I lean back a little and hit the nurse call button.
“Claire, Senia, this is Tasha Singer,” I say, nodding toward Tasha who’s standing on my left.
Senia ogles Tasha’s cleavage for a moment, before they shake hands. “Nice to meet you,” Tasha says before she turns to Claire.
Claire doesn’t seem to be in the mood for introductions, but she holds out her hand. “Nice meeting you.”
Fran arrives and immediately starts pushing me out of the room. No one speaks as we travel through the cold hospital corridors. Fran takes us down to the first floor, past the gift shop, and to the children’s hospital. We pass straight through the lobby and to another corridor toward the Heart Center.
I’m afraid of what we’ll find when we finally see her. I don’t want this to be the first and last time I ever see my daughter. I look to my left and Claire’s face is twisted with worry. I wonder if broken hearts are genetic.
Chapter Nineteen
Claire
THE SQUEAK OF THE NURSE’S Crocs on the shiny floor is making me even more nervous. I already feel as if I might collapse at any moment. My thoughts keep rewinding to the day I gave birth and I can’t remember if the nurses ever said there was something wrong with my baby.
Not my baby. She’s not mine.
A burly man stands with his back to us in the corridor about forty meters ahead. He’s speaking to a doctor who stares at us as we approach. There are too many of us. I wonder if we look intimidating to them. The burly man turns around and the worry in his eyes turns to annoyance.
We’re not welcome here. We’re just the stupid kids who gave Abigail up and now we’re crashing motorcycles and trying to ruin their lives.
I stop in the middle of the corridor and Senia stops next to me.
“What’s wrong?” she asks.
The burly man with the dark hair and four days worth of scruff on his jaw watches me. Senia catches me around the waist as my knees begin to buckle under the weight of his glare.
“He hates us,” I whisper, my shoulders weakening as the resolve drains from my body.
The nurse pushing Chris stops and turns back to look at me. She sees Senia holding me and immediately switches into “nurse-mode.” She comes back to help Senia as they attempt to hold me steady.
“Do you feel like you’re going to pass out? Do you feel cold or dizzy?”
Chris looks over his shoulder at me and immediately turns his wheelchair around.
“I’m fine,” I say as I push away the nurse and I finally see her nametag: Francesca. Chris attempts to push himself up from the wheelchair and I throw my hand out to stop him. “I’m fine. Sit down. Please.”
He grimaces with pain as he sets himself down in the wheelchair. “Claire, come here.”
“I am here.”
He shakes his head. “No, come here,” he says, beckoning me with his finger.
Senia and Francesca let me go and Tasha watches me as I step forward. He beckons me closer so he can whisper something in my ear. I lean forward and his fingers hint against my skin as he pulls my ear closer to his mouth.
“I need this. I need you to be strong like you were the day I met you and the day you broke up with me. You’re not that broken girl your mom left in the trailer. You made the right choice giving her up, but I need you to be strong right now because I fucking need this. It’s just you and me, babe. Okay?”
I nod as I blink furiously to staunch the tears. “Okay.” Francesca comes to turn the wheelchair around and I stop her. “I’ll do it. You guys can stay here.”
I turn the wheelchair around and Tasha falls in step with me.
Chris turns to her and shakes his head. “We’re going in there alone.”
“This is a bad idea,” she warns him and I try not to glare at her burgeoning cleavage.
“Tasha, this isn’t about the adoption,” Chris says, then I push him toward the doctor and the burly man.
My feet seem to sink into the hard floor as I walk, holding me still, yet somehow I keep getting closer. Help, I want to cry out. Please help me get through this.
The doctor holds out his hand to Chris. “I’m Doctor Buchik. I’ll be handling the surgery today.” Buchik holds his hand out to me and I shake it. His hand is dry and warm and, as stupid as it is, this gives me comfort.
The burly man looks conflicted, like he’s not sure he wants to meet us. Maybe he can deny our existence just a moment longer.
Chris pushes himself up from the wheelchair and I hold the chair steady as he offers the man his hand while standing on one leg. “I’m Chris.”
The man looks a bit annoyed by this gesture, but he takes Chris’s hand. “Brian.”