Jack Who?

CHAPTER 11

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JACK’S HEAD TIPPED inquiringly down, but he silently matched their strides, and she let the fabric drop.

     They were traversing the hallway away from the seating area, and she wondered if her parents’ and Olivia’s eyes were on them, but she didn’t dare turn to look. Sure enough, her phone buzzed from her pocket, quietly announcing a text. They stepped into the elevator as a trio, and ignoring the text for now, she looked up at Jack as the doors met and the floor began to lift.

     There was one other occupant, and that man was intent on the newspaper in his hand. Clearing her throat, she croaked out an explanation to Jack. “Tristan had a reaction to the anesthesia. He’s in critical care, and that’s where we are headed.”

     Keeping her gaze pinned on the lit and unlit buttons to the various floors, she refused to watch his reaction. As he had chosen not to be a part of that news in the first place, she was afraid of seeing indifference. Grabbing him upon exiting the room had been instinctual, something that, if she had given even a second of thought, she wouldn’t have done.

     “There is a comfortable area where you will be closer until he wakes.” Extending the explanation, the nurse filled the silent gap.

     “Can I see him right away?” Marissa begged, stepping aside enough for the man with the rolled up ‘Herald’ in his hand to exit onto his selected floor.

     “For just a few minutes.” Gently and concisely, the ICU rules were explained, and when Jack asked a question, the CRNA repeated the full brief on the allergic reaction.

     Jack seemed like he wanted to say something more, but he looked at Marissa and remained quiet. The tone announced their level, and they stepped out into the hall of the new floor. Once again, when her phone buzzed in her pocket, she ignored it, and in less than a minute, she was standing at the foot of Tristan’s bed.

     Hyperventilation threatened her own breathing as she beheld the ventilation tubes, the IV tubes, and various machine paraphernalia around her boy’s bed. Dark hair strands were a contrast against the crisp, white pillow– a pillow that was half his size or more.

     In a flash, Marissa edged around the bed, and her fingers softly settled on his hot forehead to brush at his soft hair. His breathing was slow and even, as if he were napping, but the hiss of the oxygen flowing into the tube attachment beneath his nose wheezed over the sound of his breath.

     Leaning and crouching to his level, she whispered her love and just crazy nonsense to keep talking. “Tiggy is looking out the window in your room, and guess what? He found a friend here. Wait till you see his new friend…”

     For the last couple of minutes, she had completely forgotten Jack. But, as she spoke of the new stuffed toy, Bandit, the image of his placement of it beside Tiggy on the window ledge replayed in her mind.

     Twisting her head, she found Jack frozen at the foot of the bed. Those dark eyes, which she could stare into forever, remained trained on Tristan, and the unguarded look took her breath away. So many vulnerable expressions played in their brown depths, creating a mixture that left her guessing as to what she was seeing.

     Only one thing was certain. Recognition and acknowledgment of his own flesh and blood.

     Feeling her assessment, his gaze skittered to hers, and his shields went up. For a second or two, there was nothing to see and then empathy lit the dark depths of his gaze as it roved her face.