Page 172 of Broken Saint
I’m gross. I know I am, but I also don’t care enough to do anything about it. What’s the point if I don’t have him?
“Any news?” he asks, dropping into his chair on the other side of Colt.
I explain what the nurse said about his sedation and hope covers his face.
He nods, taking it all in, but he doesn’t get carried away.
“El,” he says after a few minutes of silence. “I love you, you know that, but you really need to leave this room. You need to shower, eat. I know you don’t want to. I didn’t either. But I feel so much better for it.”
I shake my head.
“Ella, come on. I’ll be right here the whole time. I’ll call if?—”
I have no idea where the sudden surge of emotion comes from—maybe it’s the thought of leaving him here, or just pure exhaustion—but a sob erupts from my throat.
“Shit,” he gasps, jumping to his feet and rushing to my side. “I didn’t mean to upset you. You don’t smell that bad, I promise.”
Somehow, I manage to laugh through my tears, and all too soon, I’ve fallen into a delusional fit of giggles for no reason at all.
I’m so lost that I don’t hear the door open or anyone join us, and it’s not until a familiar voice hits my ears that reality begins to come back to me.
I blink, trying to clear the tears from my eyes, desperate to see if what I just heard is real or a figment of my fucked-up psyche right now.
But when my vision clears, I find the exact person I was expecting.
“Mom,” I cry, rushing forward and falling into her arms.
“Hi, baby,” she whispers in my ear as she holds me as tightly as I do her.
“We’re going to give you both a moment,” Letty says before slipping back out of the door, West hot on her heels.
“Oh baby, I’m so sorry you’re going through all this,” Mom says softly as I continue to cling to her like a lifeline.
“I thought he was dead, Mom,” I cry. “I thought it was over before we…before we e-even?—”
“Shush,” she soothes, smoothing my greasy hair down.
She guides me over to the cot bed I’ve been sleeping on and we sit huddled together.
“Everything is going to be okay, Ella.” She continues to hold me as she wipes the tears from my cheeks.
“You’re really here? In Seattle?”
She chuckles. The sound is like music to my ears.
“I am.”
“But you hate traveling.”
“I do, but my girl needs me. You have some incredibly selfless friends, Ella. I’ve been flown first class and everything.”
“They’re the best,” I confirm.
“You should see the hotel suite they’ve put me up in. I’ve never seen anything like it.”
I smell a rat long before she says anything else.
“It’s got two bedrooms, and both of them have these incredible bathtubs.”