In the hospital ER, the doctor is talking with Adam and Connor
"The bullet entered the foot here" the doctor said pointing to the x-ray "and thankfully passed clean through. We need to operate to repair the tendons but I don't think we're talking permanent damage here."
Adam sighed in relief that the injury wasn't severe. "Um, he uh, he plays baseball. Is he still going to be able to?" Adam asked the doctor concerned. Connor had always been active as a kid and he knew that he loved soccer and baseball. Adam had played baseball in school as well and sharing that love of the game with Connor had provided him some of his best memories of time spent with his son. Connor was so much better than he was at his age and with some focus and discipline, Adam knew that he had the potential to be so much more and Adam was determined to give his son that chance.
"Well, he's not going to be on the field anytime soon" the doctor says with a smile "but you can tell the Padres to keep holding his spot in the line-up."
Adam looked at his son's face, worry and concern clear on it. 'He must have been really worried' Adam thought about what this could have done to him. Luckily the season was over for this year, but summer camps were times when Connor could work on his skills and the basics and Adam knew how much Connor enjoyed going to those programs and hanging out with the other kids on the team.
"I'm going to send the nurses in to get you prepped and then we'll get this taken care of" the doctor smiles again.
Adam felt a wave of relief come over him as he realized that Connor was out of any real danger after this crazy night. He flashes back to the memory of his phone ringing, waking him from his sleep, to hear a woman's voice tell him that his son was at the hospital and had been shot in the foot. She indicated that they needed him there to speak to the doctors. Adam had been moving to grab his grey hoodie before she got halfway through the call so that he could head for the hospital. He did double check Connor's room, but it was empty as he expected it to be. Connor had sneaked out before and though he couldn't prove it, he was certain it was to go to that party at Jude's house. Adam had run in to Jude's room but Connor wasn't there, just Jude and two girls. Adam found Connor in his room when he got back and while Connor never admitted that he was there, Adam was certain he had been.
But now, the fear and anxiety that he had been feeling all night, of not being sure if his son was in real risk of death or permanently injured, had gone away. He crashed both physically and emotionally. All the adrenaline that had been keeping him going seemed to crash in on him as he could finally breathe again.
"Thank you" he said sincerely as the doctor walked out.
Adam looked back to Connor who was watching the doctor leave and something inside him snapped. His son, his only son, the little boy who he had held moments after he was born, the kid who would come running every time he walked in the house screaming for him to pick him up and hug him, the boy who Adam was watching grow into a man had nearly died because he did something so stupid as to sneak out! He had broken into someone's house to drink alcohol with Jude and some girls? What was happening to his son? He was 13! Too young for drinking and sneaking out and while he had to admit to feeling a bit of pride knowing his son was a lady's man with a girlfriend, he wasn't so sure that Connor could handle it.
"What were you thinking sneaking out like that?" Adam asked, feeling that knot of fear in his stomach turning to anger as he kept thinking about how close this was to being a catastrophe. "What kind of idiot breaks into somebody's house in the middle of the night?" Connor squirmed in the bed, not looking at him or giving him any kind of answer.
"Is it about that girl? That girl Daria? Is that why you did this?" Adam was trying to understand his son. God knows that he personally had done some stupid stuff to get the attention of the girls in his school when he was a kid, but getting shot? Sure he had snuck out, but he is sure it wasn't till he was 16...maybe 15, but definitely not earlier than that.
