12th of Never

Chapter 106

I WAS SLEEPING in our bed in the oncology wing when a booming voice paging Dr. Sebetic ended in a feedback squeal that rudely woke me. I groaned, reached for Joe, but he wasn’t there.

I rolled over and saw that the baby’s incubator was no longer at our bedside. Seeing that empty spot dropped me into unadulterated, heart-stopping, blinding terror.

What had happened while I slept?

Where was my baby?

I was on my feet when Joe rounded the doorway to our room. He was wearing a T-shirt, shorts, and paper slippers, and was holding two containers of coffee.

“Hey. I’ve got something for you,” he said. “If you want a shower, go now. We’ve got a meeting with Dr. Sebetic in fifteen minutes.”

“Where’s Julie?”

“She’s in the baby room. Go. Splash some water on yourself.”

I stood in the tiny stall under the hot spray, not moving, just letting the water work on me. The baby was in her incubator. We were going to meet with Dr. Sebetic and he was going to give us a thumbs-up or a thumbs-down. And whatever he said, we were going to deal with it.

Still, I didn’t like the freaking odds.

Joe rapped on the shower door.

“Let’s go, Lindsay. We don’t want to keep the doctor waiting.”

I dried off with a towel the size of a dinner napkin, then dressed in yesterday’s smoky jeans and one of Joe’s clean Tshirts. If paper shoes were good enough for Joe, they were good enough for me. I opened a packet and put them on.

After brushing my teeth and hair, I went out into our room, drank down my coffee in one long gulp, then said to my husband, “Are you ready?”

“No,” he said. “I’m not.”

We went into each other’s arms and held on tight. I gathered strength from my husband and I asked God to please let her live. Joe dropped his head to my shoulder and I put my hand in his hair.

Then Joe released me. “We’re late,” he said.