you informed.” Her gaze slid to the floor, and the entire room went still as if someone had hit the pause button. “Only time will tell if the antibiotics are working as they should. My name is Lily. If you need any more information, just ask at the desk. I’m sorry I can’t be more forthcoming.”
“Well, if all goes well, how much longer until we can go and see him?” Cole cut in. I felt weightless at this sudden change in what was happening.
“It’s touch and go at the moment, you understand.” She wrung her hands again and smiled. “Look, when we’re sure he’s stabilized, we’ll let you know. If all goes well, then we will allow a few of you in to see him.”
“Thank you.” Keith offered a hand politely.
I felt their eyes on me, and Savannah was suddenly at my side helping me to sit. “I’m sure it’s going to be all right, Sloane. We all have to think positively. John is strong, and there is no way anything is going to take him away from us.” Her defiance almost made me smile, and I took her hand but couldn’t bring myself to say anything. My throat felt as though someone was squeezing it. I just smiled a little and nodded.
“I think it’s time we called John’s parents,” Abigail said softly as she removed herself from the room.
Mike, Mark, Keith, and Cole were all huddled at the other end of the room. I wondered what they were talking about. When Cole caught me looking, he said something to Keith and left the group to join Savannah and me.
“Be strong, Sloane. That guy’s a born soldier, no fucking—” Savannah glared at him. “Oh, sorry, no damn infection is going to take him down.”
“John always said if he was going to die, it would be on his mountain,” Mike chimed in, “so not today, Satan.”
They all seemed confident. I guessed you had to be when the worst was always staring you in the face, and they’d been through a lot lately.
I couldn’t take the tick of the clock on the wall any longer. I needed to move and needed a change of scenery. The blue walls were mind-numbing. As I stood, Mike stood with me, almost as if he was watching me.
“I think I just need to go downstairs and get some fresh air.”
“Great. Me too.” Mike followed me out of the room.
I didn’t know Mike, but the few times we had spoken, he seemed kind enough, and if John liked him—well, I knew he must be a good guy. Once in the elevator, he looked down at me and smiled through his own worry.
“I hear they have really good chocolate chip muffins at the coffee stand in the lobby.”
“Oh, yeah?” I tried to be kind, but my head was with John.
“Well, Mark’s had three already, so I’m guessing they must be great.” He laughed softly, but it stopped short when the doors opened, and screams filled the tin box we were in.
“Mrs. Black?” Mike stepped forward, recognizing John’s mother. “Is everything okay?”
As I stepped around Mike’s massive body, I caught Kelly’s frantic eyes as they swung from me to Ellie, who was in the middle of a meltdown in the main lobby of the hospital.
“Sloane, thank God you’re here.” She tried to calm Ellie down. “Oliver went looking for Cole, and Ellie must have fed off our tension. We’re so worried. Have you heard anything about John? We can’t take not knowing. What happened?”
“Mike,” I quickly addressed him, “could you take Mrs. Black aside and let her know what’s going on while I talk to Ellie?”
“Of course.” He glanced at me, completely confused as to what was happening, but did as I asked and walked Kelly to a nearby table to fill her in.
“Hi, Ellie. I’m Sloane, a friend of John’s. He told me you went looking for pebbles the other day. What color were they?” I frantically searched for a memory for her and remembered hearing about this at the dinner table. I knew from past experience that brain injuries involving the temporal lobe resulted in difficulty or the inability to access long-term memories from after the accident.
Ellie whirled around, tears streaming down her face and terror in her eyes, but I could see she had heard me by the way she quieted down. Her chest heaved, and she kept clasping her hands together.
“John told me about the pebbles and how much fun he had with you. How