Brad
She’s just seen a ghost.
Or is listening to one.
Whatever is being said over the phone is making her turn deathly pale. I don’t know whether to give her her privacy or stay there in case she needs me.
“Oh my God. Is he o-o-o-kay?” she stammers into the phone, backing up against the fitting room mirror, leaning against it for support.
I reach out and she wraps her hand around my forearm, and I instantly grip my hand over hers.
“I’m not leaving,” I mouth to her, but it’s like she doesn’t even see me.
She’s nodding along to the long ramble coming through the phone earpiece, but I can’t quite make out the words. I’ll just have to wait.
“Okay, thank you. I…um, I’ll be there as soon as I can. I don’t know how, but I will. Please… please tell him I love him.”
She hangs up the phone and just holds it in her hand for a moment, as if she’s waiting for the phone to spring to life and tell her that it was all a dream.
Then she looks up at me, “I have to…I have to GO!” she suddenly yells and tries to push past me in the fitting room.
I’m too big and she’s rooted to the spot, her eyes dashing around, not focusing on anything, as if what’s going on in her brain is too much for her to form into words.
“Let me go! I have to go!” she yells again, dropping the phone in her panic.
She starts to bend over to pick it up, but I stop her, taking her hand and giving it a squeeze, letting her know I’m there.
“Go where, honey?” I ask, my voice soft, hoping to help calm her down enough for her to tell me what’s happening.
She yanks her hand away and presses it to her chest, a sob threatening to break out of it. “Back to London! I have to go back to LONDON NOW!”
I grab her by the shoulder and force her to look directly at me.
“Stop! Take a deep breath. You can’t help anyone if you’re freaking out. Now, what’s happened? Tell me so I can help you, Butter.”
For the first time since her phone call, I think she hears me. She closes her eyes for a moment and takes a deep breath before speaking. “He’s…he’s in the hospital. He…he was in an accident and they’re prepping him for surgery.”
“Who, baby, who?”
“Ben!” She yells at me, her hand coming up to slam against my chest, the frustration building again.
I hold her hands against me with my left hand and reach around her back with my right, pulling her against me.
“Who’s Ben, Butter?”
Her voice is muffled as her lips graze against my chest, but I can still hear her. “My baby. Ben is my son.”
***
“Dennis!” I call out as soon as I see him near the entrance of the record store. I’m holding Butter’s hand as she follows me, face ashen with worry.
“Where have you guys been? We’re about to start the signing again,” he says, ushering me toward the table.
“I can’t, I mean, we can’t…Just come over here.” I point to a quiet corner with my head. “We’ve got to go to London. Now,” I tell him.
“What, why?” my manager asks.
“Emily’s had some bad news from home and she needs to go right away.”
“What bad news?” There’s an immediate sense of concern for her in his voice, and he looks at her, her hand still clasped in mine.
“Someone in her family’s been in an accident and they’re in the hospital and she has to be there. Now,” I say, knowing he’ll understand.
“Who?”
“Her son.”
He pauses for a moment. The way I’ve seen him do a thousand times before when he’s making the chaos make sense and how he can control it.
“Go.” The relief is instant. I’m going to owe him big time after this. “The car will be here for you in a few minutes. Go outside and wait. I’ll call you with further details on how to get to London. Just go.”
“Thank you.” I nod to him and he knows how much I mean it.
He grabs my bicep and directs me toward the exit behind the CD stacks. “Go out the back entrance.”
We start to move toward the door.
“Emily?” Dennis calls out to her, and we stop as he runs up to us.
“I hope everything works out,” he offers.
She smiles at him gratefully and lets him squeeze her arm.
“Come on, let’s go.”
***
“Do you want some water?” I hand the bottle to her but she just shakes her head. “Juice?”
She shakes her head again.
“Wine? Champagne? Valium?”
“No. No. Maybe?” She gives me a little smile and I breathe a little easier.
We’re in the elevator going down to the surgical ward at King’s College Hospital from the roof’s helipad. She didn’t say a word in the car on the way to the helicopter in Cambridge, and it was too noisy on the flight to talk anyway. But I want to keep her engaged, scared she’ll disappear into herself again.
“So, what did your mother say?”
“Not much, she’s a bit of a wreck, not the greatest in a crisis. I guess I get that from her.” We move in closer as the elevator opens to let some patients on.
“We’ll be there soon. Then you’ll know everything for yourself. You can talk directly with the doctors,” I whisper, slinging my arm over her slim shoulders.
“He’s…he’s probably so scared.” Her bottom lip quivers and I realize, for all the panic, she actually hasn’t cried yet. “He’s…he’s just so little. He should have had his mother there when he went into surgery.”
“You’ll be there when he gets up.” I try to comfort her, my arm rubbing up and down her back.
“But I should’ve been there before. This wouldn’t have happened!” Her voice rises.
“What did happen? Do you want to tell me?”