Page 44 of Wicked Things
“Well…I do. And for a longest time, I was convinced there was someone out there for Sloane, who was her intellectual equal, who was good and right for her. And that person wasnotyou.”
I grumble low in the back of my throat. “So you’re calling me stupid. And bad. And unworthy of her.” As much as I am able to, I’m teasing her. She knows this. Smiling a little, she reaches over and squeezes my hand lightly.
“I’m saying I thought that once upon a time. I know better now. I’m saying that no matter what I thought, you recognized that Sloane was the woman for you, a part of you that was missing, and Sloane recognized the same in you. And while you may not be anything quite so fantastical or spiritual as soul mates to one another, I believe that you fell in love with her that night in that hotel room. And she fell in love with you, too. Despite the circumstances, and despite the time and all the pain that followed after.” She takes a deep breath, looking around, watching the people walking up and down the corridor with an inexplicable sadness in her eyes. “So, no,” she says. “You coming here to watch her and check in on her…I don’t think that makes you a creepy fucking stalker. I think you were just…drawn to that the missing part of you. Don’t get me wrong, Zeth. You are a frightening individual to know. There are some things I will never see eye to eye with you on. But, you’re the counterweight to something very special. And…now that I’m not running in the opposite direction from you all the time, I can see how specialyouare, too.”
I can’t move. I sit for a long time, staring at the floor, replaying the words Pippa has just said to me. I’m not emotionally equipped to respond to her in a way that she’ll understand. I try. I really fucking try to come up with the right words, to put them in the right fucking order, but I just…can’t. In the end, I simply reach over and take her hand, the way she took mine a moment ago, and I squeeze her back.
Pippa’s faint smile tells me she understands. “You, Zeth Mayfair,” she says, “are more than welcome.”
******
By midday I’m really starting to freak the fuck out. No one is sleeping anymore. Everyone looks slightly worried, which is doing nothing to ease my fucking panic. Mason won’t stop checking on his thumbnails. Kaya denies that she’s counting the ceiling tiles overhead, over and over again, but she is. And Michael is prowling up and down the hallway like a goddamn caged lion. I’m frozen in my seat, staring at the clock on the wall, my heart lurching every time the second hand ticks further around its face. I feel like I’m about to burst out of my fucking skin.
Fuck it.
Enough.
Enough of this.
I stand up. I’m about to bolt through the doors, determined to go and find Sloane, when they swing open on their own and a short, curvy little nurse wearing a facemask and a paper gown over her scrubs emerges, gunning straight for me.
“You’re Zeth?” she asks.
“Yes.”
“Can you please come with me?”
My knees almost buckle underneath me. I was about to force my way into the delivery room, but now this woman is asking me to go with her, her face so drawn and serious, I’m shitting myself. “Why? What’s happened?” I demand.
“No, no, nothing’s happened. I just need you to come with me, please. I’ll explain in a second.”
“She’s alive, though?” Michael asks. “She’s not dying or anything?”
The nurse just smiles politely. Not a no. She doesn’t say Sloane’snotdying.Holy shit. Holy fuck. Holy—
“Please, Mr. Mayfair. I promise, I’ll explain as we get you gowned up.”
I have to really concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other. I’m learning to walk all over again, because my legs refuse to function on their own. I follow behind the nurse, choking on the lump in my throat. Something’s wrong. I can fuckingfeelit. Something is horribly wrong.
In a small scrub room flanked by long troughs, the nurse hands me a paper gown and fastens it at the back. She makes me wash my hands, and then gives me gloves and a facemask, then she leads me through an imposing grey door, and we’re in the delivery room.
Sloane’s lying out on the table. Ramesh Patel’s sitting on a stool between her legs, and the only part of his face I can see—his eyes, his eyebrows, his forehead—tell a worrying story. He’s frowning, creases everywhere, concern lingering in his eyes. Sloane’s head is tilted away from me, the column of her neck exposed, so, so pale, her skin slick with sweat. Fuck. I can’t deal with this. She doesn’t move as I approach the table. Doesn’t move a muscle. I halt a few steps away from her, dread coiling deep inside me, wrapping around my very bones. Is this why they’ve called me in here? Is…isshe fucking dead? The nurses hovering around the bed all look very stern. One of them takes me by the elbow, guiding me forward, forcing me to move.
“Don’t worry. She’s just sleeping,” Ramesh says. He stands up and stretches, arching his back, rocking from side to side before he sits down on the stool again. “It’s typical for first time labors to take a long time, but it becomes exhausting for the mother after a while. The baby’s fine, but Sloane’s waters have been broken for some time. It’d be better for us to move things along as quickly as we can now, so we can avoid putting the baby in any danger. We need you to help her, Zeth. Can you do that?”
I just stare at the fucker. Help her? She needsmyhelp? “How?” My voice is little more than a croak in the back of my throat.
“Just be here. Support her. Encourage her. Get her to rally, if you can. You can start by waking her up.”
The nurse who came and got me wheels a stool to Sloane’s side. “Here,” she says. “Sit down. Hold her hand.”
The next thing I know, I’ve done it, my body obeying her without any command from me. Sloane’s hand feels cold in mine. Clammy and lifeless. For a second I think the fucker has lied to me, and that sheisdead, but then she twitches, her fingers tightening ever so slightly around mine. With my other hand, I reach up and sweep her hair—plastered to her forehead with cold sweat—out of the way. I brush my hand over her hair repeatedly, watching her, relief surging through me every time her chest rises incrementally and falls. “Sloane? Sloane, baby, can you wake up?”
She groans, her head rocking a little as she tries to move.
“Come on, baby. Wake up for me.” I have never spoken to her this gently. I don’t think I’ve ever used this tense whisper to communicate withanyonebefore.Ever. I didn’t even know I was capable of sounding this way. Sloane manages to turn her head toward me, her eyelids fluttering. They open a crack, and then she’s watching me with those intense eyes of hers, though it looks like she’s seeing me through a heavy, penetrating fog.
“You’re not supposed to be here,” she whispers, her voice cracking the same way mine did a moment ago. Her throat is raw from screaming, though, not from emotion. I hold onto her hand, bringing it up to my mouth, placing my lips against the back of it and holding it there.
