Grant’s hand moved to the oxygen cord under his nose. “What if I don’t wake up this time?” he struggled to get out.
Hailey glanced down at him, trying to think of the prefect response, but was relieved to find he was already asleep. She puckered her lips and blew him a kiss. “I’ll be here when you wake up,” she whispered.
It was a Saturday afternoon, and, Hailey, mentally, physically and emotionally exhausted, was way behind on her schoolwork. Final exams for seniors started on Monday, and she was struggling to prepare.
Jack checked in on her from the kitchen, and the first thing that struck him was what she was wearing. She was sitting on the couch wearing one of Grant’s shirts, a long- sleeved, light blue, button-down. Jack watched his daughter as she tried to concentrate, and, after a moment of witnessing a visibly agonizing struggle, Jack turned back to the kitchen to fix her a glass of sweet tea. When he returned, he noticed Hailey’s tears dripping onto the pages of her book as she read, and the sight broke his heart.
It occurred to him that, since the loss of their mother, this was the very first problem either of his daughters had ever had that he couldn’t solve in one way or another. Hailey and her sister had been the little ladies of his life for so long. Even as he had bounced his curly-headed baby girl on his knee, he had always known that, though she would always be the lady of his life, the day would come when he would no longer be the most important man in hers.
Jack had always been certain that the day he walked Hailey down the aisle would be the hardest day of his life. The thought of giving his little tomboy, his little daddy’s girl to another man had always scared him to death. Only now did the idea that such a joyous day would be difficult to experience with the daughter he adored seem ridiculous.
Watching his daughter now, he longed for that day; he prayed for that day…because on that day he knew that, as hard as it would be on him, Hailey would be happy. Only now did Jack know what it was to face the most difficult season of parenthood, all the while feeling sickeningly and mind-numbingly powerless. His baby girl’s heart was breaking, and there was nothing he could do about it. He took Hailey’s calculus book and placed it on the table. “Shh,” he whispered as he took her in his arms.
“Daddy,” Hailey cried, and her words were so muddled in her tears that Jack couldn’t make them all out, but he held her, and he listened. “Daddy…he just walked into my life out of nowhere…across a crowded gym he stood out for a reason I couldn’t understand. It wasn’t just a coincidence…there were hundreds of people there, yet he and I were drawn together. It was my destiny…finding him…then him coming to live here after I never thought I would ever see him again. So why…”
“I don’t know, Hailey,” Jack rubbed his daughter’s back with the consoling touch of a man who knew that no touch, no words, no matter how genuine or how full of love, could heal the pain his daughter was feeling. So, as he held her, he sent up a silent prayer, asking God to do what he couldn’t.
“Can destiny be as cruel as it is kind, Daddy?” Hailey pulled away from her father. She pulled the collar of Grant’s shirt up around her face, and she took a deep breath, taking in the sweet scent of cologne she had splashed on the collar and closing her eyes to imagine Grant there next to her.
“How about you and I go back down to the hospital?” Jack offered. “I just talked to Nora on the phone, and it looks like Grant’s not going to get to come home tonight after all.”
“It doesn’t look good does it?” Hailey wept.
Jack paused. “No, Sweetheart…it doesn’t, but…”
“Daddy,” Hailey looked to her father with the questioning eyes of a child placing utmost faith in one she perceived as all knowing, “I keep holding on to a little glimmer of hope that Grant can win this fight. Is that naïve, Daddy…is he going to die?”
“Oh Sweetheart, none of us can answer that,” Jack replied, brushing Hailey’s hair away from her face. “I can’t answer that and neither can Grant’s doctors.”
Hailey shook her head. “But without a miracle…”
Jack took a deep breath in hopes of keeping control of his emotions. “Miracles do happen, Hailey…I believe in them.”
“Me too,” Hailey gulped, with a hopeful glow. Then, her voice cracking, she cried, “I love him, Daddy.”
Jack couldn’t hold his tears back any longer, so he gave up trying. “And he loves you.” His throat burned. “That is why I know that Grant is gonna fight with all he has to try and beat this…he’s going to give it everything he’s got…because there ain’t a face on an angel in Heaven as pretty as the one waiting for him right here on Earth.”
Hailey kissed her father’s cheek, comforted, not so much by his words, but by the abundance of love behind them. “Let’s go to the hospital,” she nodded.
Grant startled awake, panting and sweaty. He looked around the dark room, finding himself alone. His mother had rarely left his side during this entire process, and Grant was sure she would be back soon, but his mind raced as he tried to shake himself from the nightmare he had been having.
“It was just a stupid dream,” he told himself aloud, hoping the sound of his own voice would transport him back to the present and banish the image he couldn’t get out of his head.
The sound of her cell phone ringing after midnight startled Joanna as she searched for it on the bedside table in the dark. It was her mother calling…something was wrong with Grant… she wouldn’t call in the middle of the night if it weren’t bad news…what would she do if her mother was calling to tell her that her baby brother hadn’t made it? Jarred alert by her own thoughts, Joanna sat up in bed and answered the phone. “Hello?” she said quickly. “Mom, is it you?”
“Joey,” an uncharacteristically small voice replied, and, despite the miles between them, Joanna could hear the tremble in her brother’s voice.
“Grant,” Joanna gulped, relieved. “Baby, what’s wrong?”
“I’m sorry I woke you up,” Grant sighed.
“Don’t be,” Joanna said calmly. “What’s going on?”
“I had a bad dream,” Grant said, and he sounded so young and so vulnerable that Joanna wanted to scoop him up in her arms and promise to check his closets and under his bed for monsters, the way she had done during visits home when he was just two, when he would crawl in bed with her swearing there were monsters but really just wanting her attention. She had never heard any real fear in his voice then…not like she did now.
Joanna moved to the edge of her bed. In the dark, she felt for her slippers. “What kind of dream?” she asked.
“They’re about Hailey,” Grant sighed, but, somehow, Joanna already knew that.
“What about Hailey?” Joanna asked.
Grant’s voice was soft. “She was sitting in a big room. She was crying …she was lonely…”
“And then what happened?” Joanna asked.
“This guy walked out to her,” Grant sighed. “He’s tall. Black hair. She stood up, and she threw her arms around him, and he started kissing her…and then I woke up.”
“Who’s the guy?” Joanna hesitated to ask.
“I don’t know,” Grant shrugged audibly. “But he’s not me!”
“Sweetie…” Joanna sighed.
“It’s not the first time I’ve had this dream, Joey,” Grant admitted. “The last time the guy had long brown hair and a Boston College t-shirt.”
