I nod and try to lift him, but his scream chills me to my core. “C—call an ambulance. Please. Someone call.”
Rowan jumps to her feet and rushes out of the room. Pappy ushers Kade and Seren out after her.
I’ve never felt so helpless in my entire life.
It’s an eternity before Rowan returns, but when she does, she lowers her face to Miles and whispers comforting words in his ear while rubbing his back.
The next few minutes pass with agonizing slowness, until finally, paramedics enter the room with a stretcher. Rowan is the one who speaks to them. She tells them about the scream and everything that’s happened since. She mentions that he fell asleep in the middle of a party, something I hadn’t even thought twice about.
I hold his hand as they load him up but have to release it so they can get him down the stairs. Rowan and I rush outside, each holding his hand on either side until we reach the ambulance.
“Are you his parents?” the paramedic asks as they load Miles into the back.
“I—I am,” I choke out.
The man looks between us and nods. “Immediate family only. You can come with us,” he says, pointing to me.
My gaze darts from him to Rowan. But he’s right, she’s not family. No matter how much I need her with me for this, she can’t be because she’s not ours yet.
The fear that fills Rowan’s face matches my own.
I climb into the ambulance, wishing things were different. Wishing she were Miles’s mother so she could help us through this, but my focus has to remain on Miles, so I do the only thing I can.
“Rowan.” She lifts watery eyes to mine. “Take my keys and meet us at the hospital.”
She nods but returns her focus to Miles.
“Now, Rowan. Go,” I say, more loudly this time, as they shut the back doors.
As we race toward the hospital, the image of Rowan standing in the dark with her hands over her mouth quickly fades away.
It feelslike hours since they took Miles back for an emergency appendectomy. I’ve paced miles in these hallways all by myself while my little boy has been spread open on an operating table as they remove his appendix and clean out his abdominal cavity.
Rowan never showed up. I really thought she would. Even with her hang-ups, I thought she cared enough to at least come. The pain she’s caused by not being here for me is only rivaled by the fear of seeing Miles on his bedroom floor.
I called Mya’s dad, Michael, and told him what was happening, and once again, he said he can’t get in touch with her. He’s an asshole who leveled his rage at me when I divorced his daughter, but I have to believe he loves his grandchildren in his own way.
I refuse to call Nick myself but told Michael that if he thought Nick could reach Mya, he was welcome to try. I didn’t get an answer either way, and I don’t give a fuck.
The nurse was nice enough to let me borrow a phone charger when my phone was about to die, so I called Pappy and told him what was happening. Rowan didn’t come to the phone, and I didn’t ask for her.
The sharp reality of her connection to us—or lack of connection—will have to be a problem for another day.
I really thought she’d come. I’ve never felt loneliness this acutely before.
Finally, a doctor enters the hallway I’ve been pacing, followed by the nurse who asked me for Miles’s health history earlier.
“Mr. Walker?” The doctor asks.
“Yes, that’s me. Is he okay?”
The doctor fills me in on the specifics of what happened, but all I hear is that he’s out of surgery, and he’ll make a full recovery.
I shake his hand, and he retreats through another door.
“Mr. Walker,” the nurse says, drawing my attention to her. “I can take you to him now, though he’ll be sleeping for a while. Also, I apologize, we’ve had several emergencies, so I was unable to get to you, but your friends are in the waiting room. They’ve been there since shortly after you arrived. I wanted you to know so you could give them an update when you’re feeling up to it.”
“Friends?”
