Useless information.
“I can’t believe the other driver didn’t stay,” Dom said.
“There are terrible people in the world, young man,” Mrs. Sumpter said. “Best we can do is surround ourselves with the best, keep them close, and let them help us deal with the bad.”
Sage advice. “Thank you, ma’am.”
“Ma’am. Robert, you raised a sweet boy there.”
“I know.” Dad smiled at him. “His mother and I are both incredibly proud of him.”
“As you should be.”
Dom soaked in the love and praise, and it helped him believe that maybe, just maybe, things really would be okay.
Trey’s return with clean clothes that would fit and a bag of junk food coincided with a call from Mom, who’d stuck around at the hospital to support Joshua’s parents, telling him that Lincoln could finally have visitors. Dom whooped and dropped his phone when he spun Trey around in a bear hug. He didn’t even care that he’d cracked the screen.
He could see Lincoln.
They went back to the hospital, and it took a few tries to find the ICU, tucked away down a long corridor. Hospitals confused Dom at the best of times, so navigating while his adrenaline was up did him no favors. Dad got them there. Mom was already in the waiting room. Since Trey had no real reason to see Lincoln, Mom agreed to go with him.
Stupid two-visitors-at-a-time rule.
A very sweet nurse helped them find Lincoln’s room, which was wide open with no actual door, only curtains that could be drawn around the bed for privacy. From their angle, Dom could only see the lumps of two legs beneath a blanket, and the back of the hospital bed.
“He was awake briefly a few minutes ago,” the nurse said. “He was very groggy, though, and not very aware of where he was or what happened. If he wakes again while you’re here, please buzz us.”
“We will, thank you,” Mom said.
Dom clung to her hand, terrified to go further inside. He didn’t want to see Lincoln banged up in a bed, attached to tubes and wires. But he needed to see for himself that Lincoln was alive and actually in that bed. So he let Mom pull him forward, her hand cinched around his, needing the support as much as he did. Lincoln was a part of her family.
Lincoln’s eyes were shut, the skin beneath them gray. He had a few cuts on his face and a long, stitched gash on his left cheek near the ear. His left wrist was bandaged, so the IV lines were in his right hand. Wire leads disappeared beneath the hospital gown, probably creating steady beeps on one of the machines. The scariest thing, though, was the wide, white bandage on the left side of his head.
His chest rose and fell steadily.
“Hey, babe.” Dom cleared his throat hard. He wrapped his fingers gently around Lincoln’s right hand, mindful of the tubes and shit. “You scared the hell out of me, but you’re going to be fine. Hear me? You’re going to be fine. And the other guys are all fine, too.”
Mom touched Lincoln’s other arm just above the bandage. “I’m here too, baby. Whatever you need to get better, you know Bob and I will be there. We adopted you the day your parents putyou in the hospital. You’re family, and we’ll get you on your feet again. That’s a promise you can take to the bank.”
Dom adored the mama-bear way she was getting over Lincoln—the way she got over all of her kids when one of them was hurting.
Dom wasn’t sure what else to say. He’d always heard that coma patients hear the people around them. Lincoln wasn’t in a coma—he was asleep—but maybe the same rule applied, and he didn’t want Lincoln’s mind full of the accident. “So Trey and I worked things out. He’s been so great this whole time. I hate that we won’t be going to Unbound this weekend, but part of me’s really excited for him. If it wasn’t us on that stage, at least it’ll be them.”
He babbled for a while about nothing important, and when he fumbled, Mom picked up the slack. A while later a doctor came in and spoke with Mom off to the side. Dom tried to listen, catching snips of words like “bony fragments,” “titanium mesh,” and “intercranial pressure.” He didn’t care about the details. He wanted to hear the doctor say that Lincoln would wake up and be okay.
Instead they were basically served the “head injuries are tricky, we have to wait and see” line.
Mom traded out so Dad could come in and visit. A nurse came by and recorded vitals. Then Dad left and Trey took his place. He didn’t talk to Lincoln so much as stand beside Dominic and be a steady presence until a nurse shooed them out for a while.
The afternoon and early evening became a blur of visits and bouts of watching TruTV in the waiting room. Dom started taking in magazines so he had something to read to Lincoln. He needed Lincoln to hear his voice and know he wasn’t alone. As visiting hours drew to a close, Dom’s anxiety over Lincoln waking up increased.
He was in the middle of reading an article about closet organization, with Trey sitting silently nearby, when the cool hand beneath his twitched. Dom dropped the magazine, his gaze tracking up the hand and arm to Lincoln’s face. His eyes were moving behind still-shut lids, chapped lips pressing, then parting.
“Linc, it’s Dom. Wake up for me, babe.” He stood, ass sore from the hard plastic. “I know you hear me.”
Trey appeared at the foot of the bed, arms around his middle.
Dom leaned in and pressed his palm flat over Lincoln’s heart. “Open your eyes so I can see those beautiful baby blues.”
