The two of us sat there in silence as the doctor came back into the room. And sure enough, we had us scheduled for Thursday morning at eight. In two days, Hayden would go under the knife and none of us knew if he would make it out alive.
And the thing about it?
Hayden didn’t seem to care.
Chapter Fourteen
Hayden
“You aren’t staying.”
“You don’t have a choice in the matter,” Grace said.
“I’ll be fine. I’m in the best doctor’s care for this.”
“Doesn’t matter. I’m not going anywhere.”
“You aren’t needed until I get home.”
“You keep telling me I’m not needed, and then you call on me thirty minutes later. For all I know, you’ll wake up in the middle of the surgery and demand a cup of coffee,” she said.
“You’re not staying.”
“You don’t have a choice. You’ll be out in twenty minutes anyway. So focus on that,” she said.
Grace was stubborn, and the last couple of days had been rough. Every time I turned around, that woman was angry at something. And it wasn’t doing wonders for my mindset for this surgery. For a nurse who touted that my mental state was important, she sure was doing a number on it.
“Okay, Miss Hunter. It’s time to get him into the O.R.”
Grace reached out for my hand and squeezed it, then she turned around and left. The doctors rolled me down the hallway and into the freezing room, and the last thing I remembered was being asked to count down backwards from ten.
And when I woke up, the pain was unbearable.
“Breathe, Hayden. Deep breaths.”
Grace?
Was that Grace’s voice?
I heard footsteps around me and people poking me with different instruments. Tears were welling in my eyes as the pain ricocheted up my side. It felt like I’d been hit by that damn car again. Like my body had been catapulted off the side of the Empire State Building. I felt someone petting my head as people pulled up the sheets tha
t covered my body, and soon a wave of pain caused me to heave.
“There you go. That’s it. Let it out.”
Grace.
With her fingers running through my hair.
I wasn’t sure how long the surgery had been or if I was even alive. There were times where there was nothing but darkness and then there were times where I could hear my mother’s voice. My sister’s voice.
Grace’s voice.
“You sure you’re talking about our Hayden?” my sister asked.
“I am. He was stubborn in the beginning, but he warmed up to things. I’ve gotten him out to see two movies,” Grace said.
“I can’t believe it. I couldn’t even get him to move away from the window,” my mother said.