Because (Seven Year Itch #4) (3 page)

Chapter 3

While driving like a bat out of Hell, I wait for the ringing to stop at the sound of his voice. This is the sixth time I’ve dialed his number. The first five have been ignored, sending me right into is voicemail that I know he never checks. If he thinks I’m going to hang up and give it a rest he has another thing coming. Our daughter is too sick, not to mention the fact that he should be home with us instead of out with the guys at God only knows what bar or strip club this late.

I begged him to stay. I pleaded.

He probably thinks this was just me trying to ruin his good time. He has no idea there is a real emergency going on with his only child. Brandon may be a shit husband with minimal priorities when it comes to our marriage, but Aberdeen means the world to him. He loves her more than life itself. As mad as I am with him, I know I can’t stop trying to reach him.

On top of my concerns for my child’s health, my mind is fixated on my earlier fight with Brandon, and it being the reason he won’t pick up my call. If he hates me it isn’t without reason. He was right. Sometimes I nag him too much. I can’t help it. I want him to be better, and I don’t know how else to make it happen.

Maybe we shouldn’t have married so early. Getting pregnant at eighteen and eloping seemed like a good idea at the time. I swore he was the love of my life, and that no other man could ever possibly give me the kind of passion Brandon does. It only took me a few months of pregnancy to see just how much growing up my husband had to do. He wasn’t around much for doctor appointment or pivotal firsts, like feeling our daughter move. His priorities revolve around his friends. Nothing has changed since then. Nothing.

Seven years.

Seven years of ignored phone calls.

Seven years of being his last priority.

Seven years of waiting for him to come around and see how much we need him to put us before his own social life.

I keep waiting, but it seems like it’s never going to happen.

It doesn’t help that in the time we’ve been married I’ve heard enough opinions from other people to last a lifetime.

“Give him time.”
How much time is needed? Were they talking about weeks? Months? Years? A lifetime of being miserable?

“Men mature later than women.”
I have every reason to believe it never happens, at least not for my husband.

“He will come around.”
Maybe in the next century, when I’m dead in the ground with a lifetime of regret and despair. Surely, I can agree to disagree.

“Maybe you’re smothering him.”
Asking my husband to pitch in with family decisions, chores, and priorities is not smothering him, not in my book. Maybe my friends and family are smothering me with their ridiculous opinions. In the meantime, I’m drowning in depression. I’ve let myself go, mostly because I’m too damn upset to do anything. It’s a struggle to get out of bed, especially when the spot next to me is almost always empty. 

Arriving at the Emergency is a relief. I haven’t gotten ahold of Brandon, and I don’t have time to sit around and keep trying. I type in a quick text before shoving my phone in my purse and rushing to get my daughter inside.

When medical workers see me carrying a seven year old, one that should be capable of walking in herself, they know something was terribly wrong. A triage nurse hurries to my side. “What happened?”

“Her fever was over one-hundred and four. She’s vomiting, and has a rash on her stomach. She’s lethargic and…” I can’t keep talking. I’m breaking down, gripping to her body in order to keep from dropping her. “Please. She needs to see a doctor.”

She takes us through the back and puts us in a room while calling for another nurse to help her prep Aberdeen. Once they have her in a bed, they lift her pajama top over her head and started taking her vitals.

“When did she last have medication?”

“She hasn’t. She kept vomiting and I didn’t get the chance.”

“We’re going to get her temperature managed first, and then we’ll draw blood to figure out what’s going on.” She says to me before checking Aberdeen’s eyes with a small light. “Her pupils are dilated. Can you get the doctor?”

“Is she going to be okay?” It was hard to ask with my voice cracking.

“We’re going to figure out what’s causing this, ma’am. She’s in good hands, I assure you.”

A man comes in the room followed by the other nurse that had been helping from before. She gets to work on an IV and inserts the medication directly into her veins. At the same time the doctor and triage nurse are looking Aberdeen over. By this point she’s out of it, appearing to be asleep, even though I worried she’s unconscious. “Please tell me what’s going on.”

“How long have these symptoms been occurring?”

I wipe my tears as I speak. “Maybe an hour. She was fine earlier.”

“Besides the fever, vomiting and rash, can you think of any other symptoms?” He asks.

I shake my head. “She’s lethargic. She seems like it’s hard to communicate.”

“We’re running some blood work and working on getting her fever under control. We should see improvement soon, and by that time we’ll hopefully have it figured out why she’s fallen ill. It’s probably viral, but we’ll make sure we have the proper diagnosis.”

He leaves the room with the nurse he came in with, calling out the names of certain tests he wants panels for, while I remain watching the triage nurse attach a drip to Aberdeen’s IV. “What’s that for?”

“Fluids. We need to keep her hydrated, especially if she’s vomiting. Do you know if she’s had loose bowels?”

I shake my head. “Not that I know of. She was fine all day.”

The nurse hands me a little bowl shaped like a banana. “In case she needs to throw up keep this handy. If she has to go to the bathroom, hit the call button. I’ll want to try to get a sample, but it’s okay if we can’t.” She pulls out her thermometer and after putting a new cover on the end, sticks it in my daughter’s ear. “Good. We’re at one-o-three point six. It’s coming down slowly. Don’t be surprised if she wakes up. It’s normal.”

“Is there some kind of wicked virus going around?”

“There is always something, but we’re going to make sure that’s all it is. Rest assured, she’s going to recover.”

It wasn’t until she leaves the room that I pull out my phone again. Just as I start to hit the button to call Brandon I hear the doctor and nurse talking outside the door. “We need to take precautions in case it’s meningitis. Tell the lab to page me with the results. I don’t want to wait on this one.”

“I’ll make sure they’re aware, doctor.”

I cover my mouth and look down at my sleeping child. This can’t be happening.

Meningitis. People die from it.

I have to hold onto the bedrails to steady myself as I grasp what I’ve just overheard. My daughter could be suffering from a life threatening condition and there isn’t a damn thing I could do about it.

I needed Brandon. She needed him.

I close my eyes and pray for him to show up, and within twenty minutes he appears in the doorway. His eyes are fixed on our daughter as he steps inside. “What the hell happened?”

I’m still in tears, on the verge of a nervous breakdown, so talking is a struggle. “She woke up with an extremely high fever. She threw up everywhere. I heard them say meningitis. I don’t know, Bran. I don’t know.”

He rushes to my side, pulling me to fall against his chest. He smells like stale beer and cigarettes, but this is a dire situation and I’m not about to start on him again, not when he was the only type of support I need to be able to handle this. “Are you sure? She was fine.”

“I know. I told them that. I overheard the doctor ordering tests. He mentioned it, but I don’t know if it’s the diagnosis.”

“How long have you been here?” He inquires.

“Not long. I was in the car when I tried to call you. She woke up next to me. I tried to put her in the tub, but it wasn’t helping. I didn’t know what to do. I’m so scared.”

“Don’t get ahead of yourself, Shay. We don’t know that’s what this is. She’s a healthy little girl. She’ll be okay.” He rubs my back and kisses the top of my head. Like every time there was some major catastrophe, he becomes the man I need, even though I know it’s only temporary. I think that’s why I refused to give up. There was hope in him yet, I just had to give him a reason to want to change.

“What if she isn’t? I can’t live without her, Bran. I can’t.” I hate being negative, but seeing her suffering is hard to handle. I’m losing hope, and falling victim to my deepest fears.

“Shh, you have to stay strong.”

He holds me for a couple more minutes before I pull away and sit down in one of the chairs next to the bed. Brandon stands at our daughter’s side. He is whispering in her ear that he has arrived and everything was going to be fine.

After that we sit next to each other without speaking. My thoughts of his actions were far from my mind. All I cared about is Aberdeen.

Named after my deceased grandmother, she was a spitfire from her first breath. Her flowing long light brown hair curled on the ends, and when she fluttered her bright eyes at people they gave her anything her little heart desires. Some people have mentioned she could win pageants, but I’ve never been the type of person to get involved in that type of atmosphere, not that she’d be interested. Aberdeen likes to play with the boys. She’s on a t-ball team and prefers kicking around a soccer ball over playing with dolls. Getting her hair brushed is like pulling teeth. She avoids it at all costs, making me want to chop it all off on a daily basis.

Out of nowhere I hear her voice attempting to speak. We both shoot up and we’re at her side. She’s groggy and looking around to see where she is. “Don’t move, sweetie. You have medicine going inside of you arm. It’s important you remain still.”

“How did I get here?” She asks.

“I drove you.”

Brandon rubs the hair away from her face. “How do you feel, Ab?”

“Tired.”

“Your mom and I are going to be right here with you until they say we can go home, okay?”

She manages a nod before dozing off again.

Brandon turns to look at me. “She’s really out of it.”

“That’s why it’s scary. Thanks for getting here so fast. I was about to lose it before you walked in.”

“Is this where you tell me I should have stayed home and this is all my fault?” He asks.

“No. I’d never blame you for her being sick. I know how much you love her. You’re just not there the way I need you to be.”

He clenched his jaw as I watch, waiting for him to respond. “Sorry I didn’t answer the calls. I was furious with you and didn’t feel like getting into it again. I felt like crap when I read your text.”

I had to settle for the good instead of dwelling on what couldn’t be changed. This wasn’t about our marriage. Everything had to come to a halt until we could get this situation figured out. “You’re here. It’s all I care about right now. Let’s just deal with this first.” I’d deal with him later, when I knew our daughter was going to be okay.

“Yeah, all right.”

Seven hours is the amount of time it took the doctor to get back to us with the results. In that time, Aberdeen had woke up and was responding normally to interactions with us and the nurses. She hadn’t thrown up since the initial explosion at our house, and the color was back in her face.

I don’t remember much of what the doctor said after the words ‘it’s not meningitis’ came from his mouth. Silently I celebrated without making myself look like a fool. It was early in the wee hours of the morning and we were all exhausted. With her vitals stable and them being sure it was just a virus, they allowed us to go home around ten in the morning. I could barely keep my eyes open to drive, and since Brandon had driven himself, I’m sure he was struggling the same.

Throughout the night we’d kept quiet about our earlier fight, though I knew at some point it would be brought up. For now I was content we’d all go home and sleep.

It was a huge shock to my husband when he walked in the house and it reeked of vomit. I stripped the bed, fetched the bathroom towels, and tossed everything I could fit in the washing machine. He helped Aberdeen get changed while I put fresh linens on the bed and spray Lysol everywhere she came in contact with.