A Family Affair

16

Hailey looked up from her phone in her hand at the sound of someone calling for her, stopping in the middle of the ED and gazing around for the room for who was shouting for her. That's when she sees the messy blonde locks of her daughter bouncing toward her. She gives Macie a smile and catches her in her arms, Hailey bending down to place a kiss in her daughter's hair as Macie hugs around her waist tightly.

Hailey rests her cheek against the top of the girl's head. "I missed you, Mae."

Macie moves her chin up into the air, shining her father's smile up to Hailey. "I missed you too."

Hailey then stands up straight again despite Macie continued tight grasp around her and gives Will and gentle smile too as he makes his way over to them.

He shoots her an apologetic stare. "Sorry, she saw you and I couldn't stop her."

She shakes her head, unable to wipe the smile from her face as she blows it off. "Don't worry about it."

Will comes to a stop in front of Hailey and his niece and watches as Hailey gives another kiss to the top of Macie's head before she looks back up to him and he sends her a quizzical glance. "Everything okay?" He questions, placing his hands against his hip.

She nods, relief washing through her eyes again as she answers. "Better now he's awake."

"Are you guys gonna be able to get out of here tonight?" Will wonders.

There's a sigh that escapes Hailey's mouth as she shakes her head. "No, they want to keep him under observation one more night, just in case. His blood pressure's still a little lower than normal so they want to see if they can raise it any more without making him hypertensive, so hopefully tomorrow." She responds with the glimmer of hope in her voice.

Macie then breaks into the conversation, loosening her grip on Hailey and creasing her eyebrows up to her. "Can we go see dad now?" She asks.

Hailey shoots her a smile and nod. "I'll take you up to him." She replies, subtly pointing to the elevators down the corridor because Jay had been moved upstairs into recovery the night before.

On their way to the elevator, Will turns to look at Hailey. "Well yeah, hopefully tomorrow, you know what Jay's like with hospitals, but any time you need me to take Mae out of your hands, I'm there."

"Don't tempt me," Hailey adds with a smirk as they stop in front of the large steel doors, leaning her arm over Macie's head to reach the button, "But the sooner we get out of here the better. He's already not happy about the fact he's off work for two weeks because of a pretty bad concussion, if we have to stay here another night after tonight he's gonna be even more mad."

Will tilts his head to one side. "Might teach him to be more careful."

"No it won't." Hailey scoffs and lets out a breathless chuckle.

He nods. "Yeah, you're probably right."

The elevator dinged and they stepped inside, Macie insisting on pressing the button to the floor Jay was staying on so Hailey whispers it down to her daughter and Mae happily presses the button. The ride up was silent between them, it felt as though it was perfect for some of the elevator music but it stopped half way up and a few doctors joined them inside, greeting Will on their entrance, and then there was quiet muffled sounds of the two doctors talking behind them.