His dad looks at us both.
"One at a time," he says. "Olivia." Hayden closes his mouth, and I have to press my lips together to stop smiling, because Hayden doesn't look happy, I get to talk first.
I look at his dad and think about saying it's fine, but these Crawford men are very good at reading people.
"The hospital called," I start. "About my mum's treatment costs. My dad's ongoing care once he's discharged." I stop. Press my lips together. "It's a lot."
That's the understatement of my life. It’s a number that I looked at and felt the ground shift under me, a number that turns the next several years of my life into a calculation. I don't know how to make it work no matter how many different ways Irun it. And in the three minutes I've not been on the phone, my mind has been on overdrive on how I can make this work for me.
I shake my head.
Not at Hayden's dad. Just at myself, at the helplessness of it, all at the fact that my mother spent the last years of her life fighting to stay alive and the bill for that fight is sitting on the back of an envelope in my shaking hand.
Hayden's dad sets the newspaper on the counter, he pulls out a chair at the kitchen table, sits down and he looks at me.
"Sit down, sweetheart."
I sit down; Hayden sits beside me. His hand finds mine under the table and I hold it without looking at him because if I look at him right now I will cry before this conversation even starts and I’m trying very hard to hold myself together.
"Tell me the full picture," his dad says. "All of it."
So, I do. I put the envelope on the table, and I tell him about the debt. The number on the envelope and what it means for the next however many years of my life.
When I finish, the kitchen is quiet.
My eyes are dry because I’m concentrating very hard on keeping them that way, and it’s taking most of my available energy.
Hayden's dad looks at the envelope for a moment, then at me.
"Here's what's going to happen," he says.
"Mr. Crawford?—"
"Here's what's going to happen," he says again in a tone which tells me to stop talking and listen. "Your father comes to our clinic when he's discharged. We have nurses, we have the facilities, we have everything he needs for his recovery. He'll have proper care, round the clock, and he won't be in a hospital ward."
I open my mouth.
"I'm not finished." He puts his hand up to stop me. "The costs, all of it, the treatment, the accident, your mother's care, we'll handle it."
"No." The word comes out before I can stop it. "No, I can't… that's not … you can't just?—"
"You're going to be a lawyer," he says.
I blink.
"Hayden tells me you’re both doing the same degree. I should have guessed you would want to be a lawyer." He folds his hands on the table, and smiles at me. "When you qualify, you come and work for the clinic. We need a good lawyer on retainer. Someone we trust." A pause. "You work for us, you earn a proper salary, and a portion of that goes toward settling what's owed. Not all of it, you'll have enough for yourself, enough to live, but enough that this debt has somewhere to go."
I stare at him, at the man across the table from me, the man whose son I sent to prison, and they’ve all seemed to have forgotten like it never happened, and I have no idea what to say.
"That's—" My voice comes out wrong. I stop. Try again. "You can't do that. That's too much, that's… after everything I did…, you can't just—I hurt Hayden, and the family." My voice breaks. I press my lips together hard.
Hayden's hand tightens around mine under the table.
His dad looks at me for a long moment.
"My son forgave you," he says quietly. "That tells me everything I need to know."
The tears come before I can stop them.
