Overnight Wife(45)

A better version of me.

And now… My heart leaps. A huge smile breaks out across my face. She’s pregnant. My wife is pregnant. We’re going to have a baby together.

But as soon as the news hits me, an alternate, terrifying thought occurs. Because I remember her injury, the stretcher. What if something happened? What if she’s hurt worse than the paramedics thought? What if…?

I can’t even allow myself to finish the thought. I refuse. Instead, I stuff the envelope back into Mara’s purse with the rest of her things and practically sprint toward the parking lot. I need to get to the hospital. I need to make sure my wife and our baby—our baby, oh my God, we’re having a baby—are safe. I need to protect my family. Because now, no matter what happens, they come first, always.





15





Mara





“Mara?”

The voice is far off, far away from me, somewhere floating in my subconscious. It’s familiar, reassuring. But I don’t need to worry. Not here, not where I am. I’m lying in a field of tall grass, on a picnic blanket, cradled in my favorite place in the world—against John’s chest, with his arms around me, protective, secure. Beside us on the blanket, a smiling little ball of joy beams up at us, gurgling happily. Our baby, I know, without needing to be told. That’s our child, with us.

We’re a family. Whole and complete.

It’s a beautiful dream. A happy one.

“Mara!”

So why is somebody interrupting it? I shift against John’s chest and lean back to look up at him. His mouth moves, his lips forming words.

“Mara, can you hear me?”

It’s John’s voice I’m hearing, I realize, belatedly, somewhere in a distant part of my brain that’s slowly clawing its way back to reality. Back to consciousness, and to a world I thought I’d checked out of for the time being. I shift my body, and groan at the feeling. I can feel bruises all over me. My whole left side flares with pain, it’s hard to move my left arm, and my head throbs like crazy, as if someone stuck the whole thing in a giant wood press, crushing my brain between two hard blocks.

“Mara, honey.” John’s voice sounds a little louder now, a little clearer. I roll toward him, moaning softly, and I feel his fingers twine through mine. Not the John of my dream, hazy and imagined, but the real one. Here, with me, beside me.

My eyelids flutter, and the bright white lights overhead spark a whole new rush of pain throughout my body. I groan again, louder this time, and I hear other voices now. Unfamiliar ones, male and female, murmuring something.

“—gaining consciousness, that’s a good sign. Mrs. Walloway, can you hear me?”

My eyelids flutter again, and the hospital room swims into sudden, painfully intense focus. There’s John, propped in a chair beside my bed, his hand wrapped around mine. My free hand is covered in bandages, attached to an IV. Something beeps somewhere over my head.

I blink, and another figure swims into view. A female doctor, flanked by two male interns, squinting at my chart. Before I can register anything else, John wraps his arms around me, crushing me to him.

“Thank God,” he murmurs against my hair, kissing my cheek, my jawline, the corner of my mouth, until the doctor laughs softly.

“Mr. Walloway, please, let your wife breathe,” she says.

But when he releases me, it feels harder to breathe than it was with his arms wrapped around me. Still, he doesn’t let go of my hand, and I hold onto it for dear life as I blink around the room, still trying to get my bearings. It comes back to me in flashes.

The ominous creak of that set piece overhead. Bianca’s wide-eyed stare, her soft gasp. Me colliding with her, and then my head hitting the floor.

I don’t remember anything after that.

“That was quite a knock to the head you took,” the doctor is saying softly, and leans in to peer at my face. “Look at me, please.”

I do, and am rewarded with a sudden sharp flash of pen light directly into my eyes. I groan in protest.

“Good dilation response,” she murmurs, checking my other eye quickly, before she grips my chin and turns my head left and right. “Any pain, Mrs. Walloway?”

“Yeah,” I groan, my voice coming out scratchy and thin. “I feel like my head is in a vice grip.”

“Hmm. We’ll give you another dose of Ibuprofen soon,” she says. “What do you remember? Any gaps in your memory?”

“I remember pushing Bianca out of the way of the crash… then… I think I hit my head.” I frown. “Did I pass out?”

The doctor nods. John looks furious suddenly, though not at me. It looks like he wants to punch something, though. Probably he’s mad about the set collapse, or the negligence of whoever let that rope fray so badly before they hoisted up something so heavy on it.

I push the thought away. The doctor is talking again, and with an effort, I focus on what she’s saying.

“I don’t want to give you anything too strong, painkiller-wise, given your condition, but so far Ibuprofen seems like it should do the trick. You’ll let me know, though, if you have any discomfort…”

Condition. My gaze drops from hers, toward my stomach. Oh God. John. He doesn’t know yet. I glance at him, fear and worry warring in my mind. “John, there’s something I need to tell you,” I start, but he shushes me with a finger to my lips, leaning in to kiss my temple. It helps soothe the throb there, at least a little bit.