It’s been two days since the fire at the factory. Two days of Gina giving me the cold shoulder. Two days of Elizabeth and I not talking about what happened when I broke down in her arms.
Two days of me trying to figure out my life.
“You holding up okay?” Ethan asks after dinner.
My brothers thought I could use a night with family and friends after what happened. And I think the girls are using this as a chance to plan that baby shower Baylor was talking about.
I nod. “I’m fine.”
I don’t tell him I haven’t slept since that day. Not well, anyway. Because every time I close my eyes, I see Rosita. I see her burned and broken and trying to be strong so she could say goodbye to her husband. I see her telling me life is too short. I see her showing me just how true that is.
I hold my twenty-month-old nephew, Eli, on my lap and bounce him around. I take in his fine blonde hair, his chubby cheeks, and his hazel eyes and wonder what Elizabeth’s daughter will look like a year or two from now. Will she have blue eyes like her mother? Some shade of brown hair, perhaps?
Or will she resemble the bastard who helped make her, but who wasn’t man enough to stick around for the big show?
The past few sleepless nights, I’ve found myself wondering what life would be like if I brought Elizabeth and the baby home with me. What would my apartment look like with diapers, highchairs, and toys strewn across the floor?
It’s not something I’ve ever allowed myself to wonder.
I want kids, yes. But I’m not even twenty-eight years old. Not even a bonafide doctor yet. I have so much more I need to accomplish before I do that.
Like what? I ask myself.
Like becoming an attending. Like working in the ER for a few years and then opening my own clinic.
I stare at the cute kid drooling onto my lap. Who says I can’t do all that and this?
“Who, indeed,” I hear behind me.
I whip my head around to see Charlie standing over my shoulder, staring at me while I play with her son.
“Did I say that out loud?” I ask.
She laughs and sits down next to me. Eli reaches out for her and crawls onto her lap, yawning at the late hour.
“It’s okay, Kyle. You went through a very stressful situation. It’s only normal you’d readjust the way you look at the world. But I get the idea you were thinking about doing that even before the fire.”
I look at her and cock my head. “What do you mean?”
“Oh, come on. I’ve seen the way you look at Elizabeth. I’ve seen the way you touch her, Kyle. I’ve heard the way she talks about you. There is definitely something there if you want it to be.”
“You’ve been to see her a lot, Charlie. Has she ever said anything about the baby’s father?”
“No, she hasn’t. I don’t think she’s spoken to any of us about him.”
“It could be a big issue,” I say.
“Yes, it could be. Some of us do tend to have those,” she says, with a loving glance over at Ethan. “But you just have to figure out if those issues are worth overcoming.”
“How can I, if I don’t even know what they are?”
“Have you tried asking her outright?” she asks.
I shake my head. “No. She clams up whenever I make any references to her past. She’s got enough on her plate right now. Maybe after the baby comes she’ll be more willing to talk about it.”
“I’ll bet she will be,” Charlie says. “It’s amazing how having a child can make you want to change your entire world.”
A bottle of beer gets handed to me. It’s the same craft beer I brought Ethan a few weeks ago. I turn around and raise my eyebrows at him. “You do like it,” I say.
“It’s his favorite now,” Charlie whispers to me. “But don’t tell him I told you that.”
She puts Eli down for the night and then the girls get together and plan Elizabeth’s baby shower as the guys gather around the television to watch the sports highlights.
When the baseball reels come on, I can’t help my smile. When I see the Nighthawks won their game today, I might even shout out.
“Wait, what?” Griffin says with a sour face. “So now you’re a Hawks fan? Traitor.”
I toss a bottle cap at him. “How can I be a traitor when I’m not even from Ohio?”
“What’s wrong with the Hawks?” Mason asks Griffin. “Some of my good buddies are on that team.”
“What’s wrong with them is that they aren’t the Indians,” Griffin says.
“Care to make a friendly wager on who wins out at their next meeting?” Mason asks.
Gavin gets out his wallet. “I want in on this action,” he says. “I’m with Griffin. Put me down for a hundred on Cleveland.”
“Hell, yeah,” Chad says. “I’m good for a bill on my home team.”
“Wait.” I put a stop to their schoolyard betting. “You have friends on the Nighthawks?” I ask Mason. “Do you know number eight?”
“Kessler? Yeah. I’ve met him a couple of times. Had drinks with him a few weeks ago, when he and some of his teammates showed up at a Giants’ benefit. Why?”
The wheels in my head are spinning. “Is he the kind of guy who would do a favor for a friend?” I ask. “Like a big favor?”
“I don’t know,” he says. “Guess it depends on the favor.”
“Elizabeth, my pregnant patient in the hospital, loves the Hawks, and him in particular. She’s been stuck on bed rest for weeks and still has a while to go. Do you think—”
“Dude,” Chad says, interrupting me. “You want to impress your girlfriend by bringing her a baseball star?”
“Fuck you,” I say, shooting him a death stare. “She’s not my girlfriend, Chad. And if all I wanted to do was impress her, I’d have shown up in her hospital room with your sorry ass.”
While the guys share a laugh and continue to talk about their moronic bet, Mason pulls me to the side.
“I’ll give Caden a call,” he says. “How long will she be laid up?”
“Only until she has to deliver the baby. Could be tomorrow. Could be next week. The sooner he could get there, the better.”
“I’ll see what I can do,” he says.
“Thanks, man.”
“Not a problem,” Mason says, giving me a supportive squeeze of my shoulder. “Sometimes we have to pull out all the stops for the ones we think are worth it.” He looks across the room to his fiancée, Piper.
I look around at the couples sitting in Charlie and Ethan’s living room, thinking of all the shit they had to go through to get where they are today. My life has been a walk in the park compared to what some of them have endured.
Then I think of what Elizabeth is going through. What she might have gone through to get here. What I don’t ever want her to have to deal with again. And I know with one hundred percent certainly that she’s worth it.