She taps on her keyboard and frowns. “I don’t have record of him. When did you say he came in?”
“He should already be here.”
“Could be they’re still on the way. I do show that we’re holding a room for an ambulance.”
“We beat them here?” Sam asks disbelievingly.
“Check back with me in a while,” the receptionist says with a smile. Luke leads us to the waiting room and I plop in a chair, trying not to think about the germs that I’m sitting on.
“Jesus, I hate emergency rooms,” Sam mutters. “Do you know what kind of nastiness is on these chairs?”
“You and I are on the same page,” I say absently as I rub my eyes. “Okay, tell me.”
“All I know is a car hit him in front of the job site. Isaac called me and said they’d called the ambulance and to have us meet him here.”
“Are his legs broken? Does he have internal bleeding? Is he conscious?” I’m getting shrill now. I stop and swallow, trying with all my might to keep my panic at bay.
“I don’t know anything else,” Luke insists. “We have to wait to see him.”
“I’m sure he’s fine,” Sam says and risks coming in contact with the plague and sits next to me. “Honest. If it was horrible Isaac would have said something to prepare us. He would have called the whole family.”
I nod my head. Right. She’s right. But if he’s fine, Mark would have called me himself. He wouldn’t have sent Luke.
“I mean,” she continues, “he works a really dangerous job. We’ve always known this. He’s always climbing on stuff and working with sharp, dangerous tools and equipment. He could fall, get electrocuted, cut off his hand with that really big saw. At least he’s not working on the fishing boats anymore.”
“Sam,” Luke says warningly.
“Fishing on those boats is the most dangerous job in the world! I swear, I still have stomach ulcers from waiting for days to hear that he was okay.”
“Samantha!” Luke shouts, cutting her off. “I don’t think you’re helping.”
Sam looks at me with wide eyes. The blood has drained from my head and my lips are trembling.
“Is that true? I never stopped to think that construction is so dangerous.”
“He’s careful,” she insists, backpedaling. “Honest, Mer, he’s really careful. He’s never been hurt before.”
“But it’s possible.”
“Hell, you could get hit by a bus crossing the street, Mer. Anything’s possible.”
I shake my head and stand to pace the room, which isn’t easy with all of the people sitting in the cramped space. A couple people are sleeping. One man is holding his face. He obviously has a toothache. A baby is crying in his mom’s arms.
Luke comes up behind me and rests his big hands on my shoulders. His hands are so much like Mark’s.
“I can’t lose him,” I whisper.
“Meredith, I think you’re overreacting, sweetheart. He’s probably just scraped up.”
I twirl and stare up into his clear blue eyes. “You don’t get it, Luke. The people I love die. This isn’t the first time I’ve been rushed to a hospital because of an accident.”
“Not all of the people you love die,” he says softly.
“The ones that matter the most.”
“Mark isn’t dead, Meredith.” He grips my shoulders tightly. “He’s not dead.”
I nod again. I feel like that’s all I’ve been doing, nodding like an imbecile. But then the image of my father in that hospital bed enters my head. My mom lying on him, keening in pain and agony and I shake my head in denial.
I don’t know if I’m strong enough for this.
“He’s here,” Sam says as she rushes over to us. “The chick with the computer—”
“Is that her name?” Luke asks sarcastically.
“—said that the ambulance just got here. He’s going to be examined and stuff before we can go back.” She cups my face in her hands, not gently, and says, “He’s not dead.”
He’s not dead.
“How long until I can see him?”
“She didn’t know.”
It’s the longest fucking two hours of my life.
“I’m sorry,” computer chick says with sympathetic eyes. “They’ve taken him back for some tests. As soon as he’s ready you’ll be the first to know.”
“If you just tell him I’m here, he’ll want me back there with him,” I beg.
“You can’t be in the area where the tests are being done. I promise, I’ll call you back as soon as I get the okay from his nurse.”