Chapter 198
The waiting continued, but Claire was
no longer alone.
Jamie had gone back home, taking the
twins with him, at her insistence. He’d
been surprised when she had told him she wasn’t going with him. “I thought that was the whole point of me
coming to the hospital,” he’d said in annoyance. “To pick you up.”
“The point was to bring me some
clothes, so I don’t have to sit around in a hospital gown for no reason,”
Claire corrected him gently. “I’m not
leaving.”
He’d argued with her briefly, but had
inevitably given up and packed the twins back into their stroller. “Drive careful,” had been Claire’s last
request as she watched him leave with her children.
She spent a lonely afternoon by Nick’s
side, keeping up a running conversation that was mostly one-sided, except when
one of the nurses or Nick’s new physician, Dr. Renck, was around. She tried to get friendly with all of the
hospital staff, hoping that they would be candid with her and accommodating
when she needed them to be. It took a
slight lack of honesty on her part, but by evening, she had the entire
intensive care unit believing that she and Nick were practically engaged,
which, combined with his VIP status, gave her some added benefits. They allowed her to stay with him longer than
most visitors would be allowed, and they kept her informed on his condition,
answering whatever questions she asked.
Surely, it helped that she was the only one around to be his advocate.
And then, suddenly, she wasn’t.
She had gotten up to stretch her legs
and was trying to force-feed the vending machine with a crinkled dollar bill
when a raspy voice said, “Try this one,” and a tattooed hand extended a crisp,
new bill.
Claire gasped in surprise, her
tattered dollar fluttering to the tiled floor as she whirled around and found
herself face to face with AJ McLean.
“AJ!” she cried, and then she noticed Howie standing a few feet behind
him. “And Howie… what are you guys doing
here??” Well, duh, Claire, she thought immediately, and added, with a
sheepish grin, “Well, I know why you’re here, but I… I didn’t expect you,
that’s all. At least not so soon.”
AJ offered a grim smile. “Well, D and I were both in Orlando for
Thanksgiving and decided we couldn’t just sit on our asses down there knowing
Nick was up here in God knows what kind of shape, so we tried our luck at the
airport. Had to charm a pair of tickets
for an early flight off a couple of college girls – traded ‘em for autographs,
pictures, and seats on a later flight – but after that, it was pretty smooth sailing. The weather up here must be better than it
was yesterday – O’Hare wasn’t nearly as backed up as we thought it’d be. Orlando to Chicago, Chicago to Des Moines,
and here we are.” He opened his arms,
and she hugged him, then Howie.
“What happened to your hands?” Howie
asked as she pulled away, his smooth brow creasing with concern.
She held up her bandaged paws and
looked at them listlessly. “Burns,” she
answered, “but they’ll heal. The doctor assured me they won’t fuse into
lobster claws, anyway.”
The guys smiled weakly at her attempt
to make a joke, but AJ looked a shade paler than he had before. Perhaps the mention of burns had brought back
the severity of the situation. They
couldn’t beat around the bush forever; they all knew this wasn’t intended to be
a happy reunion.
“How about Nicky?” was Howie’s next
question, his voice dropping to a whisper.
“How’s he doing? Brian made it
sound bad.”
She wasn’t going to lie to him. “It is.
He almost died last night, Howie.
But he’s alive now, and… you know Nick.
He’s stubborn as hell. He’s not
gonna go down without a fight… and he fought last night. He’ll get through this.” She nodded, forcing confidence into her
voice, trying to reassure herself as much as them. “You wanna see him?”
“Can we?” Howie glanced at his watch. “I know regular visiting hours are probably
over by now, aren’t they?”
“Don’t worry… I spent the day wrapping
the ICU nurses around my little finger,” replied Claire, wiggling her pinky
through the gauze. “They know Nick’s
VIP, and I made them think I’m his almost-fiancée, which is really like his
almost-wife. I don’t think they’ll stop
us.”
“Nice,” said AJ, offering an
appreciative smile.
They got her the Diet Pepsi she’d been
fighting the vending machine for, and she led them back up the hall to the ICU.
“Brian and Kevin want to fly up too,”
Howie explained as they walked, “but last time I talked to one of them, they
were having a harder time getting a flight.
They’re both in Lexington for the holidays, and apparently Kentucky got
ice overnight. The airport’s practically
shut down.”
“I hate ice,” Claire sighed. “I hate snow.
I hate the Midwest. I hate the
hospital. I hate all of this.” Her frustration was setting back in, and now
that she had someone conscious to vent to, she let it out. “If we weren’t here, this never would have
happened.”
“Why were you and Nick here anyway?”
asked AJ, and she saw him glance over at Howie.
This was apparently something the two of them had pondered as they’d
made plans to fly there. “We thought
Nick was with the Kentucky clan for Thanksgiving.”
“He was. And I came here right after Thanksgiving to
settle some things with Jamie and our house here. Nick just kinda showed up last night, I guess
to surprise me. I didn’t even really get
a chance to ask him…” She trailed off,
as this sad fact dawned on her for the first time. She and Nick hadn’t had the chance to just
talk, to hug, to do anything. Would they
ever again?
She swallowed hard, determined not to
let her mind go to that place now,
and forced herself to keep talking.
“It’s a long story, but something happened, and he was angry, and we
were fighting in the car, and then…” She
shrugged, looking down at her bandaged hands, the rest playing out in her mind,
a slideshow of horrific images that would stay with her for the rest of her
life.
She didn’t have to describe anymore;
Howie and AJ knew what they needed to know of the rest, or could at least
guess, and besides, they had reached Nick’s unit. “He’s unconscious,” she said before they went
in, trying to prepare them for what they would find, “but he’s not in a
coma. I think he can hear you if you
talk to him; I got him to open his eyes once earlier. He’s just on a lot of painkillers and sedatives,
too, because of the breathing tube.”
“Breathing tube?” AJ asked, his eyes
widening a little. “So… does that mean…
he can’t breathe on his own?” His face
was stricken, and Howie’s looked equally grim.
“Not very well. His lungs have been damaged. Most of his injuries from the crash were to
his chest.” She relayed what Dr. Wittig
had told her just this morning, though it seemed as if it had been a week since
that conversation. This had been one of
the longest days of her life… and she’d spent many a long day in the hospital.
When they seemed ready, Claire led
Howie and AJ into the unit and over to Nick’s corner. It wasn’t a room, just a cubicle made of
glass partitions, which had curtains that could be drawn for privacy. Most of the curtains in other cubicles had
been left open, but the nurses had closed Nick’s that morning and left them
that way all day. Claire supposed that,
even in the ICU, there was the risk of him being recognized and the news
getting out before his publicist had a chance to release it.
She paused to wonder if any of the
guys had thought to call such a person.
Was a press release being prepared at this very moment?
She didn’t ask. Now wasn’t the time. AJ and Howie were just getting their first
look at Nick, and she stayed out of their way, letting them have the moment to
themselves to take it all in.
Neither of them spoke at first, but
after a minute or so, Howie put his hand over Nick’s and said, “Hey Nicky… it’s
your big brothers, Howie D and AJ. We’re
here, man.”
AJ’s adam’s apple bobbed as he
swallowed hard. Then he rasped, “Yeah,
Prick, here we are, visiting you in the hospital yet again. Did you think it had been too long, or what? Thought you’d give us a fresh scare for the
holidays?”
Claire smiled at his sarcasm; she
sensed it was the only thing holding him together. She could empathize; that was pretty much how
she operated too. She could handle what
she could joke about.
The steady beeping of the heart
monitor seemed to accelerate, and when she looked up at it, she saw that the
number measuring Nick’s heart rate had climbed slightly. “He’s listening,” she murmured. “He knows it’s you guys. Keep talking to him.”
They did, and although Nick’s eyelids
fluttered, he was still too sedated to wake.
Soon, his heart rate fell again, and Claire knew he had drifted back
into a deeper sleep. Disappointed, she
said, “Well, I’ll let you two have some time with him. I’ll be in the waiting room down the hall, by
the vending machines.”
“You sure?” Howie asked, turning to
look at her.
“Absolutely. He’s probably sick of hearing my voice
anyway; I’ve been here all day.”
She had, but when AJ joined her in the
waiting room twenty minutes later and offered to relieve her, Claire didn’t
want to leave.
“Come on, you’ve been here since,
what, last night?” AJ asked, sinking down into the chair to her left. When she nodded, he went on, “You should get
out of this place for awhile. Howie and
I got a pair of adjoining suites at the Marriott. Let me call you a cab, and you can head back
there. Have some dinner, take a shower,
get some sleep in a real bed…” Before
she knew it, he was pulling his room key out of his back pocket.
“AJ, no,” she protested, as he tried
to hand the swipe card to her. “I have a
reservation at the Best Western if I want to do that...” As she said it, though, she doubted her
hotel room would still be available. She
was supposed to have had one reserved from Saturday until tomorrow, but she’d
never checked in Saturday night. If she
had her days straight, today was Monday.
Which meant she and the twins had seats on a plane back to Tampa
tomorrow morning. She wondered if she
should call the airline and get a refund for her tickets. She wouldn’t be using them now. There was no way she was flying back to
Florida while Nick lay in a hospital in Iowa.
As she trailed off, lost in her
thoughts, AJ’s voice broke into them. “A
room at Best Western ain’t no suite at the Marriott, though, is it?” He grinned and forced his key card into her
hand. “C’mon, babe, work with me – I’m
trying to be a gentleman here. So take
advantage of my gentlemanly hospitality and go get some rest in my suite. D and I will stay and keep an eye on Nick for
ya.”
He was being so sweet and so generous,
she couldn’t resist. A hot shower and a
big bed did sound amazing, after the night and day she’d had. She felt uncomfortable with the thought of
leaving Nick, but logic told her it was pointless to stay, especially if AJ and
Howie were going to.
“Will you promise to call me, if
anything changes?”
“Of course. Good or bad,” AJ vowed. “Whaddya say?”
“Alright,” she gave in with a sheepish
smile, holding out her bandaged palm to receive his key. “You really don’t have to do this, but I do
appreciate it.”
“It’s nothin.’ Now, let’s see… it’s room 724…”
“724,” she repeated, trying to lock
the number into her memory.
“… and Howie’s right next door,
726. Help yourself to whatever you want
and put it on my tab – room service, pay per view, mini bar… I won’t be using
that, but you might need it.” He offered
a grim smile and a knowing wink, and she let out a rueful chuckle.
“I think I’ll be fine with a shower
and some sleep. Thank you so much, AJ.”
“Not a problem. Let me call for a cab…”
She sat and watched him in amazement
as he called information on his cell phone, got the number of a cab company,
and ordered a car to be sent to the hospital to pick her up. Then, as if it were no big deal at all, he
pulled a wad of bills out of his wallet and gave them to her, saying, “This
should be enough to cover the fare to the hotel and back here in the morning,
when you’re ready… oh, and dinner, if you don’t want room service.”
“AJ…”
She shook her head. “I can’t take
all this. Really, you don’t have to-”
But he refused to take back the money,
even as her bandaged hands tried clumsily to push it back into his. “It’s the least I can do. I know I can’t give you what you really want…
what we all really want: for Nick to be all right. That one’s on Nick and God, I guess. But I can at least keep us all comfortable
while we’re waiting, right?”
She put her arms around his neck and
hugged him, telling herself that when she said a prayer for Nick that night,
she would include AJ in it. He and Howie
– all the guys, really – were better friends than most, to Nick and to
her. They’d welcomed her into their
circle years ago, and despite all the ups and downs of her relationship with
Nick, they’d never stopped being kind to her.
Even though she was the reason Nick was here in the first place, AJ
embraced her like a sister.
Humbled, she left the hospital in the
taxi he had sent and was taken to the Marriott hotel. A flash of déjà vu struck her as the cab
pulled up in front of the large hotel, and as she paid the driver and climbed
out, she remembered getting out of a similar taxi and walking into this same
hotel… to meet Nick. It was the one he’d
stayed in when he had come to Des Moines last year to cheer her up.
The déjà vu stuck with her all the way
to AJ’s suite on the seventh floor. She
was almost positive this was the same floor Nick had stayed on, and when she
unlocked the door to AJ’s room, she found herself walking into a luxurious
suite that was practically identical to the one she’d spent the night in with
Nick. He had been so good to her that
weekend, so loving and understanding.
Everything Jamie wasn’t. She wished
she had taken advantage of her impulsive nature and ended her marriage back
then, instead of six months later. She
and Nick could have had so much more time together… time they might never be
able to make up…
Completely alone and exhausted, Claire
sunk down onto the king-size bed, allowing her eyes to fill with tears for the
first time since last night. AJ had been
generous to offer her his room, but she had no business staying here while Nick
was fighting for his life in a hospital bed.
She wished she could hold him and heal him with hugs, the way he had
comforted her back then. She owed him so
much, and yet, she felt completely powerless.
It was a frustrating feeling, as frustrating as all of the waiting and
wondering and worrying in store for her that night.
She didn’t think she’d be able to
sleep, even in such a comfortable room, but when she burrowed into the center
of the large bed and pulled the covers up around her, fatigue conquered fear,
and she drifted off. She slept deeply,
but not peacefully. Stress turned her
dreams into nightmares, and she awoke in the middle of the night, covered in
cold sweat, her heart palpitating fast against her ribs. Thinking of Nick, she rolled over in bed and
snatched up her cell phone from the bedside table. But there were no missed calls, not even a
text message from AJ or Howie.
She let out her breath slowly, trying to
calm her racing heart. There was nothing
to worry about, she tried to assure herself.
Nothing too bad, anyway, or one of them would have called. The fact that they hadn’t meant that nothing
had changed with Nick. And that, she
supposed, was the best she could hope for now.
It was that thread of reassurance that
carried her back into a restless sleep.
***
Claire awoke early the next
morning. She’d showered the night before
– almost more of a hassle than it had been worth, with the effort it had taken
her to wash without getting the bandages on her hands wet – and so she settled
for running a brush through her hair and throwing on some clothes. She called for a cab, swiped a danish from
the complimentary breakfast downstairs to nibble as she waited, and took the
taxi back to the hospital.
She hadn’t heard from either AJ or
Howie since she’d left them there last night.
As far as she knew, neither of them had come back to the hotel; she
hadn’t heard a peep from Howie’s room next door all night. She worried about what state Nick might be
in. Had they been afraid to leave him?
When she got to his cubicle in the
ICU, she was shocked to find Nick sitting up.
Well, propped up was the better term; the head of his bed had been
raised to a forty-five degree angle, and he lay slumped against it, pillows
tucked around his body to help support him.
She was disappointed to find that he was sleeping, his head lolling to
the side, still tethered to the hose of the ventilator. Other than the change in position, he looked
no different than he had when she’d left him the night before.
AJ was nowhere in sight, but Howie was
sitting at Nick’s bedside, and he greeted her with a smile when she came
in. “Get a good night’s sleep?” he
asked.
“Best I could hope for, I guess,” she
replied, returning the smile. “How about
you? Did you get any sleep?”
“Yeah, I dozed.” Howie shrugged. “I can sleep pretty much anywhere.”
“Sounds like Nick.” Her gaze returned to him, and she
gestured. “How’s he doing? I see they’ve got him sitting up a little.”
Howie nodded. “AJ and I met his doctor this morning when
she was doing her rounds. Nice
woman. She said he needed to be propped
up to reduce the risk of pneumonia.”
Pneumonia. The word sent shivers down her spine. She knew it was a possibility, and Nick had
had it before, but it was a complication he definitely didn’t need now, not
with his lungs already struggling.
Pneumonia could kill him.
She tried not to think about it now
and asked instead, “Has he been sleeping like this the whole time, or…?”
“He’s been in and out,” answered
Howie. “There have been a few times
where he’s actually been conscious, but he’s still pretty out of it when he
is. He recognized AJ and me, but he
seemed confused about where he was and what was going on. We tried to explain, but who knows how much
he’ll remember. He’s only been awake for
a few minutes at a time, and then he drifts off again. It must be the sedatives and stuff. Dr. Renck said they need to keep him calm so that
he won’t fight the ventilator.”
Claire nodded. “Any word on when he’ll be able to come off
that?” As she asked the question, her
eyes roamed to Nick’s monitor, where his oxygen saturation level was displayed. She knew from past experience that the normal
range was in the nineties; any number below that meant a lack of oxygen. Even with a ventilator breathing for him,
Nick was only at a 92. That answered her
question before Howie could.
“She didn’t really say. I guess it’ll take some time for his lungs to
heal…”
Howie drifted off uneasily, and their
eyes met briefly before they both looked away.
She hated the uncertainty of waiting, and not knowing what was going to
happen.
“Well, listen,” Howie said after a
pause, “AJ went down to the cafeteria to
check out the breakfast options. Since
you’re here, I think I’ll go find him… give you some time alone with Nick.”
“Alright… sounds good,” replied Claire
with an appreciative smile.
“You want anything?”
“Nah, I’m good; I grabbed something at
the hotel.”
“Okay.
We’ll be back later then.”
Howie left, and Claire sat down in his
place, returning her attention to Nick.
“Morning, Stumpy… it’s me.” She
gingerly picked up his limp hand and brought it to her lips, kissing his
knuckles with tenderness.
Just as it had last night, his heart
rate quickened, either because of her voice or her touch. She wasn’t sure which, so she kept on talking
and kept on touching, her fingertips stroking the back of his hand. “I wish you’d wake up for me,” she coaxed
him, feeling oddly maternal, the way she did when she was trying to gently
rouse the twins. But like the twins,
when they were sleeping deeply, Nick didn’t respond. “Those must be some good drugs they’ve got
you on,” she added, reaching up to smooth his flattened hair away from his
forehead. “I just hope they’re keeping
away the pain.”
Beneath her hand, his brow
furrowed. She pulled away in surprise
and watched hopefully as he made a face, much like her babies did seconds
before they were about to wake up. And
sure enough, in the next second, his eyelids began to flutter.
***
Images swam in Nick’s mind like some
sort of movie montage that faded in and out.
He saw bright lights. He saw
Claire in the water, her ghostly hand reaching up to grasp his. And then she was above him, her face leaning
over his. He saw Howie and AJ too, their
faces appearing like strange flashes in the distance. And there were others, but none familiar to
him.
There were sounds too, strange beeping
noises and disjointed bits of conversation that he could not seem to follow or
comprehend. Voices he didn’t recognize
would say his name, but among them, he would occasionally hear Howie or AJ or, most
recently, Claire.
“Morning, Stumpy,” her voice drifted
into his dreams.
Was it morning? That meant it was time for him to get
up. He struggled to open his eyes. He could feel her fingertips, light and
gentle, on his forehead now, playing with his hair. It felt good, yet he frowned. Why did his eyelids feel like lead weights?
He fought gravity for a few seconds,
finally managing to force his eyes open, only to close them again. Why was the light so bright? He blinked and tried again. As his eyes adjusted to the fluorescent
lighting, Claire’s face blurred before them, gradually coming into focus.
“Morning, Claire,” he tried to say,
but the words did not come out. There
was something in his mouth, he realized.
His tongue felt thick and heavy, but he moved it around and felt the smooth,
foreign something snaking to the back of his mouth. It was a tube, he realized, and it extended
all the way down his throat. The
intrusiveness of it made him gag, and he felt a sudden rush of panic. He couldn’t breathe; the tube seemed to be
choking him!
“Nick,” he heard Claire’s voice
say. “Nick, calm down; it’s
alright. Look at me, Nick… Nick.”
Her voice was firm, but soothing…
reassuring. He forced himself to listen,
to focus on her face, while he struggled to take a breath.
“You’re on a ventilator, Nick. It’s helping you. Don’t fight it, okay? Just let it breathe for you. Relax… let it do its job.” Her face was right over his now, looking him
in the eyes, and he could feel pressure on his shoulder, her hand caressing his
upper arm.
Her voice and her touch comforted him,
and he managed to relax a little, adjusting to the sensation of air being
forced into his lungs, outside of his control.
Still, he felt as if he weren’t getting enough air. It was an oddly familiar sensation, one he’d
experienced before. But why now?
Confused, he looked past Claire and
all around at his surroundings. He was
in the hospital, he realized – that became clear quickly. If the ventilator wasn’t enough of a dead giveaway,
the sterile surroundings, fluorescent lights, and beeping monitors were. Even if he was groggy, he’d been in hospitals
enough to put the pieces together. But
even that realization didn’t answer the question of why.
He wanted to ask Claire, and it was
frustrating that he couldn’t. Thankfully,
she’d always had a knack for reading his mind, and that power proved intact.
“You’re in the hospital, in Des
Moines,” she told him, still rubbing his arm in a reassuring way. “We got into a car accident. Do you remember?”
Car accident? As his mind slowly processed her words, he
frowned in confusion. When had that
happened?
“Guess not,” Claire smiled. “That’s okay.
It was two days ago. You’ve been
in and out ever since. You broke some
ribs, and your lungs took kind of a beating, which is why they’ve got you on
the vent. But I know you’re going to be
okay. Just hang in there, alright?”
She took his hand, and he felt her
give it a squeeze. Some of what she’d
said had gone right over his head, but he clung to her last words. Just
hang in there, alright?
He would. He would try to, anyway. But God, he felt so drained. The fog of sleep was creeping back up on him. He tried to fight it, wanting to stay awake
for Claire, wanting to know more, but his eyelids were growing heavy again, and
soon, he just couldn’t keep them open.
The hospital room, with its bright
lights and unnatural noises, slid away again as he drifted back into a dark
calm.
***