"Two souls are sometimes created together and in love before they're even born." -F. Scott Fitzgerald
When eight year old Beau Ruby met twelve year old Colton Caine, she had no idea she was meeting the love of her life. She had no idea she'd grow...
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There were forty-two tiles between Beau's hospital bed and the door to the waiting room. I counted them over and over again as the doctor's examined her two more times. During the second round of listening to Beau whimpering from the hallway and being unable to fix it, Jack appeared with a cup of black coffee for me.
I thanked him, knowing he meant well. After taking the first sip, the nurse I had recognized from earlier appeared. She smiled sweetly and said, "Hey, Jack, it's good to see you," in a tone that had me raising my eyebrows at him. He smiled back, one of his ever-charming-Jack-Caine smiles and said, "Yeah, Anna, it's good to see you, too."
Then, she turned to me. "Colton, we should talk. The doctor is going to release her soon." I nodded in response and took another sip of the coffee. She took a deep breath before she began. "She's in shock right now. Probably will be for a while. We told her about Verne, and she's been out of it ever since." She paused as if to let me speak. I just nodded, waiting for her to go on. "Um... her arm is broken. It's a clean break, she got lucky there, but it's going to be painful. She's also going to be extremely sore over the next week. The car flipped multiple times."
I winced, then, as if what she said physically pained me. I hated the thought of Beau, terrified and crying, being tossed about in Verne's old Buick.
She continued, adding, "We are sending her home with a prescription for Lortab. The hospital pharmacy filled it. They should ease the pain and help her sleep. She's got some cuts on her arms and face from glass. We cleaned them, but she's going to need a good shower when she can stand it. It's possible there's small shards of glass in her hair that we didn't find." She reached out and placed her palm against my left shoulder before curling her fingers around it softly. "I know you're going to take good care of her, but it might be a rough few days. Take her home and put her in bed. She'll come out of this fine."
I nodded several times, feeling my eyes well up again. I didn't know why I kept crying. She was alive, and for the most part, she was fine. She was still here. The shock of Jack telling me she had been in car accident and not knowing if she was okay was just wearing on me.
Anna gave me a white paper pharmacy bag with Beau's prescription, reminded me to call on Monday and get Beau an appointment with an orthopedic doctor to check her arm, and got a wheel chair for Beau. Jack left the ER to go get the truck, and I was left alone with Beau.
I pushed a strand of hair back behind her ear. "You ready to go? Anna said I can take you home." I asked, but she didn't respond. She was still staring at the floor as she had been when I first saw her. I squatted down, feeling my knees and ankles crack and pop with exhaustion after the long day. From my lowered spot on the floor, I looked up at her. "Beau, hey, look at me," I begged, but she didn't. I stared at her, searching her now hollow eyes for any sign that she was listening to me. Her hair had hidden the cuts around her face well, but I could see them now. There were steri-strips over two of them, and the rest appeared to be simple scratches. She looked like she had a black eye forming, and her eyes were red and swollen from crying. I reached out and touched her knee, spreading my fingers across her bare skin. "I'm here. I know what I said before. I'm here, though. I'm not leaving. I'm going to get you through this."
