Page 39 of The Parkers' Handsome Holiday
I shrugged. “I don’t know if I’m doing it for her or for me to be honest. All I know is I can’t leave.”
“Nobody would blame you if you did.”
I shook my head. “I would.”
Judy didn’t say anything after that. She stayed beside me for another ten minutes or so, listening to the infuriating blip and beep of the monitor over Lina’s right shoulder and gazing upon the girl in the bed. She was pretty banged up. She’d taken a hard blow to the head. She had stitches about an inch and a half above her right ear. They’d had to shave a small amount of hair in order to get the work done. If she styled it properly, it would be easy to hide.
Of course, that was assuming she would wake up and be capable of styling her hair again.
I swallowed. I couldn’t go down that line of thought. It led to nowhere but darkness and unease. And guilt. So much fucking guilt.
Judy got to her feet, went to the bed, and kissed Lina’s forehead. Then she turned to me. “I’m going to get back to Kelli now. Come get me if you need a break. Seriously.”
“Same goes for you.”
She nodded. “Sounds more than fair.”
“Goodnight, Judy.”
“Goodnight, Cal,” she said before slipping out into the hallway. I listened to the heels of her boots strike the linoleum as she made her way four rooms down.
And then I was alone with Lina again.
I rubbed at my forehead and eyes to try to keep the fatigue at bay. It only sort of worked. I drank more water, stood up, walked around, and stopped at the big bay window to look out at the Pittsburgh city lights all around us.
It had snowed yesterday. The roofs of buildings lower than the eighth floor of Lina’s hospital room were white. The streets far below were mostly rid of snow, which had been pushed up to the curb by plows. The blanket of white made the lights seem even brighter. Christmas lights winked on apartment balconies and along roofs and windows. Trees glittered in front of patio doors, and I thought of Asher, who had been at home with my dad for the last few days. He wanted to put the tree up. I’d promised we would soon.
As soon as I could wrap my head around celebrating.
It would be hard this year after everything that had happened, but that wasn’t Asher’s fault. He deserved a damn good Christmas, and I was going to give it to him.
“Tomorrow,” I said. If Lina didn’t wake up by tomorrow, I would go home, and we would put up the tree and watch Christmas movies. Otherwise, I might never leave this place.
My attention was pricked when the beeping on Lina’s monitors quickened in speed.
It had happened so slow at first that I didn’t realize until it had nearly doubled. I turned around to put my back to the window.
She was looking at me.
“Lina?” My voice was barely a whisper.
She blinked.
I moved slowly toward the bed. She gripped the sheets, and her eyes widened a little bit. Was she afraid of me?
I stopped moving toward her. It took all my will to stay where I was and not go to her, not fall down on my knees beside the bed and cry like a child out of relief that she was awake. “Lina, are you all right?”
Her lips formed an ‘O’ and it looked like she was about to speak, but no words came out. Her brow furrowed, and she made a sound in the back of her throat.
“Are you in pain?” I asked.
Lina shook her head slowly.
“I’m going to get the doctor,” I told her.
I walked around the bed. She never moved, but her eyes remained fixed on me as I went out into the hall and looked both ways. I spotted a man in a white doctor’s coat and recognized him immediately. He’d been in and out of Lina’s room for the last few days, going over her bloodwork and checking her monitors. I hurried toward him as he scanned a file on a clipboard.
“Doctor?”
