Page 4 of Every Single Wildflower
“Ryder…” I begin but he cuts me off.
“Is this what it takes for you to come home? A fucking tragedy?” He grits out.
My cheeks flame, my pulse racing. “That’s not fair.”
“Fair?” He scoffs. “What’s not fair is you abandoning your family.”
“I never abandoned anyone,” I snap.
But didn’t you, Ivy?
“Bullshit," he barks.
His thunderous voice bounces off of the empty walls of the hallway, earning us a warning glare from the charge nurse.
“This isn’t the place, Ryder.” Cooper maneuvers me ahead of him. “Cool off. It’s been a long day and this ain’t helping.”
With that we brush past him, walking silently to the end of the hallway.
“It’s here.” Cooper presses the silver lever, opening the door to a small dim room.
Entering with lead feet, I walk slowly until I’m standing next to the aging man lying in the hospital bed. His eyes are closed while an oxygen mask is strapped over his face. It's paired with a white bandage around his head. The sounds of the monitors give off a steady beat as Wheel of Fortune plays softly in the background from the tv that’s mounted on the wall. It hurts. Seeing him like this.
A toilet flushes and the door to the bathroom opens before the best person I’ve ever known joins me.
My mother.
When her eyes land on me, she sucks in a sharp breath, and her voice cracks.
“Ivy.”
“Hey mama.” My words are just as shredded as hers, and it’s even more evident in this moment that those four years of absence had done nothing to ease the guilt I took along with me. The guilt I was hoping I could bury somewhere else.
Chapter two
Ivy
“Let’s talk out in the hall so we don’t wake him,” my mom whispers in my ear.
“I’ll stay with him.” Cooper places a kiss on my mom’s head before taking a seat in the blue chair next to dad's bed.
When we close the door behind us, my mother lets out a compressed sob.
“I thought we were going to lose him,” she admits.
Her painful cry splits my already marred heart farther in two. “He’s ok mom.”
She lets out a breath, her hands shaking as she reaches for mine. “Situation aside. I’m so glad you’re here, sweetheart.” Her hands squeeze. “I missed you.”
Damn this place. I’ve been here all of five minutes and I'm on the verge of torrential tears. “I missed you too, mom.”
I have missed her. Missed my brother’s, my best friends, myhome.But sometimes it’s not enough to erase the pain.
“What did the doctor say?” I ask.
Her blonde hair is swept back, her eyes shining as she sniffs. “We’re waiting for him to come back. They did another CT scan. We are hoping for no swelling or bleeding on the brain.”
My father was a pillar of this community. Our family was known for generations of hard-working ranchers. I don’t think the man had been to a doctor’s office in his entire life. Honestly, when he wakes up, I feel sorry for the nurses and hospital staff. The only person to ever check him out for any ranch related injuries was Dr. Palmer, our vet.
