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14. The wait
I stare at the doctor as if I’m a damn idiot who can’t comprehend what he just said. In my
defense, his words didn’t register wholly with me. He was asking me to choose between
Ava and her baby. Does he know how difficult that is?
“Mr. Woods, time is of the essence. We need to know your decision,” he all but begs.
I open my mouth, but no words come out. I try again, and the same thing fucking
happens.
“Mr. Woods?” the nurse calls, concern in her voice.
“The baby,” Letty’s soft voice suddenly says, breaking the silence. “Save the baby, if it
comes down to it.”
The doctor and nurse nod their heads before rushing back to the ER. I turn to face Letty
with mixed feelings waging war inside me.
My look must have communicated something because she hardens her eyes in defiance
before speaking.
“Don’t look at me like that, Rowan. This is what Ava would have wanted,” she says
through gritted teeth.
Corrine comes to the defense of her friend.
“She’s right. Ava would have picked her baby over herself any day, any time. If we picked
her over the child, she would have hated us.
I deflate after she voices what I was thinking just a few minutes ago. I know she’s right,
but that doesn’t take away the heaviness I feel in my heart.
I would never wish her baby harm. All I pray right now is that it doesn’t come down to
that. I hope that
both of them make it. Ava deserves to know happiness, and her baby deserves to live.
I resume my seat and wait. It killed me to wait, but what choice do I have? I’m not a
doctor, so I can’t
really help her. All I can do is continue praying.
Follow on NovᴇlEnglish.nᴇtI don’t remember the last time I prayed. Probably when I was still a kid in Sunday school.
Right now, I’m willing to pray to anyone who’ll listen and answer my request. If it was
possible to trade places with her,
then I would have gladly done so, even if it meant that I wouldn’t have survived.
As long as she got to live her life, then I would do it. I would sacrifice everything I have
right now just to see her scowling or glaring at me. I would give up the world to reverse
what happened to her if I could.
“It’s my fault.”
I turn towards the voice to find Letty silently crying.
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“She’d tried calling me, but I was unreachable. When I got her missed call, I told myself I’d
call her after i got out of work. I should have just called her back immediately. ”
Travis pulls her into his arms as she continues to cry.
“It wasn’t your fault, Letty. You couldn’t have predicted this”
“He’s right Letty, if anyone is to blame, then it should be me. I picked up her call. She
wanted us to go shopping, but I was busy, so I asked her if we could postpone. If only I’d
gone with her. Maybe I could have done something to prevent her from getting hurt.” She
had her arms wrapped around herself as if she were cold. Just like Letty, she was crying.
Looking at them, I see the love for their friend shining through their eyes. They haven’t
known each other for long, but their bond is unmistakable.
“None of you could have predicted something like this happening, so don’t blame yourself.
The only one responsible is the bastard that hurt,” Kate tells them in a trembling voice.
“Playing the blame game right now won’t help. We need to focus on Ava and the baby. We
should send
our best prayers for them,” my mom adds.
I don’t say anything. I just focus on the emergency room, waiting for someone to come
through the door.
Fuck. This was killing me. The waiting. The worrying. The uncertainty. I just need someone
to fucking tell
me that she is going to be okay. That she and the baby were out of danger. That they will
be okay.
Everything in me screamed and begged for a silver lining. For a kind of miracle. My heart
and soul begged
for the angel of death to stay away. Their souls weren’t his to claim. Not now. It wasn’t
their time yet; how
can it be when they’ve both barely begun to live?
“Remember when we went to the mall and she didn’t see the glass wall in front of her?”
Letty says with a
smile.
Corrine chuckles. “Yeah. She hit it right in the face before she fell on her ass.”
“She was so embarrassed, but she couldn’t stop laughing about it because it was so
funny.”
They laughed, and some of the others chuckled. There was just something about it that
rubbed me
wrong. I gritted my teeth and forced myself to remain quiet.
“Or the time the hot waiter caught her talking about how cute he is. We tried signaling to
her that he was
right behind her, but she didn’t get it, not until the man cleared his voice,” Corrine says
with a fond smile
on her face.
“She was mortified. She begged us to leave because she couldn’t face him after that.”
Letty adds. “He
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to that place again,”
+15 BONUS
There was a moment of silence. Everyone was probably lost in memory lane. For the
Follow on Novᴇl-Onlinᴇ.cᴏmothers, there probably weren’t any good memories. After all, they’d treated Ava like shit,
but Letty and Corrine had lots
of them.
We have so many memories to share with Noah and her newborn. So much to tell them
about how
amazing their mom is”
When those words leave Letty’s mouth, I blow up.
“Can you just stop!” I growl as I feel anger bubble up inside me. She had no right to talk
about Ava like
that.
“What? Stop what?” she stutters.
“Stop talking about her like she’s fucking gone!” I shout. “She isn’t. She’s still alive, and
she’s going to pull
through.”
They were talking about Ava as if she were already dead. That’s what pissed me off. You
only talk about
someone in the past tense if you believe that she’s not making it out of the hospital. 1
“Tha–that’s not what…”
15
Her response is cut short when the doors to the ER open and a different doctor comes out.
“How is Ava doing, doctor?” Kate asks while her fingers fidgeted.
“We’re now prepping her for surgery in order to remove the bullets. The C–section went
smoothly on the
baby’s part.
Everyone sighs in relief, but I feel like there’s something the doctor isn’t saying. What did
he mean when
he said the C–section went smoothly for the baby? What about Ava? Did that mean it went
the opposite
way?
Before I can ask him, he speaks again.
“Congratulations! You have a baby girl.
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