In Her Eyes by Sarah Alderson (ebook reader for pc and android TXT) 📕

‘It’s not your fault,’ I force myself to say. No matter what I feel, I can’t let her think it is her fault. How will she live with it if I blame her? It will ruin her life. She will never get over it.

‘The doctors said she was OK though, right?’ Hannah asks again, her voice filled with hope.

I take a deep breath. ‘They don’t know.’ I can’t tell her the truth and prick that bubble. Not yet. Besides, if I say it out loud, then it will make it real.

I take June’s hand in mine – limp and heavy, but so warm it tricks me into thinking she’s just asleep. How can we turn off the machines? How can I kill my own child? I gave her life. I won’t give her death.

I wonder if Robert has been told yet. He was always the one who argued with the doctors when June was fighting cancer. He’d stay up all night researching the latest treatments, making calls to different specialists around the world. He was the one who went tooth and nail against the insurance company when they refused to try experimental treatments and who convinced the doctors to put her on a trial drug that eventually cured her. If he were here, he would know what to do.

‘I’m going to get some air,’ says Hannah, standing up, shakily.

‘Stay inside,’ I tell her. ‘I don’t want you leaving the hospital.’

She frowns but doesn’t ask why.

When she’s gone I clamber onto the bed beside June, careful not to disturb any of the wires and tubes invading her body. ‘Please June, wake up,’ I whisper.

The machines keep up their steady beep and the ventilator shushes me.

I close my eyes and breathe in deep but all I can smell is disinfectant and bleach. She was born in this hospital. I had high blood pressure after the birth and a nurse sat with me all night to make sure I was OK. Against all the regulations, she brought me June and laid her down in the bed beside me. We fell asleep like that and I woke the next morning and blinked in astonishment at the sight of this baby swaddled, marveling at her spider-leg lashes, her perfect rosebud mouth, stunned that Robert and I had created something so perfect.

As I lie there, the fog lifts, for just a moment, and I catch a brief glimpse of the picture I’ve been trying to grasp before it melts away again. I curl my body around June’s as I did all those years ago in a bed just like this one, and let out a wracking, soul-splitting sob. ‘My baby, my love, please keep fighting.’

Chapter 35

When I stagger out of the ICU like a zombie ten minutes later to use the bathroom and to check my phone for a message from Gene, who is still AWOL, I run into June’s friend Abby and her mom, Samantha, coming out of the elevator.

‘Ava,’ Samantha says, swooping towards me like a vulture, her arms stretched wide. I stand rigid as she pulls me in for a hug, like an animal already undergoing rigor mortis.

I’ve never liked Samantha – or Stepford as Laurie calls her – a Christian who judges people more than an Old Testament God. She’s perfectly turned out today, as always, in a crisp pink shirt, jeans and blue ballet pumps. She looks exactly how you’d picture the wife of a pastor to look, and I have a sudden, sharp impulse to hit her and wipe that condescending sympathetic smile off her face.

‘How are you?’ she asks, looking me up and down, her nose wrinkling slightly, before she rearranges her expression back into faux-sympathy.

I’m not going to tell her about June. If I have to watch her doe-eyes widen and hear her pronounce some Bible verse about the will of God or Him working in mysterious ways I will most definitely slap her.

‘It’s so awful what happened,’ she says now, resting a hand on my arm and giving it a little squeeze. ‘I hope you know that we’re all praying for you.’

My jaw clenches so hard the bone almost shatters. I want to scream at her to take her prayers and shove them up her bony ass.

‘Abby’s been on at me to visit,’ she says, still squeezing my arm with her pink talons. ‘But they told us only family are allowed in the ICU. We were about to leave but then we saw you. You know, I’ve tried calling . . .’

I stare at her blankly as she chatters on, zoning in and out, her words becoming jibberish. After a while I realize that Samantha has stopped talking and is looking at me askance. Did I miss something?

‘I was just asking about Robert,’ she says. ‘We couldn’t believe it when they arrested him. It’s so shocking. Have you seen him? Have they set a trial date yet?’

My hand clenches into a fist. I’m about to shove it in her face just to stop the questions, but right then the elevator door opens and out steps Nate. He glances in my direction but then sheepishly looks away and starts to head for the nurses’ station. I wonder what he’s back here for. Investigating? That’s a joke.

‘Nate?’ Samantha exclaims at the sight of him. ‘Oh my goodness, I thought that was you!’

Nate turns around. He looks at Sam blankly.

‘I saw you on the news the other day and I said to my husband, oh my goodness, I know him! That’s Nate Carmichael.’

Nate, frowning, takes a step towards us.

‘Sam, Samantha Bridgewater,’ Sam explains, grinning at him. ‘Or rather, I’m Sam Caskell now.’ Seeing Nate’s still-blank look, she adds, ‘We went to high school together.’

‘Oh yes,’ says Nate, forcing a smile while walking over to shake Sam’s outstretched hand. ‘I remember now. How are you doing?’

‘Great,’ beams Sam. ‘I’m doing great. This is my daughter Abby,’ she says, showing Abby off like a pedigree dog at a show. ‘She’s friends with June. That’s why