“Sophie!” Emma jumped up and threw her arms around me. “They wouldn’t talk to us until you got here.”
“I’m so sorry. I thought I had plugged my phone in, I guess I was really tired and I just forgot—” I burst into tears, and she immediately put aside her cup to embrace me.
“Sophie, no, I don’t blame you! We could have come back to get you.” She hugged me tight. “I thought about waking you up when we left the house this morning, but I knew you needed your sleep, and I didn’t know this was going on. By the time we got here, they said you were already on your way in.”
“We need to work out a better system for contact, though,” Michael suggested pragmatically. “The only number they had on file for Emma was for New York.”
Dr. Grant came into the waiting room. His concerned expression lifted when he saw me. “Ms. Scaife. Why don’t you come with me.”
“Come on,” I told Emma and Michael, gesturing for them to follow.
Dr. Grant took us to a room that was meant to be cheery and uplifting, but the decor was fake and forced. This was the bad news room; they weren’t fooling anyone with their tasteful pastels. Emma and I took the chairs, while Michael stood behind Emma with a hand on her shoulder. She covered his fingers with her palm against her collarbone.
As clearly as a doctor possibly could, Dr. Grant explained that Neil’s fever was an indication of an infection; with no immune system to fight off sickness, even the mildest cold was enough to send him into a fatal tailspin. They’d already moved him to an isolation room.
“Okay, so what does that mean? I don’t understand. Is the transplant not working or something?” My heart was lodged between my clavicles. If the transplant didn’t work, what was the next step? Could they do an allogeneic transplant to save him? Would they find a donor in time? I would have opened my own veins and given him my cells, if I could have, but realistically, the chances of being a match were pretty slim.
“No, no. There’s no reason to believe that the transplant has failed. Not yet.” He didn’t say, “Not at all,” which was what I desperately wanted to hear.
“What are his chances, doctor? Can you at least tell us that?” Michael asked in his calm and steady voice. His arm around Emma’s shoulders made me irrationally jealous. I wanted someone to hold me. I wanted Neil to hold me. And he couldn’t.
I’d been prepared for this. It was all I’d thought of every day since the moment he’d told me that he had cancer. I thought I’d be ready to let him go...
Knowing something could happen, and living it... those were two different things. Hadn’t I already learned that, with the pregnancy?
“I don’t think it’s time to give you a percentage,” Dr. Grant said. I got a sense that he was trying to cushion a blow. “The next forty-eight hours will give us a better indication of his outcome. I’m concerned about his kidney function, as well, but until I get the results of this morning’s blood work, I simply can’t provide you with more detail. I won’t coddle you; his condition is very serious.”
Then it was bad. It was really, really bad.
“Can I see him?” Emma chewed her thumbnail the same way her dad chewed on his. My heart died a little bit more.
“He’s in isolation. You can speak to him via intercom, if he’s awake.” Dr. Grant motioned us out of the meeting room and into the hall. But I couldn’t move. I was rooted where I stood.
I wanted to see Neil. God, I wanted to see him. But now that I had the chance, I didn’t know that I could face him. Not like this.
Whatever spurs the sick urge in me to run away when things are uncertain, it was responsible for me ever having met Neil at all. And now, it made me want to run out of the hospital, out of the country, across the ocean to a life I could never have again.
But I couldn’t walk away from Neil. I hadn’t yet. Even if this was the end of the line, I was going to see it through.
“Are you coming, Sophie?” Emma asked.
I needed a moment to collect myself. “Um. You go ahead. I’ll be along in a minute.”
“Take your time,” Michael said gently. “We won’t let him get far.”
I tried to smile.
After they had gone on without me, I stood in the little meeting room with my hands clasped in front of my stomach. One thing I miss about being religious is the physical act of prayer. It used to make me feel so calm and in control. But now it would make me just feel empty and fake, so I paced the floor and tried to work out what I wanted to tell Neil. Something that would make it clear that I love him. That I would always love him. But without sounding like I was saying goodbye.