside him.
He looked smaller than he had in Honeybrook. Not weak. Just human in a way he usually refused to display. Seeing him like this felt like finding a crack in the town monument and realizing the monument had been a person all along.
“I don’t like hospitals,” I said.
“Most sane people don’t.”
“I don’t like not knowing things.”
“That you have in common with my son.”
“I know.”
Tom watched me too carefully.
“What?” I asked.
“You and Crew are very different until you’re exactly the same.”
“That sounds insulting.”
“It is mostly diagnostic.”
“I reject the diagnosis.”
“You both think being useful is safer than being honest.”
I stared at him.
He stared back.
Hospital beds did not make him less dangerous. They gave him time.
“I was honest last night,” I said.
“Yes.”
“It was awful.”
“Yes.”
“I hated it.”
“Usually a sign you did it right.”
I slumped back in the chair.
“That is a terrible system.”
“Agreed.”
The room settled.
Tom’s gaze moved to the window, where morning light had brightened to gray-blue.
“I knew he was scared before he left,” he said quietly.
I turned toward him.
He did not look at me.
“He hid it well. Too well. I let him because I was scared too.”
My hands tightened in my lap.
Tom continued, “I thought if I made my health smaller, his future could stay big. That was foolish.”
“It was.”
His mouth twitched sadly.
“You always did come direct.”
“You used to say that like a compliment.”
“It still is.”
I looked at his profile.
The proud nose. The silver hair. The lines around his eyes.
“You hurt me too,” I said.
He closed his eyes.
“I know.”
“I was angry at Crew for leaving. But I kept you. In my heart, I mean. I kept you as safe.”
His face tightened.
“And then I found out you were part of the silence.”
“I know.”
“That made everything feel less safe.”
He turned his head then.
His eyes were wet.
“I am sorry,” he said.
No defense.
No charm.
No gravity-assisted nonsense.
Just sorry.
I nodded because words were crowding my throat.
Tom reached out.
I took his hand.
It felt older than it used to.
Still warm.
Still Tom.
“I don’t want to lose you,” he said.
A tear slipped before I could stop it.
I wiped it with my free hand, irritated.
“These hospital allergies are ridiculous.”
Tom smiled through his own tears.
“Terrible ventilation.”
I squeezed his hand.
“You won’t lose me.”
His eyes closed briefly.
“But,” I said.
He opened them.
“I am allowed to be mad.”
“Yes.”
“And I am allowed to ask questions.”
“Yes.”
“And if you get medical news, you tell me what you’re comfortable telling me. You do not decide silence is kinder.”
Tom nodded.
“I promise.”
The word sat between us.
I believed him.
That hurt too.
Because believing people after they hurt you did not feel like a sunrise. It felt like stepping onto a floor you knew had cracked before and listening hard.
Crew returned ten minutes later.
His face told me nothing.
Which told me enough to worry.
Tom looked at him.
“Well?”
Crew shut the door behind him.
He held his phone in one hand.
“I talked to Coach.”
I sat up straighter.
Tom did too, though he tried to hide it.
Crew noticed.
“Don’t sit up like that.”
“Don’t captain me from the doorway.”
Crew crossed the room, jaw tense.
“The leadership meetings are Monday.”
Monday.
Today was Wednesday.
The Fourth was Saturday.
Monday was after.
Barely.
My breath loosened and tightened at the same time.
After the Fourth.
Still leaving.
Not early.
But soon.
“He wanted me back Saturday night,” Crew said.
The breath I had just taken vanished.
Tom swore softly.