Priscilla was in the hospital and needed me, and where the hell was I? Picking up random men, trying to sooth a collapsed heart and an aching backside.
I beat myself up on repeat for not picking up Sheila’s original call. Naively, I’d thought it was about the damn parents’ meeting. I’d also missed a call from an unknown number and ignored it, too busy flirting with some douche of a guy.
In reality, I should have been worried about getting the hell out of my abusive marriage.
“Margaret,” Sheila called to me as soon as I walked through the emergency room’s automatic doors.
Looking up, I saw her standing on the other side of the metal detectors. She bit her bottom lip and held her cardigan tight around her middle, looking nothing like the confident parents’ association piranha I once thought her to be.
“My daughter’s in there,” I said to the security guy, tossing all my belongings in a bin and hurrying through the metal detector.
All I could mumble was a quick thank-you before Sheila had her arm around me, pulling me into a hug. I can’t lie—after Mick saying he would be in, it was the most comforting gesture I’d experienced in years.
“She’s going to be okay,” Sheila whispered, her palm running up and down my back as we walked. “She fell from the bunk doing some dance routine with the girls. Penny is in a boatload of trouble with school and me because she sneaked her phone and was videotaping the whole act, but she’s really a hero because she called me right away. I called the teachers, because of course, the girls were afraid to go and tell.”
“You know what? Let’s skip the semantics,” I said, wanting to get to my daughter.
Not taking offense, Sheila nodded. “You’re right.”
“Where are they?” I asked as she guided me down the hall.
“After taking some x-rays and an exam, the doctor is waiting to see you. Priscilla told them to wait for her mom because she said she needs you, and—”
“Of course she did,” I said quickly, interrupting. “She can’t go through an accident without a parent.”
“Um ...” Sheila wrung her hands, starting to say something else, but paused when Mick barged down the hall toward us as he bellowed my name.
“Margo. Margaret!”
Sheila and I both turned, taking in the panicked yet gorgeous man calling my name.
I started to say, “My friend Mick drove me here,” just as a second loud voice carried through the air.
“What the hell is this?” a booming voice bellowed in the hall.
I could have sworn I just heard Priscilla call for me from the room we were standing in front of ... but circumstances didn’t allow me to investigate.
“When you didn’t pick up your cell phone, I called the house,” Sheila said quickly, trying to explain, but Tommy cut her off.
“Margaret, where the hell did you go? What the hell is this?” He waved his hand at me, presumably at my outfit, but it didn’t stop me from flinching. His voice became increasingly louder as he spoke. “No one could reach you. What kind of mother are you? Our daughter was injured on a damn school trip, and you’re nowhere to be found.”
“I was out for a bit, cooling off from the ...” I scrounged deep in my belly for the words and the courage. “From the state you left me in,” I said in a loud voice. It wasn’t the time or place, but Tommy had hurt me long enough, and I’d hidden it for too long.
“The state I left you in?” he demanded, his veins popping out in his neck, sweat beading on his forehead. “My state is the one you should be worried about, after getting me all worked up for nothing. Then I try to get some work done, so I can pay your bills, and this woman is blowing up the phone.”
He flung an arm toward Sheila, and all I wanted to do is take his attention away from her. She was nothing but an innocent bystander.
“Tommy, our daughter needs me,” I said, trying to reason with him. “No doubt, I need to be a mother first and good to myself second, which is what tonight was. Good for me. But I never anticipated an accident like this, so if you will let me go to our daughter—”
I didn’t know if it was real or not, but I swore I heard Priscilla calling me. I moved in the direction of her voice, but Tommy grabbed my arms and shook me hard in front of the only people who’d cared enough about me to come.
“Answer me. Where the hell were you?” he screamed at me, snarling.
He’d never made a scene in public before. Although, he’d never tried to force sex on me either ... so tonight was about a lot of firsts.
Feeling my lips quiver, I sucked back impending tears. A cocktail of fear and embarrassment ran through my veins.
“Tommy, let me go see Priscilla,” I said softly, trying to pull my wrist free and deescalate the spectacle. “I’m here now. I can take over, and you can go back to work. We can discuss all of this later.”
