Even if she never wakes up… maybe it would do her some good to have someone else here who knows her and cares about her. Someone other than me, the husband stealer. But she had a life, and for the first time in so long… I have a life, too. Yes, he’s still on the other side of the ocean, but when we talk he feels so close, and it feels as real as if he was right there beside me.
I am resting my elbows on her hospital bed and dreaming about Gabriel when the door to her room opens.
“What are you doing?” asks a man’s voice.
I jump slightly. It’s Doctor Mike.
“Oh, nothing. Just talking to the patient,” I tell him, straightening my posture and trying to act professional.
“Is that… nail polish?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.
“Just trying to do something nice for her,” I explain. “Something to cheer her up when she wakes up.”
“She’s not going to wake up,” Mike says, moving over to check her chart and glance at the machines. “She’s never going to be strong enough to get off the ventilator.”
My heart sinks. “What? Why do you say that?”
“Haven’t you been paying attention to her condition?” Mike asks. “Her lungs are getting so stiff, they’re like bricks… we’re forcing so much oxygen into them, but her body is just failing. Her heart is so weak. I think you’re in denial, Milla—you can see how bad it is.”
“We can’t be sure, can we?” I ask, feeling sick to my stomach. “Why don’t we just try to be positive?”
Mike groans. “I am always positive about my patients. But the facts are the facts. You know that. I’m usually not wrong.”
“That’s true,” I say softly.
“So you can stop wasting time with the nail polish,” he tells me as he heads for the door.
I don’t know why, but the harshness in his voice causes tears to spring to my eyes. It’s an impossible situation. As a woman, I know that she could take everything away from me if she ever breathes a single breath on her own again. But as a human being, I just want her to be okay.
I almost wouldn’t mind losing Gabe… if it means that she will be okay.
I want her to be okay so badly.
Deep down in my soul, I know that I would lose him. It’s not that I’m insecure about Gabriel’s love for me. He’s said so many things that really do make me feel like I have a special place in his heart. He’s said that he still loves Yvette, but not like one should love a wife. Whatever that means. He said he loves her like family.
I don’t understand, but I’m just trying to hold onto some hope that I’m important to him. After so little time, and never even meeting him or touching him—it’s hard. They have so much history.
But he’s said that he’s never felt about anyone the way he feels about me. Is it real? Is it bullshit? I don’t know, but I choose to believe him.
Still, I know that he also has a strong sense of duty, and that he would never abandon his sick wife waking up from a coma. And I wouldn’t want him to. I know that he’s a wonderfully kind and caring man, and that’s why I grew to love him so much, so fast. That’s why I think he would make an amazing father to our seven little dwarves, or seven days of the week.
I smile through my tears.
“Hey,” Mike says softly from the door, noticing how emotional I’ve gotten. “I’m sorry to be so cold about it, Milla. You know how doctors are, we just look at the numbers and the data instead of the people sometimes. I’ve never had great bedside manner.”
“It’s okay,” I tell him softly.
Mike moves back over to me, and places a hand on my shoulder. The touch surprises me. It’s the first time he’s ever been comforting toward me. “Look, I know you were doing a nice thing,” he says. “With the nail polish. It’s a kind gesture, Milla. You’re a good person.”
“Thank you,” I say quietly. But I don’t feel like a good person. He wouldn’t say that if he knew the whole story.
“I just don’t want you to get your hopes up,” Mike explains.
“I understand.”
“You’re doing a great job of keeping her pretty. Just save some work for the mortician.”
“Mike!” I say with annoyance.
“Sorry, sorry. It’s a bad doctor joke. I have zero sense of humor. That’s probably why my wife left me. Forgive me, Milla.”
I am so pissed at him. I turn to fix him with a death glare.
“I won’t give up on Yvette,” he promises me. “I’ll keep trying to do all I can to make her better. Did you know that she’s rich or something?”
“Oh, yeah?” I ask.
The doctor shrugs. “Her husband offered to send a private plane to take her to France to be cared for by a private doctor. That’s some rich people stuff. I looked him up, it seems like he wrote some books or something.”
A pang of pain shoots through my chest.
Gabriel never told me about any plane. I wince a little. I hate to not know something like that, but it’s a sharp stab-in-the-gut reminder that I’m not his wife, and she is. And she’s still alive.
“Why don’t you let him airlift her to France?” I ask Mike.
“Because I don’t think she’s stable enough to move. I want her here where I can keep an eye on her and help her recover. I think that if we were to try to transport her, she would die in transit. The stress of being moved around and flying is too much for her system. If she has
