Chapter
19
When
we had all composed ourselves, we decided to go to the hospital. AJ and Nick were the two that were calmest,
so they were designated to drive us all there.
Luckily, Brian and Leighanne had a van, so the seven of us could all
ride together.
Nick
decided to drive, and AJ rode in the front seat next to him. Heidi, Sammy, and I sat in the very back, and
Brian and Leighanne sat next to each other in the middle row of seats.
The
ride to the hospital was silent and morose.
Heidi, Sammy, and I held each other’s hands the whole way there. Sammy was not even in the same position as
Heidi and I, but still, she seemed to be quite sensitive, and she was obviously
very upset by this whole situation.
When
we finally got to the hospital, we all piled out of the van and went into the
Emergency Room.
AJ
and Nick seemed to be the designated leaders.
Nick led us all a waiting room nearby while AJ went to speak to the
receptionist. He came back a few minutes
later and sat down next to me.
“Can
we see them?” I asked.
“Not
yet,” he said. “The receptionist didn’t
know much, but she said the doctors were still working on them and that someone
would come talk to us soon.”
“Ok,”
I said, sighing. Suddenly, a feeling of
déjà vu came over me. I recalled sitting
in a waiting room similar to this one six years ago, just waiting, worried sick
about someone. But that time, that
someone had been Nick, not Josh or Sonny.
I glanced at Nick, who sat between Brian and Sammy, his best friend and
girlfriend, one arm around each of them.
It gave me some comfort knowing how close he had come to dying then, but
yet, he had lived, and here he was now, perfectly normal. I prayed that the same would happen for Josh
and Sonny.
Suddenly,
I felt a pain run through my stomach as it began to cramp up. I suddenly remembered the baby that was now
developing inside me. Josh’s baby. Would he survive to see his baby son or
daughter be born? Tears came to my eyes
once again. I realized I hadn’t gotten
around to telling anyone about me being pregnant yet. Now was not the time though. There was no way any of us could be joyful at
a time like this, when two men’s lives were in jeopardy.
***
My
head shot up as the door to the waiting room we were in opened. Two men entered the room. Both were dressed in long, white coats.
“Are you all here for Mr. Williams and Dr.
Benton?” one asked. We all nodded. “Ok
then. My name is Dr. David Ellis, and
this is my colleague, Dr. James Young.”
He motioned to the man beside him, who nodded in greeting at us.
I
stood up first and shook the two doctors’ hands, saying, “I’m Julie Benton, Josh’s
wife.”
“And
I’m Sonny’s wife, Heidi Williams,” Heidi introduced, also shaking their hands.
“Are
any others of you immediate family members of Dr. Benton or Mr. Williams?” Dr.
Ellis asked.
Brian,
Leighanne, Nick, Sammy, and AJ shook their heads.
“We’re
just friends of the families,” Nick spoke up.
“Well,
then, Mrs. Williams and Mrs. Benton, would you like to come with us so we can
speak in private about the conditions of your husbands?” Dr. Ellis asked.
Heidi
and I exchanged glances, and my stomach dropped. I had a bad feeling about this, and I figured
she did as well.
“Sure,”
Heidi said softly, standing up. I stood
up next to her, glancing back at the others.
Brian motioned for me to go along.
I took a deep breath and gave him a little nod. Heidi grabbed a hold of my hand, and we
followed Dr. Ellis and Dr. Young out of the room.
My
knees felt quivery as we walked down the hallway to a small, empty room with
two small sofas. The two doctors ushered
us in and closed the door behind us. Heidi
and I sat down on one of the sofas, and the doctors sat down on the other.
“Okay,
so how are they?” Heidi finally asked boldly, although her voice trembled. “How’s my husband?”
Dr.
Ellis nodded to Dr. Young. Dr. Young
cleared his throat. “I’ve been treating
Sonny ever since he was brought in to the ER.
He suffered several stab wounds, one in the back, and one in the
stomach. He was in critical condition
when he was brought in, and we feared he had some internal injuries. Right now, he’s having surgery to repair what
damage was caused by the blade of the knife he was supposedly stabbed with.”
“Do
you think he’s going to be okay?” Heidi asked, struggling to hold back her
tears.
“I’m
going to be honest with you, ma’am,” Dr. Young said gently. “From what I saw, it doesn’t look
promising. However, the surgery that
he’s undergoing at this very minute could change that. He lost a lot of blood, but if the surgeons
can repair any damage that was caused, he might make it. It’s really too soon to tell you anything for
sure.”
Heidi
nodded, her chin quivering as she tried hard not to cry. I felt like a ton of bricks had been dropped
on my chest. If Sonny was that bad, what
would my own husband be like? I was
afraid to ask, but I knew I had to.
“What
about Josh?” I asked, my voice nearly a whisper.
“Josh
has been in my care,” Dr. Ellis responded.
“Right now, he’s also in surgery.
He was stabbed in the abdomen, which we believe caused some internal
bleeding. He also lost a lot of blood,
but not to the extent that Sonny did because he was only stabbed once, and
Sonny was stabbed twice, in two different places.”
I
nodded, my eyes filling with tears. I
didn’t know what to think. “Thanks,” I
whispered numbly.
Dr.
Ellis nodded. “I’m sorry we couldn’t
tell you anything more about their conditions.
I promise their individual surgeons will be down to talk to you both
later, when they’re out of surgery.”
“Ok,”
I said.
“Would
you two like to stay here or go back with your friends?” Dr. Young asked.
I
glanced at Heidi, who had begun to cry.
“I think we’ll stay here for a few minutes and then go back,” I replied.
“Ok
then,” Dr. Ellis said. “Good luck to the
both of you.”
“Thanks,”
I said. Heidi was too upset to
speak. Dr. Ellis and Dr. Young nodded at
us and left the room.
As
soon as they were gone, I let out my built up emotions and began to sob. Through her own tears, Heidi pulled me into
her arms, and we cried together.
***
Hours
passed, and the seven of us sat together in the waiting room once again. We barely spoke to one another, and the
tension in the room was thick, as we all sat waiting for Josh and Sonny to get
out of surgery.
Finally,
another doctor came into the room. He
was a young man, short, yet muscular, with black hair and dark skin. “Hi there, I’m Dr. Shawn Bradley,” he
said. “You guys all here for Sonny
Williams?”
We
all nodded. “I’m his wife, sir,” Heidi
said. “Are you the surgeon?”
Dr.
Bradley nodded. “Well, Sonny’s out of
surgery and in recovery right now,” he said.
“He should be taken to a room in the ICU in a few hours.”
“How
did the surgery go?” Heidi asked anxiously.
I saw fear in her brown eyes.
“It
went as well as can be expected,” Dr. Bradley said. “Luckily, the knife missed Sonny’s spinal cord
entirely, so at least we don’t have to worry about that kind of damage. However, it destroyed one of his kidneys,
which we had to remove. The other kidney
was also damaged, and we did our best to repair it. Several of his other internal organs that are
located in the abdomen area were damaged, and there was some internal bleeding
that we had to clean up.”
“But
he’s gonna be okay, right?” Heidi asked hopefully.
“Well,
it’s a little early to really know right now,” Dr. Bradley said, shifting
uncomfortably. “We have to give it a day
or so and run some tests to see how he’s functioning and everything. He’s not at all out of the woods yet, but if
we were able to fix the damage done, he should recover. The problem is, it’s hard to tell if we got
everything, and sometimes, there’s harm done to parts of the body that we can’t
fix. We’ll just have to wait and hope
that Sonny gets lucky.” The doctor
sounded hopeful, but as a doctor myself, I knew that Sonny’s future seemed very
uncertain at the time being.
“Thank
you, Dr. Bradley,” Heidi said sincerely, shaking his hand.
“You’re
welcome, Mrs. Williams,” Dr. Bradley replied, offering her a reassuring
smile. “Well, I need to get back to
other patients. If you have any
questions, don’t hesitate to ask. I’ll
be around.” He started to leave, but I
interrupted him.
“Excuse
me, but do you know anything on the condition of Josh Benton?” I asked. “I’m Julie Benton, his wife. He was in surgery too, but no one’s come to
tell us anything about him yet.”
“No,
I’m sorry, ma’am,” Dr. Bradley said. “I
haven’t heard anything on him.”
“Okay,”
I said. “Thanks anyway.”
Dr.
Bradley nodded sympathetically to me, and then left the room, leaving us all to
wonder how Josh was doing.
***
After
awhile, AJ got up and turned on the TV that was mounted to the wall in the
corner. “Anybody mind?” he asked. No one protested. He flipped through the stations, trying to
find something to take their minds off of everything that had happened. He passed by the Disney Channel, and
Leighanne’s eyes filled with tears, for that was Hope’s favorite channel. She stifled back a sob, and Brian’s arm
immediately came around her again.
Watching
them from across the room, Sammy’s own eyes began to fill with tears. In the past year that she had been Nick’s
girlfriend, she had gotten to know Brian, Leighanne, and Hope very well, since
Nick and Brian were still best friends, even though the Backstreet Boys as a
group were finished. She was friends
with Leighanne and adored Hope. The fact
that this had happened upset her greatly because of her closeness to the
Littrells. But there was another reason
for her emotionality. Something that no
one in that room knew about, not even Nick.
Something so horrible that she had kept it a secret for the ten years
since it had happened. She thought she
had gotten over it, moved on. But now,
it was coming back to haunt her.
Sammy
tried to keep her tears from falling, but she had no control over the wave of
emotion that flowed through her. No
control over the pain that ripped through her heart. Her tears filled her eyes and overflowed over
their rims, flowing quickly down her cheeks.
“Sammy?”
she heard Nick say, his voice concerned.
“Baby, what’s wrong?”
Sammy
covered her face with her hand and sobbed into it, unable to answer Nick’s
question. Suddenly, everything was
wrong.
“Sammy?”
Nick asked again. He wrapped an arm
around her and pulled her close to him, turning her to face him. He gently cupped her chin with one hand and
lifted her face to meet his.
“Sweetheart, what’s the matter?
Why are you crying?”
“It’s…
I… it’s just everything,” Sammy sobbed, her face flushing red. She wanted with all her heart to tell Nick
the truth. She loved him, and she needed
to release her feelings. She had kept
them, along with her secret, bottled up inside her for too long. These people were her friends, and she
trusted them. But to tell them all what
had happened so long ago was a big step, one that she was not sure she could do. Talking about it made her pain seem even
worse, as if it had just happened all over again. But keeping it inside seemed to be hurting
her more.
“Sammy,
please talk to me,” Nick said.
“Something’s wrong, I can tell.”
“I…
I just can’t believe Hope’s missing,” she said, knowing that he would know
there was more to it than just that.
“I
know, baby, but there’s something else, isn’t there?” Nick asked. He knew her too well.
Sammy
looked up to see everyone else watching her and Nick, looks of sympathy and
concern spread across their faces.
From
across the room, I watched as Nick spoke softly to Sammy, trying to soothe
her. I didn’t know what had come over
her. Of course, I was upset about what
had happened too. But I, just like Nick,
could sense that there was more to it than just what had happened that
day. Something else was troubling
Sammy. I just hoped that she would tell
us what that was. I couldn’t stand to
see her like that, so miserable and upset.
Sammy
sighed, knowing that the others wanted to know what was wrong with her, just as
Nick did. She realized she couldn’t keep
something like this inside anymore. It
was pushing to get out, and she couldn’t hold it back anymore.
She
took a deep breath, and in a shaky voice, said, “Guys, there’s something I have
to tell you.”
***
