"It was nothing." She dropped onto a chair beside the gurney. "I'm just glad I remembered the quick way to get here."
"You did more than that."
I held out my free hand but she didn't take it, only frowning down at me. She popped back up, filled the basin with water, and pulled some paper towels from a dispenser beside the sink. She cleaned one hand, emptied the dirty water, and then repeated the process on the other side.
"Not perfect," she mused, "but at least you don't look like an axe-murderer."
"Thanks." She laced her fingers with mine as a stray thought hit. "Where's Bagel?"
"In his crate," she said. "He went right in when I grabbed the keys. And the dish towels and the tablet and the frozen peas."
"Okay. Good." It bothered me that I didn't remember that. Well, I remembered the peas. Percy had shrieked and kicked when I tried holding the bag to his forehead. "We gotta talk about that walkway, Saunders."
"I know, I know," she said, groaning up at the ceiling. "The problem is the?—"
"It's the tree roots," I said. "We can fix that because Percy is just the first person to wipe out on those cracks. He won't be the last."
"I know it's a problem but Ilovethat cherry blossom tree."
"Yeah, so we dig up the concrete," I said. "That part is a pain in the ass because you'll need some machinery to excavate but then you can put down something less rigid. Something that flexes better with the roots."
"Oh." Her brows creased as she considered this. "Okay, then."
I squeezed her hand. "I'll add it to my list."
"It's turning into quite the long list," she said.
"I like it that way." We stared at each other for a moment, ignoring the obvious questions about what came next and where this was going. It was getting harder and harder to ignore them and I knew I was courting trouble by trying to.
The curtain swept open, saving us from everything I wasn't prepared to say.
"Hi, I'm Dr. Stremmel. I hear we had a fall this evening." He hooked his foot around the base of a rolling stool and yanked it toward him. Swinging a glance from me to Audrey, he asked, "It was two or three steps, concrete, but no loss of consciousness?"
"No, not at all," I said. "He was on his feet immediately after he hit the sidewalk."
"That's good to hear," Dr. Stremmel said. "And Percy's been awake and lucid since then? Talking? Making sense?"
"Signing, but yes," I said, patting the gurney for the tablet. "He has selective mutism. I have all of his records here, including a brain scan from about nine months ago." I fumbled the device but Audrey caught it and swiped it open for me. "Thanks."
"Okay, I'm going to check that out in a minute but I want to start with the head wound." As Dr. Stremmel snapped on a pair of gloves, he asked, "Percy, would it be okay for me to take a look?"
Percy tightened his hold on my neck as he cut a glance toward the doctor. He thought about it for a second, burrowinga little deeper into my chest, but eventually gave a single microscopic nod. I sat up and set him beside me on the gurney. He closed some of my shirt in his fist.
Dr. Stremmel shuffled forward on the stool, saying, "Hi Percy. I'm going to take the gauze off and see what we have going on under there. If it hurts too much, just hold up your hand and we'll stop. Can you show me that? Hold up your hand? And now try it with the other hand? Great."
The doctor nodded as he studied the cut on Percy's head. He didn't appear extremely concerned about it though I had to assume that someone working in emergency medicine had probably seen worse than a four-year-old tripping down some stairs.
"All right, Percy," Dr. Stremmel said. "I'm going to shine a light in your eyes now. It's going to be quick. Can we do that? Awesome."
Percy's hold on my shirt gradually shifted from white-knuckled death grip to low-key choking as the doctor examined him. When I helped him off the gurney to walk into the hall and back, he didn't flail for my hand and that eased more of the tension in my chest.
But not all of it. The last thing—and I did mean the absolute last fucking thing—I needed right now was a brand-new head injury for this kid. Not when we had to fly back to Saginaw in a few days and go before a judge for this custody petition.
I knew accidents happened, especially with young kids, but goddamn the timing of this. It was bad enough that it always seemed like I was starting on the back foot with Penny's family but bringing him back to Michigan with half his face bruised and his forehead stitched up would only compound that.
Dr. Stremmel pushed back from the gurney, saying, "I'm not seeing any indication of a concussion but we're going to get some images anyway because kids like to hide those things from us.While we're waiting for those to come through, I'm going to see if a friend of mine from plastic surgery is still in the building. She might have some ideas about treating that head wound. Sound good? Any questions?"
I glanced at Audrey, wide-eyed. My brain was moving both too fast and too slow to formulate questions. "I think you covered it all," she said to him.
