Standing Tall

Scott returned to Rebecca's room and sat in the chair next to her bed. He pulled his phone from his pocket and called Zach to let him know that Brad had signed the papers. Zach said he would be by in the morning to pick them up and have the legal team file them first thing. Scott thanked him again for all of his help and hung up the phone.

He slid the phone back in his pocket and rubbed his hands over his face. The stress of the past twenty-four hours has started to take its toll on him. Although his hair was short, it was messy from having run his hands every which way through it. Dark circles had formed under each eye from the lack of sleep. He had run out of the house without thinking after getting a visit from Springfield's finest, and was still wearing the same shorts and t-shirt combination.

In addition to the current state of his new wife and stepson, Scott worried about Gia. She's just a baby and luckily doesn't understand what's going on, but he couldn't help but wonder how this would affect her. What if Tyler doesn't make it through the surgery? What if he does but he's changed? What if Rebecca doesn't wake up? He shuddered to think of having to raise Gia by himself. She was a spitting image of her mother, and would be a constant reminder of the love he and Rebecca had found in such a short time.

He missed the little girl that had him wrapped around her finger, but he couldn't let Jean bring her here. He couldn't let Gia see Rebecca like this, no matter how much he wanted her with them. As he held Rebecca's hand and stroked her face, he found himself wishing he was the one laying in this bed. If only he had gone to pick up Tyler, maybe this wouldn't have happened.

He considered himself to be strong, but the way he felt right now was anything but. It took an insane amount of strength to be a hockey player. Taking all of those hits, and the amount of training...definitely not for the weak, in mind or body. But this, sitting next to the woman he loves, staring at her not knowing when she'll wake up or at all, this he was not prepared for.

His heart ached for her to open her eyes. He continually ran his fingers through the hair lining her face, letting his thumb graze her cheek. He held her face in his palm while rubbing his thumb over her lips. They were soft and pink like always, but unresponsive to his touch. He wanted to feel her kiss, wanted to feel the passion that always sparked between them when they kissed. But he wouldn't feel that...not until she woke up.

Scott laid his head on his folded arm, the one holding her hand at her side, and closed his eyes and attempted to fall asleep. He would need to sleep at some point, even if it was just for ten minutes. And that was all that he got. A gentle knocking on the door woke Scott up, not that he was in a deep sleep to begin with. He lifted his head and was greeted by a smile from a dark haired woman in a white lab jacket.

"Mr. Hartnell, I'm sorry to disturb you but I wanted to let you know that we are taking Tyler into surgery now." She took a few steps into the room before continuing. "I'm Doctor Drake, the neurosurgeon performing the surgery."

Scott stood from the chair and walked towards the doctor. He extended his hand for her to shake, which she did. "Nice to meet you. Thank you for doing this so late," he said with a small smile.

"It's no problem. I want to assure you that the procedure is fairly routine. It should only take about two hours. Once we relieve the pressure we'll be able to see if there is any extensive damage and assess the situation then. A nurse will keep you updated as we progress, but if everything goes as planned Tyler will be as good as new in no time," she said, mirroring the small smile Scott had given her.

"Alright. I'll be in here....in case she wakes up. Thank you again," he said.

"Of course. It's what I do Mr. Hartnell."

"Please, call me Scott. I hear Mr. Hartnell and I look around for my father," he said with a chuckle.

Dr. Drake smiled bigger, "Okay. Scott. I'll have Tyler back to you in no time." With that, she turned and exited the room.

Scott resumed his previous position next to Rebecca, but this time instead of trying to fall asleep, he spoke to her. "Baby. Tyler is going into surgery now. I know you're probably going to worry that I had to involve Brad, but I didn't have much of a choice. I didn't want to wait too long and I didn't know when you would wake up. I had to do it. Please understand it was my only option. But you don't have to worry. After I got Brad to sign the consent papers, I also got him to sign papers terminating his parental rights. So when you and Tyler come home we'll be able to start the adoption process so that we'll be a family and we won't have this problem ever again."

Scott pressed his forehead into Rebecca's hand, trying to fight back the tears forming in his eyes. "Baby, please wake up. I don't know if I can do this without you. I can't imagine my life without you. I love you so much. So much more than I've ever told you. You are the best thing to ever happen to me. I promise to show you every single day how much you mean to me. You…and Gia and Tyler. You're my world. If you don't come back to me, my world implodes." Scott felt a stream of tears fall down his cheek.

"You're such a girl, Hartnell. Does Claude know this?"

Scott's head shot up as he heard her weak voice. "Oh my God! You're awake!" He leaned over the side of her bed, took her face in his hands and kissed her with force.

She brought her hand up and placed it over his, trying to pull away before he broke her face. Scott pressed his forehead to hers and whispered, "Don't you ever scare me like this again Caruso.”

“You mean Hartnell,” she replied with a smile.

Scott beamed. “Yes, I mean Hartnell. God, even laying in a hospital bed you’re a smartass. I love you so much.” He pressed his lips to hers again and then sat back down in his seat. “How do you feel?”

“Sore. And I have a headache. What happened?” Rebecca asked, rubbing her temple.

“You were on your way home from picking up Ty and were hit by a drunk driver who ran a red light.”

Rebecca’s face contorted at the realization that Tyler was driving her van when they left the mall. “Oh my God…Tyler. Where is he? Is he okay?” Scott rubbed Rebecca’s hand and averted her eyes. “Scott, tell me! Where is my son?!” Rebecca’s voice filled the room.

“He should be fine,” he said as he brought his eyes to meet hers, “he’s in surgery. His brain was swollen from the impact and he has a broken blood vessel in his brain. They are draining the blood to relieve the pressure and fixing the blood vessel. The doctor said it’s fairly routine and they don’t expect any problems. But they won’t know if there are any other issues until they drain the blood.”

Rebecca couldn’t control the tears and gasped at what Scott was telling her. Scott wiped the tears from her cheeks, trying to console her. “It should be me. I should have been driving. I knew it was a bad idea to let him drive at night.”

“Shhhhh, it’s not your fault. It wasn’t Ty’s fault either. It would have happened either way,” he whispered to her.

“How long has he been in surgery?” she asked, fighting the sobs.

“They just took him in,” he answered but paused, deciding whether or not to continue. “They were trying to wait for you to wake up. I couldn’t…I’m not…” he took a deep breath before proceeding. “I couldn’t sign the consent forms to have them do the surgery when you guys were first brought in. They needed a parent’s signature. I tried everything. Even had the team’s lawyers threaten the hospital. But they wouldn’t budge.” Rebecca noticed the sadness in his eyes.

“So…how?” she asked.

“I had Zach make a statement…to draw Brad here,” he said. “I had to get him to sign the forms so that they could take care of Tyler.”

“Scott…why did you do that? What if he wouldn’t sign?” she asked, her voice filled with worry.

“I had to take the chance. He signed. That’s all that matters,” he responded.

“But what if he tries to…” Scott interrupted her mid-thought.

“He’s not going to do anything. He can’t. Not anymore.”

“What? What do you mean? What did you do?” she panicked.

“Stop. I didn’t physically harm him if that’s what you’re thinking. I just convinced him that there wasn’t a possibility of you or Tyler ever wanting to have anything to do with him. And I convinced him that it was in his best interest to sign a few pieces of paper that would prevent him from ever being a part of our lives again.”

“What papers?” she asked, thoroughly confused.

“Zach had the legal team draw up the paperwork terminating Brad’s parental rights to Tyler,” he said as he picked up the folder from the tray at the end of the bed and handed it to Rebecca. “He’s going to come by in the morning to pick them up and have the legal team file them first thing. Then I’ll be able to adopt Tyler…properly.”

“I don’t believe you did this,” she said as she looked over the documents.

“I had to. I would do anything for you and Ty,” he said before placing a kiss on her forehead. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

**************

“Come on people, we’ve been at this for an hour and a half. He’s going to code if we don’t find where all this blood is coming from,” Doctor Drake sternly said as nurses scurried around her.

Once Doctor Drake and her team had opened up Tyler’s head and found the broken blood vessel, it was apparent that it was not the only one as there was still an excessive amount of blood flowing from Tyler’s brain tissue.

“I cannot lose this kid,” Doctor Drake said to herself as she continued working to find the source of the blood.

**************

The resident doctor on duty came in to evaluate Rebecca once Scott had gone to the nurse’s station to inform them that she was now awake. He told them that she had a concussion and said that they should be able to release her the following day. He encouraged her to sleep, as it is the best way for the brain to heal itself, but asked Scott to wake her every half hour for two hours. If she didn’t have any problems waking up, then he could let her sleep longer after that.

After the doctor left, Rebecca shifted to one side of the bed and motioned for Scott to lie next to her. Without hesitation, Scott climbed into the bed and situated Rebecca into his side so that he could hold her. He rested his chin on the top of her head and stroked her hair. “Well, now you and Claude have something in common,” Scott chuckled.

“What’s that?” Rebecca asked.

“You’ve both had a concussion,” Scott smiled.

“Keep it up Hartnell…I’ll tell Claude all the mushy things you said earlier. I’m sure the guys would love to hear it,” Rebecca laughed as she turned her head up to look at her husband.

“You wouldn’t dare,” Scott narrowed his eyes at her.

“Wouldn’t I?” she smirked.

“You don’t fight fair Mrs. Hartnell.”

“Exactly. Hartnells never fight fair,” she laughed as he tipped her head back so he could kiss her.

“I don’t know what you could be referring to,” he smiled.

“Mmmhmm.” Rebecca kissed Scott and snuggled herself back into his side. Scott said an alarm on his phone to wake them up in a half hour, knowing that he would now be able to sleep alongside Rebecca. She listened to his heartbeat and they quickly drifted off to sleep, only to be woken up by a voice.

“Mr. and Mrs. Hartnell?”

Both Scott and Rebecca opened their eyes and sat up in the bed.

“I’m sorry to disturb you, but I wanted to give you an update on Tyler.”

“That’s okay. Becks this is Doctor Drake. She was the one performing Tyler’s surgery,” Scott said to Rebecca as he stood up. “How did everything go? Is Tyler out of surgery?”

“I want to start by saying that Tyler is not out of the woods yet. I wanted to make you aware of the situation,” Doctor Drake started. Scott turned to look at Rebecca, who had a look of panic on her face. “We encountered some additional bleeding once we fixed the original broken blood vessel. It took us a while to find the source,” she continued. “Mr. and Mrs. Hartnell, I’m not going to sugarcoat this…it was touch and go for a while before we were able to locate the bleed.”

“Is he…” Scott choked on the words.

“No, no,” Doctor Drake shook her head, “once we found the source we were able to repair the damage rather quickly. From what we could see, there wasn’t any additional damage from the injury, but it will still take a few days to know for sure.” She smiled gently and continued, “He’s in recovery now and we should be able to move him back into his room in a few hours. After that we will wean him off of the sedatives so that he will regain consciousness. Then we will be able to assess any additional damage.”

“Can we see him?” Rebecca asked.

“Of course. A nurse will be around in about twenty minutes with a wheelchair to escort you to recovery. You will only be able to stay there for about a half hour,” Doctor Drake stated.

“Okay. Thank you,” Rebecca said.

“Now, I must advise you that once Tyler wakes up it is imperative that you let the nurses or myself know if there are any gaps in his memory or a shift in his personality. We may need to run a few more CAT scans to see if there are any additional issues going on. Please do not be alarmed if either of these things happen, the brain is a sensitive organ or requires a lot of time to heal. We will keep him here as long as it takes to make sure we have everything under control.”

“Alright. Thank you Doctor Drake,” Scott said as he shook her hand.

“If you need anything or have any questions, just have the nurses page me,” she said as she exited the room.

Scott again turned toward Rebecca. Her shoulders were slumped and she was holding her head in her hands. “We almost lost him. He could have…” she sobbed. Scott placed a hand on her shoulder and she looked up at him. “Thank God you were able to get him into surgery when you did.”

“I’m just sorry I couldn’t get it done sooner,” Scott said before placing a kiss on her forehead.