“What? More like child support? That’s the point. You’ve done this on your own for ten years. I have a lot to make up for.”
Rose sighed and folded her hands in her lap. “I just don’t want to be—”
“We’re ba-ack!” the nurse announced, rolling Joey back to his bed.
They both leaped up and hovered anxiously as the nurse helped Joey back onto the hospital bed. “How did everything go?” Xander asked.
“Fine. The doctor should be in to talk to you guys in just a minute. Then, after that, I’m pretty sure the casting crew will be here.” The nurse turned to Joey. “Start thinking about what color wrap you want. We have bright blue, neon green, red, hot pink—” she wrinkled her nose and shook her head “—and construction-cone-orange.”
“So it’s broken?” Rose asked.
“I’m not a doctor, so I’m not supposed to say, but between you and me...oh, yeah.”
The nurse disappeared with the wheelchair, leaving Rose, Joey and Xander alone together for the first time. He didn’t really think about that until he heard Joey ask Rose a question.
“Mom?” he whispered in an attempt to be sneaky, but it was loud enough to hear down the hallway. “Who is that man? Was he your date?”
“Oh,” Rose said, putting on her best smile. “I’m sorry, baby. I was too worried about your arm. Joey, this is Mr. Langston. And yes, he was my date. We went to high school together a long time ago.”
Xander frowned at the super-formal use of his name for the second time tonight. It was bad enough for Rose to do it. He didn’t want his son calling him that, too. “You can just call me Xander.”
“Xander?” Joey said, his eyes wide. “I wouldn’t even know how to spell that.”
“No worries,” he said. “There won’t be a test.”
“Good,” Joey said with a wide smile that was so much like his own at that age. There was even a hint of his same dimple in his left cheek.
The first moment he’d laid eyes on Joey, he’d known the truth. There were pieces of both him and Heath at that age in the boy. His brother had better well not be the father of his ex-girlfriend’s baby, so that left only one answer.
It had actually thrown him for a loop seeing Joey lying in that hospital bed. Xander hadn’t been with his parents the night of their car accident. He had been spending the night at a friend’s house after going to see the latest superhero movie. Heath had been with them, though.
The next morning, his friend’s parents had brought him to the hospital, not quite sure what to do with the child who’d become an orphan while they’d watched him overnight. His father had been killed immediately and his mother had been on life support in a coma she wouldn’t wake up from. Heath had been in stable condition, but he had been hurt pretty badly—a broken leg, a laceration across his forehead and a few cracked ribs.
When he’d gone into the hospital room and seen Joey for the first time, he’d looked just like Heath had. He’d almost had a flashback to the most traumatic moment of his life in that instant. And then to realize that it wasn’t his brother lying there but his son...
“How are we feeling, Joey?” The doctor stepped in, X-rays gripped tightly in his hands.
“I think the medicine is starting to wear off,” Joey said, favoring his arm.
“We’ll get you some more. But first let’s talk about what you managed to do to yourself.”
The doctor flipped on the light panel and threw one of the X-rays up onto it. Xander wasn’t a medical professional, but even he could see the slight displacement of one bone and the crack in the other bone of his forearm.
“You’ve given your radius a good whack. Cracked your ulna, too. The good news is you won’t need surgery. This should come back together just fine with a cast. And since you’re right-handed, this shouldn’t interfere as badly with daily activities. You’ll have a cast for a few weeks, and then we can switch you into a brace. The bad news is, I’m afraid this baseball season may be over before you can play again.”
Joey’s face tightened as he tried not to show how upset he was. He was determined to be a man and not cry, but clearly he wanted to. Xander understood. Baseball had been his life at that age. Losing it when his parents died had been just one more tragedy piled on the rest. At least his son would get to play next season.
“I’ll bet they’ll save me a good seat to watch from the dugout,” Joey offered cheerfully, his lower lip barely quivering as he held in his disappointment.