I nudged Carter toward the nearest row of chairs. He went, but his hand hovered at his belly, fingers clenching the fabric like he was trying to keep the world from unraveling.
The waiting area was almost empty—just a farm couple in their Sunday best, an old man reading a battered Louis L’Amour, and a little kid curled up under a hand-knit blanket, out cold. The wall clock was set ten minutes ahead of the real time, the kind of mind-game you played with the desperate and the dying.
We sat. I braced both boots on the floor, fists clenched in my lap. Carter’s shoulder pressed up against mine, warm and steady. He didn’t look at me, just stared straight ahead, lips moving in a silent conversation with ghosts.
Rawley paced the length of the room, down and back, over and over, the regular click of his boots like a metronome. I tried to count the steps, but lost track after fifty.
Each time he passed, I saw his hands: one curled in a fist, the other running up and down his thigh, thumb tapping out a pattern like morse code. Every ten circuits, he’d stop and check the swinging doors, as if brute force could make them open.
Nobody spoke. The kid in the blanket snored once, high and sharp, then rolled over and started drooling on the armrest.
Thirty-seven minutes later—by my watch, which I’d set to GMT as a mental exercise—the doors finally banged open and a doctor strode out. She wore purple glasses and a fuchsia stethoscope and didn’t have the air of someone who was going to deliver bad news.
I let myself breathe.
“Family of Joseph Stinson?” she called.
Rawley was on her in two steps. “That’s us.”
She smiled, the kind that’s practiced but not fake. “He’s doing well. So is the baby. Preterm by about ten days, but nothing we can’t handle. You can come back now. He’s asking for you.”
Rawley sagged so hard I thought he’d hit the floor. He nodded, once, twice, then followed her through the doors without looking back.
Carter let out a breath I didn’t realize he’d been holding. He slumped into my shoulder, head falling forward.
“You want to go in?” I asked, soft.
He shook his head, eyes bleary. “Give them a minute. It’s their moment.”
We sat in silence. The couple across the room got up, hugged each other, and left. The old man finished his book, set it on the end table, and shuffled away. The kid’s parents scooped him up and carried him out, blanket and all.
Eventually, it was just us and the drone of the vending machines.
Carter drifted, eyelids heavy. His hand stayed fixed over his stomach, thumb making little circles. I watched his breathing, the rise and fall of his chest, the twitch of his fingers.
I wondered what it would be like, months from now, to be on the other side of this—waiting, hoping, everything out of your control.
I’d been through firefights, mortar attacks, two hellish deployments, and a house fire. Nothing felt as dangerous as this: the sheer helplessness of waiting for someone else to survive.
I reached over and set my hand on top of Carter’s, gentle.
He startled, then looked at me, eyes watery but clear. “You’re shaking,” he said.
“Don’t tell anyone,” I said. “Might ruin my rep.”
He smiled, the small and private kind that I’d come to live for. “Your secret’s safe.”
We stayed like that—hands overlapped, breaths synched—for a stretch of time that had no shape.
Then the doors opened again, and this time Rawley was the one who came out. He looked like he’d been hit by a truck—shirt untucked, hair mussed, a scratch on his cheek he must have picked up in the chaos. But his eyes were clear, and when he saw us, he grinned, wide and stupid, all teeth.
“You wanna meet your nephew?” he said.
Carter was up first, moving faster than I thought he could. I trailed after, feeling the adrenaline return in slow-motion. We followed Rawley through a maze of halls to a quiet recovery room where Jojo sat in bed, looking smaller than I’d ever seen him. His hair was wild, skin washed out, but his eyes were bright, almost feverish.
And in his arms: the tiniest, angriest baby I’d ever seen. Red as a beet, fists clenched, making a noise somewhere between a cat’s yowl and a police siren.
Jojo looked up at us, a raw joy breaking over his face. “He’s got Rawley’s glare already,” he whispered.
