Forever Loved (The Forever Series) (3 page)

“Honey, you’re awake!” he said, setting the flowers on the table in front of the others.

“Hi, Dad.” Corabelle pushed her hair away from her face self-consciously. She always did care how she looked around her father. Her eyes darted nervously from him to me.

He’d apparently decided to go the pretend-the-jerk-isn’t-in-the-room route, keeping his back to me. “I heard you went for an ill-advised swim,” he said.

“Seemed a bit warm out,” she said. “Thought I’d take a little dip.” She sucked in a breath like she might cough again, and I almost jumped up, but she just cleared her throat.

I realized I was gripping the arms of the chair like I was about to be electrocuted. I forced myself to relax. I wouldn’t let Corabelle’s parents bully me into leaving. But I knew they had every right to be pissed off. I’d be more worried if they weren’t.

“We’ve been trying to call you, sweet pea,” Mr. Rotheford said. “I guess you don’t have your phone anymore?”

“It’s in rice,” Corabelle said. “We’re trying to save it.”

“I’ll get you another.” He settled on a stool, still with his back to me.

“Do you guys want to stay at my apartment?” she asked.

“Oh no, we’ll get a hotel close by,” her mother said. “Unless you need us to be there.”

“No, no. Gavin can check on it.” She looked around her father at me. “You have my keys?”

“I do,” I said, and I could see Mr. Rotheford’s back straighten in disapproval.

He turned around. “I can take those.”

“No, Dad, Gavin can handle it,” Corabelle said.

“I insist.”

Corabelle struggled to sit up. “No, I’m the one who is insisting.”

I wasn’t going to be pushed around. “I listen to Corabelle.”

He stood up, pointing a finger at my nose. “Listen here. I know what you did to my daughter. I was there to pick her up after you took off without any word to anybody. I don’t know how you insinuated yourself back into her life, but I’m watching you.”

He towered over me, but I didn’t challenge him, didn’t stand up. He needed this moment. I knew to let him have it. I tried to imagine having a daughter who got knocked up by some teenage lowlife and then all the things that played out for us, and I agreed that I deserved whatever they wanted to dish out. But I would not let Corabelle go, not now, not ever.

“Sir, I expect you to,” I said.

Corabelle searched for the bed button, which had slipped down the side of the mattress. I reached around her irate father and set it by her pillow. She moved the bed up a few notches, doing her Corabelle determination thing, aiming to not only do what the doctor said, but exceed his expectation on her recovery.

“We need to check in somewhere,” Mrs. Rotheford said.

“There’s a hotel on the next block,” I told them. “Easy walk.”

Mr. Rotheford still stood, stiff and angry, in the middle of the room.

“What’s it called, Gavin?” her mother asked.

“The Elms. Just go out the main entrance and turn right. I’d drive you, but I—” Maybe I shouldn’t bring up the motorcycle just now. “I would need to fetch Corabelle’s car.”

“We can walk it,” Mrs. Rotheford said. She turned back to the bed. “We’ll be back in the morning. Call us if you need us.”

Her father finally relaxed his shoulders. “I’ll pick up a new phone for you. We’ll be here.”

Corabelle nodded, then turned back to me, her eyes like a fawn’s, soft and dark. “Can you stay a minute?”

“Of course,” I said.

I stepped aside as her parents kissed her and left the room, their suitcases trailing behind them.

3: Corabelle

Gavin ran his finger across my palm, and I felt so much calmer. The rumble of the rolling suitcases faded down the hall as he pulled the stool up next to me by the bed. “That was tough, huh?” he said.

“Thankfully the pain meds are kicking in. I didn’t think I could take another minute of his beady glare.”

Gavin laughed. “He is pretty pissed at me.”

I pressed his hand to my cheek. “They’ll adjust. It’s all pretty new, even for us.” I kissed his fingers. We had to talk about what happened. I could play the sick card, but really, we should just dive in. Get through the hard stuff before it got too late to bring it up again.

“We haven’t really talked about that last conversation we had on the beach,” I said.

“You’ve been too busy trying to re-create the Pacific in your lungs.”

I tried to smile, even though my lips were cracked and dry. We had so much terrain to cover, I didn’t really know where to start. “Where did you find someone willing to give you a vasectomy so young?”

“Mexico. Cash-under-the-table thing.”

“Was it safe?”

He shrugged. “I went to a doc here and they tested it. Said it worked. Nothing seemed damaged. He was pretty pissed I had done it and wanted the name of the doctor.”

I let go of his hand. “Did you give it to them?” The heat rushing to my face made my head hurt again. I tried to slow my breathing, stay calm. A coughing fit would end the conversation fast.

“No.” He shifted over and braced his elbows on the bed rails, resting his scruffy cheek on his wrist. He was tired. He’d probably been in that chair for days.

“Have you gone home at all?”

He reached out and ran the back of his knuckles across my upper arm. “For clothes. Now that your parents have descended, this is all the time I get with you.”

“Maybe we can tell the hospital that you’re my husband.”

“Your dad won’t back us up like he did with Finn.”

I sighed. “They could kick you out, maybe.”

“They won’t.”

“Aren’t there visiting hours?”

“Probably. I don’t exactly play by the rules.”

“That’s true.” I laid my hand on his thigh. “I’m sorry I never told you about the marijuana.”

He exhaled with a long gush of air. “I never thought you’d keep a secret from me.”

“I was embarrassed. Katie got me started, and it helped me on the test, it really did.”

“But you never told the doctors. Not even when Finn was sick.”

Tears formed in the corners of my eyes, hot and painful. “I couldn’t bear everyone hating me.”

“We wouldn’t have.”

“Everyone would blame me.”

“You don’t know that.”

“I did!” I grabbed fists full of the sheets, pain shooting through my head despite the meds. I could feel another cough coming on, deep in my chest. I didn’t think I could suppress it.

Gavin reached for my arm, holding it tight. “I don’t blame you. I don’t think anyone would have. When you found out you were pregnant, did you keep doing it?”

“No!”

“Then you did what you were supposed to do.” He ran his fingers along my arm, gently, carefully. I relaxed back into the pillow, slowly bringing the upset down.

“I’m sure lots of women do it,” he said. “It probably didn’t do anything.”

I breathed in carefully, testing the cough. It had passed. “People always ask if you could change one thing, what would it be? I would change that.”

“Probably everything would have happened just the same.” He kept the pressure against my skin, feather light but comforting. He knew me. He knew what worked.

“At least then I would know it wasn’t something I did.”

He let go of my arm and stood up. I thought he was going to leave, and I could feel my chest tighten in distress, but instead he lowered the rail out of the way. “Scoot over. This bed is bigger than the one at your parents’ house, and we seemed to fit on it just fine.”

My cheeks burned to think of all the things that had happened on that narrow white bed. My parents had to have known, although the news of the baby still seemed to catch them by surprise. Of course, we all thought the shot would protect me.

I shifted over, feeling the heaviness of the tube on my leg and the pull of the tape. God, was there pee running through that into a bag somewhere? Could Gavin see it? “You’re never going to want to have sex with me again,” I said.

Gavin snorted. “I want to have sex with you
now
.”

“No way. I’ve got pee running down my leg.”

“Sexy.”

I wanted to punch him, but even that seemed to require too much strength. He settled in next to me, cradling my head against his shoulder.

“I’ve seen you with your feet in stirrups, pushing until you’re red in the face.” He trailed his fingers lightly along my arm, making me shiver. “I’ve seen you covered in puke with the flu.”

I groaned. “This conversation just keeps getting sexier.”

He turned my face to his. “I’ve seen you before you were out of diapers, if you recall. There is nothing that could happen that would change how I feel about you.”

I wanted to believe him, to feel that same blind faith I’d known as a girl who had never known any love but his. But he had left me. “Something did, once,” I said, my voice barely above a whisper.

He stilled, and I knew I had hit him close to the bone. “I was wrong,” he said. “I was foolish and stubborn and misguided and stupid.”

I snuggled into his neck, the warmth of his skin like a balm. “That was a terrible time.”

“We will never have another time as awful as that, not if it’s in my power.”

“I believe you.”

He squeezed me gently. “Things will be better now. We’re nearly there.”

“We have to finish school. I’m missing so much class.”

“The profs know.”

I looked up at him even though the movement created a searing pain in my temple. “Promise me you’ll go back to class tomorrow.”

He frowned. “I want to be here with you.”

“I’m fine. And my parents — they are going to be difficult. Bring me class notes, show them you’re responsible. Get your life back.”

Gavin sighed. “Okay. I guess that means I’ll have to pay attention.”

I squeezed his arm. “Yes. Even the boring parts.”

“They’re all boring parts.”

I relaxed into the rise and fall of his chest, feeling sleep descending on me again. I was home.

4: Corabelle

“All right, Corabelle, rise and shine.”

I turned away from the voice, but the screaming pain from a dozen places reminded me this wasn’t my mother getting me up for school. I shifted to my back again and peered up at the unfamiliar face looming over my bed. Another nurse, different from the gray-mop-headed one yesterday. She was younger, with a lion’s mane of flame-red hair that would have made Jenny’s pink ponytails look positively ordinary.

“Is it morning again?”

“It is indeed.”

Another day in the hospital. I pushed my hair out of my face, wishing for a ponytail holder. Something to ask Mom for.

“First, pain meds.” The nurse buzzed the bed upward, and I had to brace myself on the rails to avoid sliding down. She handed me a cup of water. “Take a sip first. You are probably still pretty crackly in there.”

The water was a cool relief. Hopefully I could drink more today. My stomach grumbled and I looked down at the belly of my blue hospital gown.

“That’s a good sign.” She passed over a small cup with two pills in it. “We’ll send up a soft breakfast. You’re going to have some company in about half an hour, so we need you up and about.”

She passed me a strange contraption with several cylinders that contained small plastic balls. “Blow into this.” She angled a tube at my mouth.

I puffed into it, but only two of the balls moved up, quickly settling back down.

“Try again, as hard as you can.”

I blew harder this time, as long and sustained as I could. All the balls went up, but not very far. When I stopped, my chest contracted, and another coughing fit came over me.

“Relax, relax, breathe in.” The nurse pressed me back against the upright pillow. “The cough is going to linger for a while.”

After a minute, I finally managed to get control again. “How long?”

“Depends on how well you take care of yourself.”

“I’m just lying in bed.”

“Sitting up is better.” She moved to the end of the bed and lifted a heavy plastic bag. “If you walk steady today, then this can come out.”

Thank God. I swallowed the pills. “You said someone is visiting?”

“She’ll introduce herself. Just part of the staff.”

The social worker. I just knew it. My heart started hammering. I had to be clearheaded when she came. Sound cool, competent, and most importantly, able to explain my entry into the ocean. If I could get through this one visit well, I probably wouldn’t be bothered by her again. My goals were as clear as they’d been in a while. Get better. Get out. Get back to school. And to Gavin.

I could get back to Gavin now.

The very idea that he was out there, reachable, and waiting for me was still so new. I hadn’t felt so hopeful in years. Everything had meaning again — why I was in school, where I was going, who I wanted to be. He had been the missing piece.

The nurse took my temperature. No, the missing piece would always be missing. Finn. But at least Gavin and I had each other again.

And we’d only ever have each other if we didn’t find a way to work around what he’d done. No more babies. No family.

The nurse removed the thermometer and picked up her iPad.

“So how easy is it to get a vasectomy reversed?” I asked her.

She picked up the blood pressure cuff. “Now that’s out of the blue.”

I shrugged. “Just wondering.”

She pushed a button to start the inflation. “I’ve never done a stint in urology. We don’t get those types of patients in the hospital anymore. It’s all outpatient. But it’s done all the time.”

“Successfully?”

The cuff began its ticking descent. “I don’t reckon it would be so popular to try if it never worked.”

True. I let out a long sigh. We’d figure this out. Later, after college, we’d find someone who could look at him. This didn’t have to be the end. Hopefully they hadn’t mangled him at whatever godforsaken clinic would take on an eighteen-year-old.

“I want to get you up a little before we take out the catheter. Make sure you’re steady enough for bathroom breaks.” The nurse pulled back the covers. I grimaced at the clear plastic tube. At least there was nothing in it at the moment.

Thankfully I didn’t feel woozy today. Maybe I could leave before the weekend was over, be back at school on Monday.