Page 125 of Home Run

Rubbing my fingers over my brow was all I could do to stop the tears of relief bursting out in front of Millie’s mom and this very professional, kind of stern looking doctor in front of me. I needed to keep my shit together. Not to mention we were in the middle of a corridor where several other very professional medical looking people were hurrying back and forth.

Didn’t seem to matter that it was almost eleven p.m.

I glanced back through the small window in the door to Millie’s hospital room where she was sleeping soundly, albeit wired up to the max on painkillers, sedatives and body monitors. As was the bump.

“How’s the baby?”

“He’s totally fine, sleeping soundly.” The doctor grinned while my face froze at his words.

Oh my god.

“He?”

Kirsty let out a loud gasp, and I had to cough away the lump in my throat. I tried to anyway but it didn’t work, my next words came out a garbled mess.

“It’s a boy, we’re having a son?”

“You are.” The doctor peered at his clipboard, “sorry, I didn’t realize you hadn’t found out.”

I glanced down at Kirsty’s hand gripping my forearm.

“We were supposed to have our twenty-week scan tomorrow. We were going to find out.”

“You still can have a scan when Millie is out of the woods, but we had our neo-natal surgeon on hand, and she checked her over. There’s nothing to worry about. Strong little thing, ten fingers and ten toes from what we can tell,” he chuckled. Guess it was a doctor joke because he was theonly one laughing. “Heart rate was a little elevated but that’s to be expected.”

“Strong?” I asked, wiping my cheeks dry.

“Yes, takes after his mother. Your um…girlfriend… has a very high pain threshold, Mr Simpson. I’m surprised she made it as long as she did. Not many people would have.”

I think that was supposed to make me feel better, but it didn’t.

“Unfortunately, her pain threshold is equal to her stubbornness.” I sighed, and next to me Kirsty laughed.

“Well, she’s in the right place now, and she’ll be able to go home in a couple of days. We’ll take good care of her.”

“Thank you.” I replied, and another wave of relief crashed over me as I stared at Millie again.

“If you’d like, the nurse can bring some extra blankets if you wanted to stay.”

“Thank you, yes, that would be great. I’m not going anywhere until I know she’s okay.” I answered.

It was pointless going anywhere, I wouldn’t be able to sleep, not while Millie was here. But even if I could have slept there’s no way I’d be leaving her now.

“No problem.” He replied, and made a move to step away before deciding against it. “I…uh… I should tell you, I’ve been a Lions fan since I was a boy. You’ve done us proud this season, I hope you get to lift the trophy.”

“Thanks, doc.” I smiled at him as best I could, though I wasn’t feeling particularly smiley right now. “I appreciate that.”

“You’re welcome. I’ll go and get your blankets organized.”

The pair of us stayed where we were, watching him walk off.

Kirsty turned to me, “I guess telling you to go home and get some rest will fall on deaf ears.”

I nodded, “Yup. I’m staying right here until she’s out of surgery. If I need to sleep I’ll use the couch in her room.”

“Thought as much.” She replied, “Don’t worry, she’ll be fine. Matty and Josh both had their appendix out as kids, it’s pretty simple.”

“Yeah, me too. But I’m staying put. So if you wanted to go home and get some sleep, I’ll call you if anything happens. Doug will probably be worried about you.”

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