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Sometime later, after the music had ended and all of the candles had melted down to waxy stumps with dying flames, he laced his fingers through mine. The scars on our hands ran parallel lines on our palms.

“Do you think we did it?” he asked, his eager tone forcing me to smile.

“We have no way of knowing right now, Brew.”

“If we did, we may need to move the wedding date. You’d be three months pregnant by then.”

“Hmm
.” I closed my eyes and smiled.

“Or if we made twins- because they run in my family, you know- then y
ou might be showing even more-”

“Jason.
” I held my index finger over his lips, my eyes fluttering open with a grin. “Shh.”

He
beamed, pressing a kiss to my lips before tucking me into his arms.

~

We played on the beach like kids the entire next day. We built a sandcastle, digging a moat that forced the beach patrol to stop and chastise us. When Jason tried to laugh it off, the officer warned him that we’d be ticketed if we did it again. We finally kicked in the hole, and he carried me out to the water to rinse all of the sand off of me as I giggled.

He narrowed his eyes playfully.
“You got me in trouble. As usual.”

“Stop!
I told you not to make the moat that deep. You dug a fucking bunker.”

“Hold still while I drown you.”

I shrieked as he attacked, and we both came up laughing as Joplin barked at us from the shore.

That night we argued between watching
Happy Gilmore
or
The Wedding Singer
, both in the mood for Adam Sandler but neither willing to relinquish their vote.

“Why not both?”

“
Wedding Singer
first then,” I demanded.

“Why do you always get to win?”

“Because I’m the mother of your child, Jason,” I cried, covering my stomach and pretending to pout.

“Oh Jesus.”
He laughed, and I grinned at the blush that stained his cheeks. “That’s going to work on me every time, just so you know. Try to go easy on me.”

“I can’t promise anything,” I teased.

We cuddled on the couch, and half-way through the movie, I sat up. “What’s wrong?” he asked.

“I need my glasses,” I said absently, reaching for my purse near the coffee table.

“We need to get your vision checked. Seriously. As soon as we get home.”

Whether the universe had a dramatic flair or not, I would never be certain. But at that moment, I blinked.

And I saw darkness.

I could hear the movie. I could hear him breathing. I blinked several times, trying to see the light from the TV
from my right side, but I could only see through my left eye.

“Sandy?”

“I can’t see,” I realized, my voice edging on panic.

And then terror took over as I realized that no matter how many times I blinked, I couldn’t see
anything out of my right eye.

Anything
.

“What do you mean?”

“I can’t see out of my right eye! Jason, I can’t see out of my right eye,” I cried, rubbing my eyes, the pressure behind my right socket a little stronger than usual.

“
Listen, hold my hand, I’m grabbing my phone and calling nine-one-one. Sandy?”

“I can hear you, I just can’t see
… everything,” I tried, forcing my voice to even out and stop shaking. “It’s got to be… something simple, you know? Just take me to a hospital, please, just… just…”

I was hyperventilating. I knew that a panic attack was coming on, and I heard the distinct ringing in my ears before the world around me faded in and out in the darkness.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

Jason

I tried not to be a cynic.

I tried not to sit in the cold, metal chair of the emergency room, convincing myself that I’d
gotten too comfortable, and was too fucking insanely happy for the first time in my life. Did I deserve her? Probably not. Did I move too fast? Most likely.

Was I going to lose her?

I thought back to our conversation weeks ago in my office, when I’d suggested that she had a brain tumor. What if she truly did have a brain tumor? Or something worse, if that was even possible?

When they’d taken her back for the MRI, I’d told
the technician that there was no way that she was pregnant. I wanted nothing standing in the way of answers.

My brain refused to shut off.
What if she needed chemo, and I’d just gotten her pregnant? What if we had to decide between treating her and aborting the baby, or waiting until the baby was safely born before beginning treatment, losing valuable time-

My phone buzzed.

My mom’s voice sounded through the line before I could speak. “Jason. Stop worrying.”

“Mom, I’m not worrying. Everything’s fine. I’m just waiting for her to get back from the MRI.”

“And you’re thinking the absolute worst, because that’s what you’ve always done. Honey, she’s going to be okay.”

I sighed, closing my eyes tightly and taking a deep, even breath. “Thanks, Mom.”

“Your dad and I are praying for you both. And so are Sandy’s parents. Please keep us on speed dial and call as soon as you hear what’s going on. Do you have me on speed dial?”

“Mom, I have an iPhone, I can just say ‘Mom’ and
it automatically calls you. It’s not the nineties anymore… okay, wait, she’s coming out now, I’ll call you back.”

I disconnected, shooting to my feet as the attendant rolled Sandy’s
bed back into the room.

“The doctor should be in shortly,” the man assured me.

“Did you see anything weird? Tumors?”

“Jason, he can’t read the MRI and tell you anything,” Sandy protested. I gripped her hand, and the
nurse smiled and nodded toward Sandy.

“She’s right. I’m sorry
sir, the doctor should be in very soon.”

The sounds of the hospital
frayed my nerves. Sandy held my hand, drifting in and out of sleep. After she’d passed out, the EMS brought her back with smelling salts, and she complained the entire way to the hospital about how badly the salts made her feel.

They’d given her something to calm her down. Whatever it was had worked; she moved in and out of sleep, and I smoothed her curls away from her face.

When the doctor finally came in, it was after two AM.

“
Mr. Brewer,” he said, reaching to shake my hand. He was a stately, older man, and there was something gentle in his eyes that worked to calm my nerves.

“Is she okay?
What’s happening to her eyes?”

He looked over at Sandy, and then glanced down at her chart. “
She had a hospital stay just a few weeks ago?”

“Yes. Her boyfriend beat her up, but he never will again.”

“And that wasn’t the first time?”

My body
tensed; my heart dropped into my stomach. I felt like I was standing on the edge of a mountain, and everyone was screaming at me not to look down.

I had to look down.

“No, it wasn’t the first time,” I admitted angrily.

He nodded, sitting back on the rolling stool near the counter.
“Alexandra’s test results show that she experienced some retinal damage to her right eye. This new trauma might have led to the complete retinal detachment, which must be corrected. We are prepping for her surgery right now.”

“Wait, now?” I tried to absorb all of the information, but all I could hear were key words.

Damage. New trauma.

Jack
.

“We’ll take her back within the hour. When the re
tina detaches, it loses oxygen…”

I tried to listen. I tried with all of my
strength to listen to what the doctor was saying, but my temper was flaring. I wanted to get in my truck- no, fuck that, I wanted to get on a
plane
- and murder Jack.

He hit her. He hit her, more than once, and
damaged her eye. Now she needed surgery.

“Why didn’t they see this when she was in the hospital three weeks ago?”
I demanded.

“I can’t
answer that, Mr. Brewer. I’m sorry. All that I can tell you is that we have to take care of this now to make every effort for Alexandra to see again out of her right eye. Do you understand?”

“Yes.” I
nodded, realizing that I was holding Sandy’s hand so tightly that her fingertips were white. I eased my grip. “I understand.”

The surgery ended up taking more than two hours. A nurse came out half-way through to let me know
that she was doing just fine, and that they’d found some scar tissue, which would mean a little extra time in surgery.

I talked to both of Sandy’s parents, and both of min
e. By the time Scott called me, I was edgy and was pretty sure that I sounded like a zombie.

“Jason, you want me to fly out there? You know I will. Emily is fine with it.”

“No,” I sighed, resting my elbows on my knees and my forehead in my hand. Stay with your girls.”

“Sandy’s our girl,” he replied, matter-of-factly, and I winced, fighting back the burn of emotion in my eyes. “She’s like a sister to me, man. Just say the word and I’ll be there.”

“Thanks, Scott.”

Sandy was in recovery when I finished the second round of phone calls. I called my dad last, though his voice was the one I wanted to hear the most. “She’ll be alright
, son. You’ll get through this just like anything else. And you’ll look out for her going forward. I’m proud of you.”

Sandy woke up as I was dragging the back of my arm over my eyes. Her right eye was covered by white gauze, and she focused on me with her left. “Are you crying? Did they have to remove it? Do I have a glass eye?”

I exhaled a breath of laugher, forcing myself to remain calm. “No, you’re fine. You’ll be okay. You only have to wear the eye patch for a day, though, so we need to hurry up and have our kinky pirate sex before Friday.”

She gave me a small smile
, drifting back to sleep.

I drove her to the beach house,
and by the time I helped her to bed, it was almost eight AM. Joplin hid in the corner, ashamed that she’d shit on the living room floor. Sighing, I cleaned up the mess and stretched out on the couch.

She whined, and I patted my chest. She jumped up on me, resting her nose on my shoulder.

“It’s okay, girl. We were gone a long time.”

The
papers detailing Sandy’s recovery lay on the coffee table where I’d dropped them, and I reached for them, scanning the words.

Swelling… eye drops… first day after surgery the worst due to inflammation.
Double vision for the first few days.

Her phone buzzed, and I reached for it, expecting it to be Jess.

When I didn’t recognize the number, I swept her phone open. “Hello.”

“Alexandra, please.
”

“What the fuck,” I
hissed, glancing once at the screen and then slamming the phone back to my ear. “Jack? Is that you?”

“Listen, Jason, I don’t want to argue with you. I’m asking you to please put Alexandra on the phone. I’ll be brief. It has to do with the motion that she filed against me.”

“You mean, the fucking restraining order?” I sat up, hurrying to the bedroom to pull the door closed. I made it out to the balcony before raising my voice.

“Yes, that’s what I mean.”

“No, Sandy’s asleep. I just spent the entire night with her at the hospital.”

“Is she okay?” h
e rushed out.

His concern for her physically sickened me. I thanked God that I was at least four states away from him, because all I wanted to do was blow his fucking head off.

“No, she’s not. Blunt trauma to her eye caused her retina to detach. She spent hours in surgery. She can’t see out of her right eye, and we don’t know if she ever will again.”

“What?”

He had the decency to sound bowled over, and I shook my head, gripping the balcony railing.

“
Fuck
you. Don’t you ever call her again. Don’t even think about her again. You stay the fuck away from her, or I will kill you. The long, slow way that involves blunt fucking trauma.”

I disconnected.

I was running on too little sleep, and I knew that I needed to remedy that immediately.

Sometime later, I fell asleep on the couch with Joplin, and the sound of Sandy’s voice lulled me from
what felt like fevered dreams.

“Brew?
Can you help me find some Advil?”

I shot off the couch, and Sandy held her hands out, gripping the edge of th
e coffee table. “San, sit down…”