Love Song

Jordan

It had been two days and I hadn’t even seen my own daughter yet. I didn’t even know if she was going to make it. Ryan eventually came to see me, which didn’t help my stress. I watched him sit there next to my bed and stare at the clock, like this was a huge inconvenience and waste of time. Then I’d see Josh, who would sit on the other side of my bed, glaring at Ryan, ready to explode at any second.

“Can we leave yet?” Ryan yawned as he leaned back in his chair. I sat in silence, not wanting to say the wrong thing. But Josh was fully content to scream.

“If you don’t want to be here then you can leave yourself! No one wants you here anyway!” he snapped. Ryan stared at him, unfazed by him. He looked away without saying anything, which just made Josh even madder. I put my hand on his arm and he scoffed as he slowly sat down.

After a few hours of watching TV, the nurse came in to talk to me, “it’s time to get up and walk around.”

My mom had told me about when she had a C-section with Josh and how when she stood up for the first time, the incision burned like hell. She wasn’t kidding. It burned like crazy and I just wanted to throw up. Josh quickly stood up from his seat to help me.

“Listen, can we see one of your other patients?” he asked.

“Who’s the patient?” she answered in a bubbly, annoying voice.

“Zakk Grant,” he said.

“Oh of course, he’s down the hall,” she said, pointing to the hall. Josh and I made our way down the hall, looking into the open doors until we finally saw Zakk. He laid in his bed with his leg wrapped in a cast being held up. He had a bandage on his forehead with bruises marking his skin.

“Zakk…” I squeaked. I knew they’d given him a bunch of pain killers earlier. He looked so loopy and out of it. Josh and I slowly made our way to his bedside. When I finally got to him, I slowly raised my hand and stroked his matted hair.

“Jordan…” he whispered softly. I looked up at the bandage on his forehead as I continued silently stroking his hair. There was a blood spot that had bled through the bandage.

“What the hell happened?” I asked softly, almost on the edge of tears.

“It was raining last night and you know how stupid people get when god forbid the weather changes,” he said, making me chuckle a little, “some fool slammed on his brakes, which made me run into him, which made the poor guy behind me run into me. Funny part is…none of this was my fault and I was the only one who got really badly hurt.”

“That’s terrible!” I exclaimed, “you’re ok now though, right?”

He chuckled softly and looked up at me without moving his head, “I am now. They gave me these pain killers for my back and I’m feeling really good now.”

“That’s good,” I said with a smile. His chuckles faded into silence and he slowly grabbed my hand with his hand that didn’t have a cast over it.

“I’m so sorry I couldn’t be there for you, Jordan. I’m so sorry,” he said, his voice beginning to crack.

“No, no Zakk don’t apologize,” I said, “it wasn’t your fault.”

He smiled and squeezed my hand and for a moment everything seemed to work in the way I wanted them to. Ryan didn’t exist for those moments. I was sure that Aria would make it for those moments. But then he let go of my hand and that moment was over.

“I should go. I’ll come visit you later today,” I said. He nodded as he began to doze off. I sighed and I followed Josh back into my room and into my bed.

“Where did you go?” Ryan asked, still staring at the TV.

“I went to go see Zakk,” I said softly. I could say a million bad things about Ryan, but one thing he wasn’t was stupid. He knew Zakk had loved me and I’d loved him. And although Ryan was in no way in love with me, he still resented Zakk and probably had dreams of setting him on fire. And I knew that he was just delighted by the fact that Zakk was badly hurt.

“I’m going home. I’m tired,” he said as he stood up. Josh’s eyes widened and he was ready to murder him right where he stood.

“Why? In case you forgot, you have a child now!” he exclaimed. Ryan gave him a glare that didn’t faze Josh at all.

“This isn’t your business Josh,” he snarled.

“I have to be here since you won’t be!” he shot back, “you’re a terrible husband and a terrible father!”

He hit Ryan in the wrong way. He rushed over to Josh and threw a punch at Josh’s face. Josh stumbled back, covering his nose. He uncovered his nose to see blood running down his nose. He growled almost like an animal and he punched Ryan in the eye, giving Ryan a big black eye that almost made me laugh but I kept it together enough to stand up and try to separate them.

“Come on you guys, stop it!” I shouted. I grabbed both of their arms and tried pulling them apart. Josh began to back down but Ryan wasn’t having it. He yanked his arm away from me and backhanding me, which riled Josh up and he tackled Ryan to the ground. I had fallen back onto my bed and I just felt helpless.

A doctor eventually ran in, having heard the fighting. He pulled them apart with no effort at all. They were both bruised and bloody and the doctor held their arms tightly, knowing if he let go, they’d go at it again.

“How did this happen?” he asked, glancing at me. He looked at my red cheek and then glared at Josh and Ryan.

“Which one of them hit you?” he asked, looking at me again. I looked at Josh, who was begging me with his eyes. I looked away from him and looked at Ryan who was warning me with his eyes and I felt that same fear rush through me as I replied, “I didn’t get hit, I had an itch and I guess I was just scratching aimlessly until my cheek turned red.”

The doctor stared at me for a second and then averted his attention to Ryan. He could see through whatever game Ryan was playing. He knew. He opened his mouth to speak but nothing came out. He eventually closed his mouth and cleared his throat.

“Well, knock it off,” he said, slowly letting go of their arms. When he saw that both of them had calmed down, he let go of their arms completely and walked out. I sat on my bed for a second, staring at both of them. They gave each other dirty looks for a few seconds before Ryan turned angrily and walked out. Josh sat down next to me and looked at my cheek.

“Are you ok?” he asked. I waved him off and smiled softly, “I’m fine.”

Despite what I’d gone through for the past, three or four years, Josh seemed to be the real victim. Most big brothers aren’t burdened with the same question of “is my sister going to get the hell beat out of her today?” he was told since we were little that he had to protect my sisters and I no matter what. But this was just ridiculous. I didn’t want him around to see me get hit or to see my new bruise of the week. He didn’t deserve this. He deserved to live a happy normal life with his girlfriend, Erin. I felt awful because he’d been explaining a few days before I got pregnant that he planned on proposing to her and I ruined everything.

As soon as Erin popped into my head, she’d called him and asked if I wanted her to come see me. It took me forever to convince both of them that they should go out by themselves. I had to almost get someone into the room to drag Josh out. As he went out, a nurse came in and took me to where Aria was. I was finally going to see my baby girl. Even though Aria had come to me in my dreams and told me my daughter would make it, that didn’t mean I wasn’t going to worry. She still looked as sickly as when I saw her a second after she was born. Her skin was still almost see through and she wasn’t any bigger than a teddy bear.

I got closer to her and was almost tempted to touch her but I was afraid that she would snap in half if I even blew on her. The diaper they put on her seemed to take up most of her body and it looked as though she was just a doll. She was so stiff and she looked like she couldn’t move her arms and legs. She was so fragile that I wouldn’t be able to pick her up and hold her until she was at least a year old.

I squeezed the hem of my hospital gown and was ready to throw things and scream and hit someone. Aria could’ve been born healthy, Zakk wouldn’t have been hurt, Josh wouldn’t be on the edge of snapping, and I wouldn’t be feeling so empty and lonely. I had my friends and family I could turn to, and I was still alone. I was breaking promises that I’d made to myself. I swore that I wouldn’t let any man put his hands on me and that I wouldn’t get married or have kids until I was older. But I was standing here next to my premature daughter with a wedding ring on…and I was only twenty-one.

I silently turned and walked back out into the hallway. I walked towards Zakk’s room and peeked into his room. He was lying in his bed, untouched flipping through channels on the TV that hung in the corner of his room. I stood there and looked at every bruise that marked him and every cut, some with painful looking stitches. I slowly turned and shuffled down the hall into my own room.

I found Amy sitting in a chair next to my bed where Ryan had been. She looked up at me and smiled, “how is Aria?”

“I think she’s doing better than before,” I said softly, trying to stay optimistic. I laid down in my bed and pulled my covers up to my chin. Amy ran her fingers through her slightly wet curly hair, “you’ve never heard of an umbrella?”

“I left it at home. I was in a hurry,” she said, shifting in her seat uneasily. She looked away from me and small tears dotted her eyes.

“What’s wrong?” I asked softly, reaching over to grab her hand.

“You know that Katie girl from my school?” she began. I nodded and she continued, “I came back from my visit with you and I saw her with Sean…”

I gasped and covered my mouth. From what I heard from Amy, Katie was capable of doing something like that. But I never imagined in a million years that Sean had the heart to betray anyone.

“Then I got into a little fight…” she said, wiping her tears and narrowing her eyes in shame.

“What did you do?” I asked. She explained to me what happened between her and Katie before she left for the hospital to see me.

“You punched her and grabbed her by the hair?!” I exclaimed. She pressed her lips together and a tiny smile appeared, “she kept antagonizing me. I had to put her in her place didn’t I?”

I nodded and we started to laugh. At least we had something to laugh about. Through the entire mess of my premature baby, my best friend being severely hurt, my other best friend being cheated on, and my brother and husband fighting, I could finally laugh at something small.