Page 116 of Give My Everything
“He doesn’t deserve to fucking know what’s going on,” Wyatt grumbles, leaning forward in his chair and taking Ivy’s hand in his, watching her where she lies, blissfully asleep and not having to deal with her body’s weakness for a few hours.
Our dad never really bonded with Ivy when she was born. We assume it was because he was already out the door on our mom, and because he had a good idea that she wasn’t his biologically. Their relationship has always been a strained, constant set of bumps in the road, with him rarely being a part of her life.
Which is why it was so weird that he was here yesterday, and with Krissa.
“Do you know why he was here last night?” I ask, unable to keep out the uncomfortable idea that he may have used his daughter’s hospital stay as an opportunity to talk to me or Remmy.
Wyatt shrugs. “Not sure. It was kind of weird, though, especially since he came with the child bride.”
I roll my eyes. Wyatt loves to refer to Krissa as the child bride. Obviously there is a massive age gap between them, but I feel like that should be the least of our problems with her. With them.
I take a seat in the chair my mom left empty on the other side of Ivy’s bed, crossing my arms and leaning back, just watching her where she reclines, multiple lines connected to her body.
When my mom first told us we were going to have a baby sister, I wasn’t that excited about it. I liked my life just fine as it was, didn’t need anything new or crazy to disrupt the order I craved.
It wasn’t until I saw her for the first time in the hospital that I fell in love with her. She was so tiny, a little pink ball of wrinkles, like a Shar-Pei, and I instantly knew it would be our job to love and protect her, to do everything we could to make her life amazing.
Now I’m getting a sense of déjà vu. She’s snuggled in a hospital bed, looking so tiny and desperately needing to be taken care of. And I don’t know if there’s anything I can do.
Wyatt told me about their shot-in-the-dark idea to get Hannah to be a donor, and how it didn’t pan out. About the aggressive search they’ve been doing to find a match somewhere in the world and how they’ve turned up no results.
The only thing I can think, over and over in my mind is, what else can we do? Seriously. What else can we do? Because I’ll do it. I don’t care what it costs or who I have to talk to or schmooze or…it doesn’t matter.
But I don’t know where to start.
“We’re going to figure this out.”
Wyatt says it like a statement, but when I look up at him, I see the question in his eyes.
He’s not saying it. He’s asking me. Just like he used to when we were kids and Ivy was getting sick. Or our parents were getting divorced. Or something else in our lives was going wrong. He’d look to me and ask me if it was going to be okay. If we were going to figure it out.
And as much as I want to agree with him, as much as I want to look him in the eyes and tell him yes ofcoursewe’re going to figure this out, I just can’t this morning.
Not when I’m looking at Ivy in this bed, feeling lost and confused and not knowing where to begin when trying to look for answers.
So I look Wyatt in the eyes and I say the only thing I can say that is the absolute truth.
“We’re sure as hell going to try.”
I stay at the hospital for a while longer, only leaving when I’ve been assured that Wyatt and my mom are sticking around. The nervous energy is thrumming through my veins, and I need to get to the gym to burn some of it off. Then, maybe I can head back and bring Ivy some non-hospital food.
I spend an hour at Jim’s, pushing my body as hard as I can to max out my physical limits. Shower, change, and swing by the house to grab a photo book I have from when Ivy was a lot smaller.
It was actually a gift I gave to her for her birthday—her fifth or sixth, I think—but she was too young to appreciate it at the time, so my mom told me to hang on to it and give it to her when she was older.
Today could be a great day to go through it together.
When my phone rings, I yank it out of my pocket, not looking at the screen as I go through the books I have in my study, trying to find the specific one I want to bring with me.
“This is Ben.”
“Hello, Benjamin. I’m surprised you answered.”
My focus instantly drops away from the shelves and I spin where I’m standing, as if I could turn around and look my dad in the face.
“You know, there are a lot of things I’d love to use to strangle you right now,” I say, my anger beginning to bubble up, “but that would mean I’d have to spend time looking at you while I did it, and I’d rather not.”
He laughs. The motherfucker’s daughter is in the hospital, and he’s laughing that his son wants to strangle him.
